{"id":19445,"date":"2019-11-07T14:52:02","date_gmt":"2019-11-07T22:52:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cinemastance.com\/?p=19445"},"modified":"2019-11-07T14:52:02","modified_gmt":"2019-11-07T22:52:02","slug":"doctor-sleep-is-effective-but-cant-quite-escape-the-ghost-of-its-predecessor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/?p=19445","title":{"rendered":"DOCTOR SLEEP is Effective But Can\u2019t Quite Escape the Ghost of Its Predecessor"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Talk about impossible acts to follow. Stephen King\u2019s 1977\nnovel The Shining<\/em> remains one of the most popular bestsellers in horror.\nAnd although director Stanley Kubrick\u2019s 1980 film adaption may have had a few\ndetractors during its initial release (mostly due to its icy approach and some significant\nchanges made from the source material), it has grown ever more popular over the\nyears and is now considered a genuine classic of the genre. While sequels are\ncommonplace these days, few expected a new novel from King devoted to the characters,\nnor another film nearly 40 years later to update audiences on the lives of the survivors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is a difficult film to review, because I am one of\nthose critics who genuinely adores the original and feels like any sort of\nfollow-up is doomed to failure. Alas, Doctor Sleep<\/em> most certainly\ndoesn\u2019t live up its predecessor. However, it could have been much worse and\nseveral elements work quite effectively. If one keeps their expectations in\ncheck and simply goes in hoping for a decent horror picture, then they may find\nit delivering a few chills.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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In the years since the terrifying events at the Overlook\nHotel, Danny Torrance (Ewan McGregor) has grown up, but is still traumatized.\nWhen the drifting protagonist arrives in a small northeastern town, a new\nacquaintance named Billy (Cliff Curtis) tries to help him find his footing.\nDanny decides to live a more fulfilling life, taking a position at a hospice.\nHe also forms a telepathic friendship with a young girl Abra Stone (Kyliegh\nCurran), who lives far away and has the same \u201cshining\u201d gift as he does, although\nin more powerful quantities. Unfortunately, there are many more with these\npowers and some are sinister. Rose the Hat (Rebecca Ferguson) and her gang are\nundead killers who use their powers to kidnap children, torture and drain them\nof their gift to extend their own lives. After the baddies target Abra, Danny\nmust determine how he can help the girl survive the oncoming attack.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Unfortunately, the story itself involves a few flashbacks to\nthe original that have been reshot, not to mention some new bits involving\nseveral characters who have appeared in the previous film. These bits involve\nsome awkward recreations that appear artificial. Obviously, these performers\nare doing their best impersonations, but at times they feel like little more\nthan that. One supposes that this issue was unavoidable in order to tell the\nstory, but one still gets the impression that a more subtle approach or even\nvoice-overs featuring Shelley Duvall, Jack Nicholson (or a good voice\nimpersonator in the case of another character) might come across in a less jarring\nmanner. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The film also takes some time to get going and finds itself\ncutting between three different storylines which slows the pacing down early on.\nAgain, this may be due to the screenwriters adapting and following the source\nmaterial much more closely than the original film did. This feature also really\nwants to explain the unknown elements explicitly to viewers\u2026 what the \u201cshining\u201d\nis and what the souls within the Overlook Hotel were trying to do many years\nago. It does take away some of the mystique to be told that the monsters are essentially\nenergy vampires.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Still, for all of these critiques, when the movie gets\nmoving, there are some excellent thrills and chills. McGregor fares well as the\ngrown-up and tortured Danny, a man who has had to live life on the fringes\nafter the events of his childhood. There\u2019s a nice arc as he attempts to fight\nhis fears and try to do the right thing when danger approaches, even if it\nendangers himself in the process. Ferguson makes for an appropriately chilling\nand threatening foe, creating a real sense of unease when she and her band attack\neach young target. These two performers definitely smooth over and help sell\nthe material. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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And there are some very entertaining sequences when all of\nthe leads use their telepathic and supernatural gifts to try and trick and vanquish\none another. All of the action in the middle of the film is very well handled\nand there are a few good jolts courtesy of director Mike Flanagan (Oculus<\/em>,\nGerald\u2019s Game<\/em>). In particular, when the group finally meet face to face\nand come into conflict in the empty lot of a state park. These scenes are some\nof the best in the movie. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So overall, the final film is something of a mixed bag. I\ngreatly enjoyed the lead performances and thought that when the characters were\nin direct conflict, the results were pulse-pounding. However, some of the\nattempts to directly emulate aspects of the original classic didn\u2019t come off\nquite as smoothly, and the movie doesn\u2019t have the same consistently eerie\natmosphere or stand-out bits that fans continue to refer back to so many years\nlater. Taken alone as a horror movie, Doctor Sleep<\/em> is an effective\nchiller, but one that can\u2019t quite escape the ghost of its predecessor. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Talk about impossible acts to follow. Stephen King\u2019s 1977 novel The Shining remains one of the most popular bestsellers in horror. And although director Stanley Kubrick\u2019s 1980 film adaption may have had a few detractors during its initial release (mostly due to its icy approach and some significant changes made from the source material), it […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[197,5977,5978,5979,5980,7172,18035],"class_list":["post-19445","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movie-reviews","tag-197","tag-doctor-sleep","tag-doctor-sleep-film-review","tag-doctor-sleep-movie-review","tag-doctor-sleep-review","tag-ewan-mcgregor","tag-sequel"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19445","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19445"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19445\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19445"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19445"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19445"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}