1408

1408 is about Mike Enslin (John Cusack). Mike is a writer who goes around to hotels that claim to be haunted and tests them. He was once a promising writer before a personal tragedy caused him to abandon his life and begin the one on which he is engaged. One day he receives a simple postcard from "The Dolphin Hotel" with a simple imperative scrawled on the back - "don't enter 1408." Mike laughs at the 'tactic' that is clearly being used on him and even the quaintness that the numbers add up to 13. He researches the room and finds plenty of ghastly murders and decides this is a perfect new chapter to his book. Eventually Mike gets into the room and the horror begins.

If you weren't aware this is a horror film. There is not much more than that. Set up and then scare, its been working for years, so why change a good formula. I desperately wanted to like this film. I really did. I didn't want another negative mark. And for about an hour or so I did like the movie. It has a few jolt you from your seat moments and some genuinely creepy moments and some neat effects. I wished they would cut back on some of the flashier stuff and play up the suspense and tension but not so much I was taken out of the film. That was saved for a moment late in the film. Its a fake out (one you can see coming early on), I saw the seeds laid and I hoped, I prayed they wouldn't do it, that they had just put that scene in to make you think they were going to do it (can anyone follow that?).

Needless to say my prayers were not answered. After that things get bigger and more showy but not scary. If the fake out was cheap, the end is bargain bin cheap. Performances? Well, Cusack as always is entertaining to watch. Sam Jackson has a few ultimately pointless but well acted scenes trying to convince Cusack not to rent the room. And well, that's it really. I don't have much to say about this film. It started well enough and crapped out by the end but maybe I just wanted a better movie. I'd probably watch it again if I found it on free cable (the first half at least).

Rory

A Response:

I should start by saying I've never been what one may term a Horror Movie Fan. They just don't do it for me. I mean, a few of them do. But most of the time I find myself disappointed. There are even horror movies I'll admit are skillfully made but - personally, and personally only - they leave me hollow. Yet, I don't think a lot of them are skillfully made. Any director can couple a door opening with a loud piano chord and make you jump, right?

So is 1408 a typical horror movie or is it something else? Well, I think it has an inkling to be something more. I think it wants to work on more of a psychological level. Or maybe it just wants us to think it works on more of psychological level. You're totally right, Rory, in that as it progresses it just gets more showy. Not scary. Good way to put it.

But I was at least somewhat involved in it most of the time. I wasn't checking my watch (so to speak since I don't own a watch) or tapping my foot incessantly. And that is due in no small part - or completely, if I think about it - to John Cusack's performance. This guy is just such a good actor. I mean, we've gotta' be willing to roll with this guy (even though through some trite character development we learn he's a bit "selfish") as he's pretty much the whole movie. And you do roll with him because Cusack has that ability to pull you in no matter what he's doing. And he's pitch-perfect even if the movie itself is not. (His performance actually brought to mind for me Naomi Watts' turn in "The Ring". I didn't really like that movie as a whole, either, but I thought the moments in which it did work were solely because Watts grounded it.) He goes through the stages of emotion just as I imagine someone would if in a situation such as this. Complete Denial to It Must All Be My Imagination to What The Hell Is Going On?! to an almost Ah, Fuck It.

Samuel L. Jackson is good, too, in what little he has to do. I enjoyed watching Jackson and Cusack go head to head. If I'd made this movie I would have had it be 85 minutes of Jackson's hotel manager trying to convince Cusack's writer not to go into the room and then right at the very end Cusack would have decided not to go in. Most of America would hate that. Too bad.

But yeah, the movie itself just doesn't work, just doesn't hold up. I think the reason I've never been a big fan of the horror movie genre is that so many of the horror movies I've encountered (at least recent ones) seem to rely so heavily on false endings. And I hate false endings. And we get a plethora of them here.

The fake out scene you mention is one that even I caught and I never catch them. I tend to not try and guess ahead when watching a movie, I just like to be absorbed in it. But I totally saw that fake out coming. It stood out like such a sore thumb. There was utterly no reason for it to be there except to come back later for a little trickery. And, in the end, the whole thing is just a big empty bag of trickery and one too many conclusions.

(Did we actually agree?)

Regards,

Nick

Rebuttal?

Yes, Nick I think we are in agreement (mostly): the highlights: Cusack and Jackson are fun to watch as ever. The low points: the horrible fake out and lack of genuine tension. In a cheesy send off of something from this very movie:

"Don't go see 1408"