The Doctor Is In

It was about a year ago (or a decade ago, in COVID time) that I was reading Stephen King's The Shining for the first time, and speculating that I might want to read the sequel, Doctor Sleep before seeing its then-upcoming movie adaptation. It didn't work out that way. I still might want to read the book some day, but I did watch the movie.

I come to this movie from a perhaps unusual place. Many people revere Stanley Kubrick's movie adaptation of The Shining; I'm not one of them. Neither was my reaction to it tainted because Stephen King himself reportedly hates it. I'm basically a heretic to both sides of this fan feud: I thought The Shining was a pretty middle-of-the-road horror movie.

What I find amusing in all that is that (in film form, at least) Doctor Sleep barely feels like a sequel to The Shining. It all builds to a climax at the Overlook Hotel (more on that in a moment), but it's otherwise a pretty independent story, about being haunted by psychic abilities and tormented by evil creatures. It fits as a Shining sequel, but I'm not even sure The Shining would be required viewing to "prep" for this movie.

So, setting comparisons aside, I did like the neat tightrope this movie managed to walk between the fantastical and the grounded. Ewan McGregor is the perfect lead actor to make you feel the real-world weight of battling alcoholism, struggling with PTSD, and facing trauma. (Not that this performance is anything like his breakout role in Trainspotting, but it feels like there's a connective tissue there.) That these real-world troubles issues have supernatural origins in this tale is beside the point.

There are exceptional child actors in the movie too. Kyleigh Curran doesn't have many film credits on her resume, but I'd say she deserves a bunch based on her work here. It would be spoiling too much of the plot, I think, to highlight the things she's called on to do in this movie, but she's great throughout. There's also Jacob Tremblay -- a more known young actor, and in a surprisingly small role here -- but he makes a big impact.

The movie also has great villains. Rebecca Ferguson is the ringleader of an unusual and vaguely defined gang. (The book might say more about it, but I'd bet not much.) She's a potent blend of seduction and menace. She's surrounded by half a dozen other goons, many played by recognizable character actors, who remain unsettling throughout the movie.

The musical score is a distinct creation of its own, compelling and fitting to the movie and yet nothing I'd ever want to own the soundtrack to. (It's dominated by a heartbeat rhythm that's as much sound effect as musical composition.) The visuals are often compelling and unusual, with strange camera placements and prominent color choices.

But you can only set aside comparisons for so long. This movie is a Shining sequel, and really embraces this in its final 30 minutes. Yet it's an odd embrace: gimmicky yet appropriate, predictable yet thrilling. That the movie ends where and how it does really doesn't make sense plot-wise, and is really the only way that it could end thematically. My understanding is there is some odd friction here in trying to please Stephen King; the book Doctor Sleep is an explicit sequel to his Shining book, deliberately rejecting changes made in the movie version. Writer-director Mike Flanagan had to really thread the needle to reconcile the differences and please Stephen King. He did (reportedly), but I can't help but feel that some of the strangeness (which I don't want to spoil) is a telltale sign of these adaptation issues.

Still, Stephen King stories are often known for their weak endings, and I think the ending of this movie is a fair amount better than some in the King novels I've read. Certainly, it doesn't detract from what I enjoyed about the rest of the movie. I'd give Doctor Sleep a B+. Some day, I might make time to read the original book. Until then, at least, I'll hold this movie in fairly high esteem.