413. Doctor Sleep; movie review

DOCTOR SLEEP
Cert 15
152 mins

BBFC advice: Contains strong bloody violence, gore, horror, threat, language

Any readers will know, I have been caustic over the avalanche of sequels which have been released at UK cinemas in 2019.
But at least most have them have appeared in the same decade as their predecessors.
Mike Flanagan's Doctor Sleep has come nearly 40 years after The Shining. The long interregnum cannot be blamed on movie studios - Stephen King did not write his follow-up novel until 2013.
But film-making was a lot different when Jack Nicholson played a deranged hotel-sitter, smashing a bathroom door with an axe and peering through the resultant hole to exclaim: "Here's Johnny!".
Flanagan's movie stars Ewan McGregor as the adult Danny Torrance who has found alcoholism is the only way to cope with the trauma of the past and his own propensity to 'shine' .
Thanks to a newly found friend (Cliff Curtis) he finds a way to lead a normal life until he meets a teenager (Kyliegh Curran) who shares his extrasensory gifts.

Reluctantly he joins her in battle with a cult whose members feed off the dying breath of those with the shine to become immortal.
Rebecca Ferguson plays the leader of the cult who is out to establish herself at the top of the supernatural food chain.
Doctor Sleep demonstrates one of the big differences between bygone and current pictures in its full-on depiction of bloody death,
By contrast, The Shining left much of its violence to the viewer's imagination. Stanley Kubrick understood that the mind is more terrified by what it can't see.
In 2012, I watched a re-release of Stanley Kubrick's film and wrote: "This is plain and simple one of the most dramatic, thrilling horror films ever."
It also runs at nearly two and a half hours but has so many memorable moments, it doesn't feel like it.
By comparison, Doctor Sleep is stretched and was always going to come up short.
McGregor is a strange choice as Danny as he is far too clean-cut to play a man tormented by drink and memories over 40 years,
And I just couldn't buy into the whole cult tangent.
Kubrick created a classic movie of a wonderful King novel. It should have remained untouched.

Reasons to watch: It's a sequel to The Shining!
Reasons to avoid: Its storyline is difficult to follow

Laughs: None
Jumps: One
Vomit: Yes
Nudity: Yes
Overall rating: 6.5/10

Did you know? Stephen King did not make a cameo in Doctor Sleep because he was "pretty wiped out" from his full scene cameo in It Chapter Two. However, Danny Lloyd — who originally played Danny in The Shining when he was just six years old — does make a cameo.

Final word. Stephen King: "He took my story, which was the sequel to The Shining and basically did a seamless weld to Stanley Kubrick’s film, which is probably one of the reasons why Warner Bros. was eager to do it. I always felt that the Kubrick film was rather cold and director Mike Flanagan warmed it up. " Time

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