The Mist could have been a fantastic, 80-minute B movie – it certainly has the appropriately shlocky special effects – if it weren’t directed by Frank “Stephen King” Darabont. Once again, Darabont tries to make an “important” picture out of King material. As a group of neighbors find themselves marooned in a grocery store while a mysterious mist envelops them, Darabont provides a few good Boo! moments. But mostly he tries to inflate the horror trappings with ham-fisted commentary about the thin veneer of civilization, the nature of bravery and the evils of religion (Marcia Gay Harden is especially grating as a Bible-toting doomsayer). Darabont hasn’t made a film since his Jim Carrey dud The Majestic in 2001, and The Mist is clearly his commercial bid to get back in the game. At two talky hours, though, The Mist isn’t commercial enough.
