Let’s Watch a #Horror Movie…1408

Every month I get together with my horror-loving friends and live-tweet a scary movie. Because it’s more fun with friends. This month I will be watching the 2007 psychological horror movie 1408, based on the Stephen King story of the same title.

If you haven’t read the story…do. I love it! Super creepy and weird and mind warping fun! You can find it in one of his anthologies.

The cover of Everything’s Eventual: 14 Dark Tales, published in 2002 by Scribner.

The movie is pretty different than the written version. The main story is the same, just amped up a bit. When making a short story, rather than a full novel, into a movie there’s a bit of  room to play, to expand the story, to add depth to the main character. Not to make it better, just bigger.

1408, directed by Mikael Hafstrom, screenplay by Matt Greenberg, Scott Alexander, and Larry Karaszewski welcomes us to The Dolphin Hotel in New York City.

2007 movie poster

Meet Mike Enslin. Author. He investigates haunted locations and writes about them. Mike Enslin. Cynic. Skeptic. He’s writing to pay the bills, but doesn’t believe in the supernatural.

Played by John Cusack, Mike Enslin with his handy recorder, getting settled in his room. From the 2007 movie 1408.

Welcome, Mike…to room 1408.

Scene from the 2007 movie 1408.

He received a postcard holding an image of The Dolphin Hotel and the words “Don’t enter 1408.” written on it. A challenge. So he booked the room. Though the hotel manager Gerald Olin worked hard to talk him out of it… the room isn’t haunted, it’s evil.

Samuel L. Jackson as the hotel manager Gerald Olin in the 2007 film 1408

56 people have died there, beginning with a wealthy businessman jumping from the window.

Scene from the 2007 movie 1408

No one has stayed in the room longer than an hour.

Scene from the 2007 movie 1408

The room soon takes over.

Scene from the 2007 movie 1408

The walls. The phone. The artwork. The room temperature. Mike begins to lose his mind.

Scene from 2007 film 1408

He begins to question his life. And we learn that he lost his child, Katie.

Scene from 2007 movie 1408 Mike Enslin played by John Cusack and Katie played by Jasmine Jessica Anthony

What the movie gives us that the written story did not was this tale of grief, of letting go. The room is evil, haunting him with the fear that his child still needs him, that she isn’t okay.

Join me on Twitter for the live-tweet of 1408 on Friday, May 19th at 9 EST. Use #1408Movie and add your thoughts and reactions.