Mike Flanagan just proved with Netflix’s Midnight Mass that Stephen King finally has his perfect director. King’s 2013 novel Doctor Sleep acts as a sequel to his iconic ’77 work The Shining in which an adult Danny Torrance meets a young girl with psychic abilities named Abra, and he tries to protect her from a group of murderous paranormals hunting after her. Ewan McGregor starred in Doctor Sleep as Danny Torrance alongside Kyliegh Curran as Abra, Rebecca Ferguson as villain Rose the Hat and Henry Thomas replacing Jack Nicholson as Jack Torrance.
Doctor Sleep was a critical success, scoring rave reviews for its mixture of Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation of The Shining with King’s source novel to the performances of its cast. Despite the strong reception, the sequel’s box office performance was considered a disappointment, grossing just $72 million worldwide against its estimated budget of $45 million, while fellow 2019 King adaptations IT Chapter Two and the Pet Sematary remake performed much better. Those familiar with Flanagan’s career prior weren’t surprised at Doctor Sleep‘s positive critical reception, especially following his acclaimed adaptation of King’s 1992 novel Gerald’s Game.
Long considered unfilmable, Flanagan turned it into one of the best adaptations of any of King’s works and a terrific film in its own right. With Flanagan’s latest series at Netflix – which they recently, accidentally spoiled – Midnight Mass, he not only confirms his status as an auteur within the horror genre but also the ultimate director for King’s bibliography.
Why Midnight Mass Feels So Much Like A Stephen King Adaptation
Midnight Mass is set on the small community of Crockett Island as outcast Riley Flynn returns following a prison sentence for the death of a woman in a drunk driving incident. His return coincides with the arrival of the mysterious Father Paul Hill, who arrives to temporarily replace the town’s aging monsignor, but he brings with him seemingly miraculous events. These “miracles” send the town into a religious fervor but also hint at a sinister secret behind Father Paul’s arrival.
The general concept may sound like a King adaptation because a number of its themes and characters take similar trajectories to the author’s works, including King’s 1991’s novel Needful Things or 2014’s Revival. The former focused on the titular shop opening in King’s favorite Maine setting of Castle Rock that offered customers their deepest desires in exchange for committing various deeds, all of which build up to an eruption of chaos in the community. The latter finds a young musician returning to his New England town to find its disgraced former preacher has become a prolific faith healer utilizing electricity experiments to cure many, though he comes to learn of the occultism the healer is using in his treatments.
As with many filmmakers, Flanagan is no stranger to having projects fail to get off the ground and a cancelled adaptation of King’s Revival is one of his most famous unmade projects. Midnight Mass feels like a culmination of his drive to get the film made, though substituting the Lovecraftian spectacle the book becomes for meditations on existentialism and religion. They’re themes Flanagan has explored time and again and yet, much like King’s frequent reflections on greed or addiction, he consistently finds new ways to dive into these subjects.
Protagonist Riley also feels like the prototypical lead in a King story. Haunted by a tragic past, not quite seeking redemption though not looking to remain reviled by his community and fighting against his addictions, Riley is a character well-known to readers of King’s work. Outspoken about his own struggles with drugs and alcohol, King has channeled this conflict through a number of his heroes, with everyone from Jack and Danny Torrance to Under the Dome‘s Dale Barbara or Bag of Bones‘ Mike Noonan.
Flanagan has also opened up about his struggles with some form of substance abuse in the lead up to Midnight Mass‘ release, revealing he has been sober for the past three years and citing the series as incredibly personal to him for that reason. In the same vein as King, the director has processed his own sobriety battle and existentialist fears into Flynn, essentially creating a stand-in for himself onscreen. The show’s creator has also noted the series has been in the works for over a decade, debunking any claims of it being a beat-by-beat adaptation of King’s Revival.
Why So Many Stephen King Adaptations Fail
Throughout the years, King’s bibliography has reached screens in a variety of formats, from movie franchises to miniseries. Unlike the majority of his books, the critical reception to these adaptations has ranged from the Oscar-nominated Carrie to the notorious Maximum Overdrive. These divisive responses have targeted performances, direction or visual effects, but the one thing even some of the better-received efforts have received criticism for is lack of proper translation of the author’s voice.
King’s works are known for their more contemplative narratives and inner dialogue – the former of which is difficult enough to translate let alone when paired with the latter. In their efforts to translate this stream of consciousness to the screen, writers and directors end up losing the deeper nuances of King’s writing. Additionally, many adaptations find themselves rushing by eliminating these pensive moments by getting right into the action.
The latter is another problem of many Stephen King adaptations, as they often seek to ramp up tension and terror by blowing up minor moments or adding sequences that take away from the original themes or character development. Arguably the biggest issue with a lot of King adaptations is the deviations from the source material, which far too often loses the intention of the author’s work. There’s no denying Kubrick’s The Shining from 1980 is a haunting film, but his changes to the devolution of the Torrance family or Jack’s struggles with alcoholism – a theme close to King’s personal life – is a detriment in its quality for fans of the novel. King’s The Dark Tower books were adapted into a 2017 movie that has become another infamous effort for its bland compression of the source material that seemed uncertain of who to consider its audiences — newcomers or longtime fans.
Mike Flanagan Understands Stephen King’s Voice Perfectly
In just two adaptations of the author’s work, Flanagan has shown he has a clear understanding of King’s voice. While doing press for the Gerald’s Game adaptation Flanagan spoke to The Independent, calling himself a “Stephen King fanatic” and revealed he had wanted to adapt it into film since he was 19, even when he believed it to be “unfilmable” due to over 300 pages being its central character’s inner thoughts while handcuffed to a bed. Yet, despite this storytelling challenge, he stayed true to the King’s work and its themes.
If the difficult nature of Gerald’s Game – including the now-infamous hand scene – wasn’t enough, Flanagan’s tackling of Doctor Sleep was the most unenviable task as he had to decide whether to adapt the novel as a faithful sequel to King’s novel or Kubrick’s iconic film. Ultimately, he took the middle road and blended the two disparate worlds to great effect, with King praising the film for redeeming the parts of The Shining film he hated. The biggest reason Flanagan’s movie workied so well is its authentic approach to exploring both novels’ themes of alcoholism and trauma.
More so than Gerald’s Game, Doctor Sleep offered proof to critics and audiences of Mike Flanagan’s abilities to expertly adapt Stephen King’s works to screen and Midnight Mass has now offered displayed his grip on the writer’s voice. Though currently at work on an adaptation of The Midnight Club for Netflix, hopefully, the filmmaker will find his way back to King’s bibliography for another adaptation soon.
