Better than "Into the Wild" could ever dream... The Mist.

The Mist, directed by Frank Darabont (of Shawshank Redemption fame) is so much better than it's being given credit for. In fact, the only thing actually working against this film is a few scenes of mediocre CGI, but the poor CGI is ultimately canceled out by some (in particular one giant) instance of CGI glory. However, this film shines because its CGI creatures are NOT the stars of the film. Wouldn't you know it, the HUMAN ACTORS are what prop this film up with excellence. It's a horror film that is not catering to pre-teens and torture fetishists, that manages to be entertaining in a way that doesn't require it to be so bad it's funny.

Hearing about The Mist before it arrived in theatres, I wasn't exactly counting down the days: Another adaptation of a Stephen King novel, and this one's about sinister mist... No Country for Old Men should be out soon! But NO, Frank Darabont, an actually credible director, was not gonna go down like that (i.e. The Grudge, Hostel II, shit etc. etc.). He deserves major kudos for the screenplay and his almost documentary like shooting. The film also has a pretty unobtrusive film score. The composer has the rare gift of understanding the benefit of silence. We don't need music to tell us when to be scared.

When the preview rolled around, my senses were perked by the presence of Thomas Jane. Thomas Jane is sorely underused these days, and even though The Mist is inexplicably getting lame reviews by upscale snooty film reviewers, as well as performing rather poorly at the box office, I like to think that someone who has power in the industry could see this film and recognize the quality acting going on, especially from T. Jane.

Unlike what the preview suggested, the actual mist in the film looks excellent, and slithers creepily and realistically over the small New England town. Had the filmmakers desired it, and had they balls that huge, the creepiness of the film could have been sustained by the mist alone. Of course unraveling human psyches barreling down the path of sociopathic religious hysteria never fails to create an uncomfortable and dangerous environment. Marcia Gay Harden plays her best role in years as the town batshit-crazy religious zealot. She is indeed a villain you don't have a warm spot for, and that's refreshing. A wiser choice than her embarrassingly awful and cliche roles in Into the Wild and The Invisible, two of the worst films I've seen so far this year.
The central child in the film, Jane's son, is not annoying or meant to be abnormally intelligent or creepy, which is also refreshing. No one trapped in the grocery store is portrayed as particularly remarkable, including Jane's character, who is more or less the hero of the film. Anything goes when everyone in the room is just a regular joe who simply wanted a few nonperishable goods to store in the house after a nasty storm. The fun of these disaster survival movies is being able to relate to the characters, and in your mind play out the way you would personally react to each situation.

The ongoing battle between religion/hysteria and science/rationale is played out between the increasingly divided store patrons. Sure, some points are cliche and some of the characterizations come off as over the top, but you can't really say that it's an ultimately dishonest display. One character, whom I shall refer to as Capote II, sums up one of the main commentaries in the film when he states, and I'm paraphrasing, that if you put more than one person in the room they'll immediately take sides and then think of reasons to kill one another. Why do you think we invented politics and religion? Amen to that. Of course another reason to start killing each other out of fear could simply be government experimentations that cause a portal tear into a sinister otherworld that spills over uncontrollably into our own. Simply a theory. Life affords us so many possibilities.