Of the nine movies I've seen based on Stephen King stories, Misery is in my personal top two. When I learned that Kathy Bates had starred in another King adaptation five years later, I took interest.
As is common for King, the action occurs primarily in backwater Maine. Selena St. George (Jennifer Jason Leigh), a young reporter in New York, gets wind that her mother, Dolores, is the prime suspect in the violent death of Vera (Judy Parfitt), a wealthy yet stingy, fussy old curmudgeon who hired her as a maid. Selena and Dolores have been out of touch for so long that Dolores does not recognize her daughter by sight, but Selena sticks around because she doesn't share her mom's seeming confidence in an acquittal, not least because the lead detective (Christopher Plummer) thinks Dolores got away with murder 20 years ago -- that of her abusive husband (David Strathairn). Between numerous flashbacks and reports, we and Selena gradually learn which allegations are true and which aren't.
Despite her crazed, familiar appearance in the opening scene, Dolores doesn't have much in common with Annie Wilkes from Misery. She does not project sweetness or piety by default to obscure a dark side; she is bitter, rude, and unashamed of it. I often thought of Mildred in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, except that I find Dolores easier to sympathize with. Her actions (I won't tell you which) seem more vindicated by the various jerks in her life, and her behavior toward Selena isn't so bad.
Apart from the setting, there aren't any obvious King cliches herein. Nothing paranormal happens, though a solar eclipse shows off good effects for the time. No one gets hit by a vehicle. No one has warped ideas of what God expects of them. A throwaway line mentions Shawshank Prison, but that was the only cross-novel reference that I noticed.
While Wikipedia summarizes DC as a psychological thriller, it only occasionally feels like a thriller. Few scenes, mostly in flashbacks, involve violence or the threat thereof, and the violence never lasts long. Very little blood is visible. Mainly I see it as a hard-edged drama, bordering on neo-noir, with a focus on Selena deciding what to make of her troubled and troublesome mother.
It's worth noting that the director, Taylor Hackford, and screenwriter, Tony Gilroy, next worked together on The Devil's Advocate. That, too, was more uncomfortable drama than thriller to me. Both films touch on teen sexual molestation, and DC manages to be more disturbing about it yet.
DC doesn't crack the top five King features for me, but I respect it all the same. You can tell that talent went into it from pretty much all directions. I just wish it were a different kind of tale.
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