Category Archives: Frank Darabont

1994, Academy Award Nominees, Bob Gunton, Clancy Brown, Drama, Frank Darabont, Morgan Freeman, Prison, The Shawshank Redemption, Tim Robbins, Top 10 Movie of 1994, William Sadler

The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

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Remember, hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.

Wrongly accused of murdering his wife and her lover, Andy Dufresne (Tim Robbins – Jacobs Ladder, Mystic River), a young, successful vice president of a major bank, is sentenced to serve back to back life sentences in Shawshank State Penitentiary never gets too down in his circumstances, even though he will spend out his days behind bars. In contrast, his wife’s killer roams the streets free. The legendary fiction horror writer Steven King (The Shining, The Mist) introduced himself to a new kind of audience with this quiet and underrated (at its release) The Shawshank Redemption, a film that is nothing like Pet Semetary, IT, Cujo, Misery, Needful Things, Christine, Thinner, Carrie, Firestarter, Children of the Corn or a host of his other adapted horror novels adapted for film. The Shawshank Redemption is the complete opposite of a horror film. It is the crowning achievement of director Frank Darabont’s (The Green Mile, The Mist) career, a movie that has been the highest-rated movie on the International Movie Database (IMDB) in the history of its website. Continue reading The Shawshank Redemption (1994) →

2007, Andre Braugher, Frank Darabont, Hidden Gems, Horror, Laurie Holden, Marcia Gay Harden, Small Town, The Mist, Thomas Jane, Toby Jones, William Sadler

The Mist (2007)

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The best film adaptation of a Stephen King horror novel since the 1980s, The Shining, is not classics like Misery, Cujo, Pet Sematary, 1408, Christine, Firestarter, Thinner, or even IT (who seemingly everyone not named me seemed to love). Instead, it is the 2007 Frank Darabont’s (The Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile) The Mist, a creepy dark tale that haunts your mind as much after its viewing that it does during it. King’s adaptations are hit, or miss and all of the ones mentioned above (except for IT) are ones that I enjoyed and would watch on multiple occasions. But there is both a plot and a suspense factor with The Mist that is like nothing I’ve seen before. I will also say that The Mist is the best Stephen King book I’ve ever read (granted, I’ve only read five or six), and it is one of the best adaptations of a film made from a book that I’ve read before (again, granted there had not been many of those). Recently, I started watching the Netflix show based on the book/movie. While not nearly as good as the book or the movie, Netflix did the show right. I don’t know if there was a need for the show, but I’m glad that they did it right since they went that route. Basically, everything about The Mist is fantastic. I wish I could say the same about a movie like The Fog, one of the worst horror films I’ve ever seen. But I digress. Continue reading The Mist (2007) →

1999, Barry Pepper, Bonnie Hunt, David Morse, Drama, Fantasy, Frank Darabont, James Cronwell, Michale Clark Duncan, Mystery, Science Fiction, The Green Mile, Tom Hanks, Top 10 Movie of 1999

The Green Mile (1999)

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The Green Mile was Frank Darabont’s (The Mist, The Majestic) first movie following The Shawshank Redemption, a riveting prison movie that has found a permanent spot on many critics and movie fan’s top ten of all-time lists. The expectations were high for The Green Mile, if not altogether unrealistic. Like The Shawshank Redemption, this movie was set almost exclusively in prison. Like The Shawshank Redemption, this movie was based on a Stephen King novel. Like The Shawshank Redemption, this movie was set somewhere in middle America, reasonably close to the time frame of World War I, though neither of these movies ever really talks about any war. The Green Mile was set in 1932, while The Shawshank Redemption was set in 1946. The expectations for The Green Mile might have been unrealistic. I say this because of the reasons mentioned above, but also because it starred Tom Hanks (Forrest Gump, Philadelphia), Hollywood’s #1 leading man at the time, who was fresh off of receiving his 5th Academy Award Nomination for Best Actor after his performance in Saving Private Ryan. While The Green Mile is not as good as The Shawshank Redemption (my favorite film of all time, at the time of this review), it is still an incredible movie that everybody should see at least once.

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