Doctor Sleep
Doctor Sleep may be based on the recent Stephen King novel, a sequel to his own The Shining from 1977, but it’s more precisely a follow-up to the 1980 Stanley Kubrick film, which diverged considerably from King’s original book.
The horror novelist’s dislike aside, the Kubrick is a masterpiece of design, film language and acting. Doctor Sleep is not a ground-breaking masterpiece, but it is a fine example of suspense craftsmanship and a remarkably intelligent blend of elements from King and Kubrick. It doesn’t require fond recollection of the movie The Shining, but it certainly pays off more handsomely for those who do recall the original.
After revisiting the telepathically powerful Danny, his mom Wendy, and their ally Mr. Hallorann back in 1980 (played by actors closely matched to the Kubrick cast), the main plot picks up with a grown Danny (Ewan McGregor). He’s now an alcoholic trying to get his life together in a small New England town, using his psychic powers only to assist the patients at the hospice where he works. (They call him “Doctor Sleep.”) Then he’s contacted by a teenage girl named Abra (Kyliegh Curran) who has gifts that far outstrip Danny’s. Abra has discovered an evil coven of the supernaturally powerful who feed off the torture and murder of psychic children — and who soon target Abra.
Danny is the only connection to The Shining in King’s Doctor Sleep. But in the movie, the haunted Overlook Hotel, where Kubrick’s film took place, is still around, and it’s inevitable that Danny and Abra and Rose the Hat — the leader of the parasitic coven — should wind up there.
Rebecca Ferguson makes a mesmerizing Rose, a beautiful and merciless woman who doesn’t age and doesn’t believe anyone has powers greater than her own. Ferguson appears charismatic and heartless with no need to chew up the scenery. McGregor humanizes Danny’s dilemmas with his usual warmth and vulnerability, and Curran is quite a find as Abra. The supporting cast is a rich assortment of character actors, including Carl Lumbly doing an admirable Scatman Crothers impersonation.
Ewan McGregor is Danny Torrance in Doctor Sleep.
The most valuable player, though, is writer-director Mike Flanagan, who reportedly talked King into letting him rewrite Doctor Sleep to incorporate the Kubrickian elements. And they are almost all there: the music, the Big Wheel, the scary sisters, the carpeting, the ballroom, the hedge maze, Room 237, a man calling himself Grady (played by Henry Thomas from E.T.), and so on. They’re lovingly and accurately recreated and seamlessly merged into King’s story (which was a bit shaggy and bloated on the page).
Doctor Sleep is a taunt supernatural story with a few splashes of gore — Jacob Tremblay has a small role as a viciously brutalized Little Leaguer — but it’s more thriller than horror film. Once the chase begins, the tension doesn’t waver, and Flanagan ratchets it up with economy (despite the 151-minute length). A number of visual effects are effectively rendered, but Flanagan never piles on the CG nor belabors the confrontations. In the spirit of King, this is character-driven storytelling.
Flanagan can’t recreate Kubrick’s incredible mastery of space and time, and the Overlook sets haven’t the grandeur of 1980’s The Shining, perhaps because the hotel is now rotting and perhaps because the use of CG pales in contrast to Kubrick’s entirely practical effects. But as a work of fan homage — honoring both King and Kubrick equally — Doctor Sleep is another kind of achievement: a good, old-fashioned scary movie with characters you believe and a fully satisfying ending.
Grade: A-minus. Rated R. Playing at the AMC River Hills, Carolina Cinemark, and Regal Biltmore Grande.
(Photos: Warner Bros.)
A scene from Doctor Sleep meticulously recreates the same scene from Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining.
