Stephen Kings "Dark Tower" Film/TV Series

King also mentioned that he wants to write himself out of the final books, wishes he didn't do that to begin with. Some parts of the last 3 novels were disappointing. He even admitted that he rushed to finished them after recovering the accident that almost killed him. Blame it on staring his own mortality in the face.

 

I was really disappointed in this movie.

The whole thing was super rushed. 94 minutes is a travesty.

No mention of Eddie or Odetta.

This should have been at least 3 movies like the Hobbit was.

 

Re: the short run time - someone online said it had ten minutes devoted to credits, so only 84 or 85 for the actual film/plot. However, I don't know if that's actually true.

Someone else said that the movie felt like the cliffnotes version of The Dark Tower. From the half dozen or so reviews I've watched and read, that seemed accurate. I don't want to sound like I'm slamming a film I haven't seen, I'm just trying to wrap my head around having such a condensed story.

 

It's true.

That was me. A poorly interprted Cliffs Notes version at that. Like someone who did a book report but really didnt read all the material so they made stuff up.

I really don't understand the decisions made here. Wasn't this supposed to launch a franchise with a couple more films and TV series to fill in the backstory? Then why wrap it all up in 85 minutes? It's as if Frodo makes it to Mordor and chucks the ring in in less than an hour and a half.

 

Wait. This was supposed to be just the very first chapter in what was to be a longer story. Right? Why would you expect the whole story to be told in this first installment?

 

I didnt expect the whole story to be told in the first film and didnt want it.

My problem with it was too much was told with barely any thought to the narrative. This film took us from beginning to end pretty much as I previously posted using the LotR as an example. If you're going to continue the series why end the first LotR movie where Frodo takes the ring all the way back to Mordor? Or have Harry Potter defeat Voldemort in the first film and fill in the blanks later? All in under 90 minutes. Idiotic choices.

 

I don't think Matthew played The Man in Black as he is written. I thought they should have started the movies/tv show with the Wizard and glass story.

 

They should have started with The Gunslinger but in this go round makes the decision to save Jake.

 

I have not seen the film but the poor reviews have made headlines in director Nikolaj Arcel’s native country Denmark. He has written and/or directed a number of successful and award winning movies in Europe and been nominated for both an Oscar and Golden Globe award. I guess the transition to big Hollywood projects can be tough.

 

Just saw it a couple of days ago (in a nearly-empty theater in LA), and I thought it sucked. I loved the books, and I think 90% of the changes they made for the film were bad ideas. Some seemed arbitrary (no real spoilers): Jake is no longer from the 1970s, his parents aren't wealthy, and now he has great affection for his mother; the doorways to other dimensions apparently have to be run with 2400-baud modems and a DOS computer keyboard; and Roland the gunslinger has "forgotten the face of his father." There's so many arbitrary and silly changes, I got the strong impression most of the audience members had no clue what was going on much of the time.

I think they simplified and dumbed down quite a bit of the story, but also added some odd ideas, like giving The Man in Black (aka Matthew McConaughey) magic powers, which he didn't exactly have in the books. The whole thing was a mish-mash that went all over the place. It's also rare that I say this, but they needed about $100 million more in the budget and and another hour of screen time to cover the first installment.

Currently 16% on Rotten Tomatoes, and I can see why.

 

We took my daughter to see the Emoji movie this weekend and some teenage girls where in line to see the Dark Tower. The Emoji movie was something like and hour and 42 minutes. I thought it was odd seeing the girls leaving the theater around the same time! I thought it would be a 2.5 hour flick at least.

 

I don't think that's exactly fair, but I would concede there's some weird, sloppy writing here and there in the books. I think they're still very entertaining and engaging, but some stuff kind of peters out, is never explained, or just runs out of steam a satisfying conclusion. As long as the scenes resonate with the reader and tell a story with compelling characters, everything else is just detail.

I think if the film had ended with the kid dying, it would have been so profoundly depressing for audiences, they wouldn't have been able to handle it. The fans understand that the characters' fates are a lot more complex than just one simple death, but making that understandable in one film would be nearly impossible.

I suspect this is the only film for which they could get a decent budget and actually get it made. I think the should've started with The Drawing of the Three and show how Roland meets Jake, Detta, Eddie, and Oy, and then end with a violent battle with The Man in Black... until the next time. But that would've easily taken 3 hours and double the budget to tell.

 

As critical as I can be of King's epic, I really love most of the first five books and think Wizard is one of his very best stories. Plus, he really doesn't give a crap about traditional fantasy "world-building" and we end up with stuff like Blaine the Mono that is so utterly nuts that you don't know quite how you can take it seriously and retain any self respect. But I remember Blaine long after I've forgotten all but a handful of George Martin's hundreds of Game of Thrones bit players.

And I couldn't agree more that they should have started with the second book. If they needed to keep it under two hours they could have made a dynamite action movie of just the Eddie section and included enough of the back and forth to the beach stuff to get the fantasy rolling, ending with the two of them seeing another door on the horizon.

Sadly, we'll probably never see that world on screen.

 

Hell, I didn't much like it that Jake died (again) in the book...or Eddie, for that matter.

The "Eddie" section in Drawing Of The Three -particularly the sequence on the airplane- is probably my favourite part of the whole Dark Tower series- definitely worthy of a film version IMO!

As for the film we got, I so wanted to see it, and wanted it to be good, but now I really can't be bothered, given what I've heard/read about it...not even downloading the damn thing and watching it for free.

 

Just saw it; heh, thought it was OKAY. I mean, are we talking spoilers in here? I liked Idris and McConaughey but the story was so damn condensed.

But, LAGERTHA! (Katheryn Winnick from Vikings). Once I recognized her, what a nice surprise.

Also was happy to see my favorite Indian restaurant, Dhaba, and its also recognizable neighbor, Pongal.

Would have preferred a more all-inclusive multi-movie epic that could breath a little.

DADA-CHUM!

Edit to add: I could see how one who hasn't read the books and has no prior connections with the story and characters would find it to completely suuuck.

 

Went to see this last nite & walked-out about 30 minutes in. And it takes a pretty bad movie to make me do a walk-out. What a complete & utter crock of ####. I'd rather chew rocks than go through those 30 minutes again...

 

Thanks guys. I was thinking about going to the theater to see it, but it seems the movie isn't even worth a rental. 90 minutes and 8 euros saved.

I owe you.

 

I knew this film would be doomed the second I read Eddie Dean wouldn't be it. In the books, the story doesn't really come alive until he is introduced. Also, Aaron Paul would have been perfect to have played him.

 

Man, that is a superb casting idea. Good choice.

 

Just watching this. Ugh. Let's turn surreal, gritty Stephen King into "Tomorrowland"

 

It's back on again!

Amazon Casts The Gunslinger and The Man in Black in Their DARK TOWER Series Adaptation

My wounds are still raw from that mess of a film with Idris Elba. One of the most painful films I ever had to endure. Devastating from one who read the series at least 4 times.

 

I'm really hoping they get this series right. The Dark Tower is such an interesting, unique series and it deserves a great adaptation. From the language in the article (the show will focus on how Roland became a gunslinger) and the relatively young age of Sam Strike (25), it seems like they are going to start with Wizard and Glass.

I'm a massive Stephen King fan and we have seen that he can be adapted to screen brilliantly. It just takes the right creative team. A series makes much more sense for The Dark Tower than a film ever did.

 

I finally caught up to the movie this week on Hulu. Oh. My. Lord. It’s been a while since I read the books but this wasn’t anything remotely like what I remembered. Hands down the worst King film I have ever seen, and there’s a lot of competition. The film is so altered and condensed that I doubt people that haven’t read the book would understand what was going on, and if you HAD read the book you would be pissed off at it. It’s a film with no audience. I’m fine with taking liberties with the text to adapt books to screen, but this was a complete and total travesty.

 

Agree with every word. The books (which were by no means perfect) told the story of a Gunslinger. This travesty of a movie told the story of...Jake. Who the hell wants to watch a movie about Jake

 

This amazon version looks like could be really, really good. If it would go on for several seasons.