1408

Mike Enslin is a writer who has been compiling guides on haunted places in America for several years. Cynical and disillusioned with life, Mike learns that in New York, at the luxurious Dolphin Hotel, there is a cursed room, number 1408, where an incredible number of deaths have occurred. It is said that those who have entered that room have not managed to survive more than an hour. Despite the warnings of the Dolphin's director, Mike is still determined to spend the night in 1408. Periodically, American cinema feels the need to draw from the prolific bibliography of Stephen King to stage adaptations from novels and stories that deal with nightmares, paranoias, and human fears. The latest reduction from the "King" of Maine is "1408," a rich Dimension production adapted from the eponymous short story (contained in the anthology "Everything's Eventual" and previously published in draft form in the autobiography "On Writing"). "1408" is not a typical "Kingian" film, except for the profession of the protagonist (a true autobiographical constant of much literature signed by King), the atmosphere dear to the author's stories is not felt at all, made of childhood obsessions and intimate fears of small towns. In "1408" rather, the line of the classic ghost story centered on a haunted place is followed, and an attempt is made to put pressure mainly on the psychological aspect of the story and on the tragic past of the protagonist. The beginning is very promising: the Swedish director Mikael Hafstrom ("Derailed – Attraction Fatale"; "Drowning Ghost") immediately stages a disillusioned, cynical John Cusack with a tormented personality; it is not clear why he is so pessimistic, and one can even feel a strange sense of empathy for this writer of the paranormal firmly convinced of the non-existence of ghosts and supernatural beings. The first forty minutes are really well managed, thanks to the duo with Samuel L. Jackson, a meticulous hotel director, and the first unsettling manifestations of the evil that lives in 1408. Nothing new, to be clear, but the formula seems to work wonderfully. Reaching the first hour, however, the film begins its rapid decline: the situation becomes redundant and boredom does not take long to arrive; there is an obvious excess of paradoxical situations and the use of special effects; moreover, an attempt is made to find narrative loopholes in the most banal and exploited solutions of dramatic cinema. After the first unsettling supernatural manifestations, represented by simple but effective tricks (objects that suddenly appear, appliances that turn on by themselves, doubles that materialize, etc.), the situation is stretched to the unbelievable by adding effect after effect, and thus the ghosts of the previous tenants begin to appear, cracks on the walls, and many other "haunted house" gimmicks that are clearly inserted to lengthen the film, which in the end turns out to be even excessively long. Furthermore, the minimalism of some ideas, capable of capturing and unsettling the viewer, is added to the final "effettoni" made of animated paintings, floods, explosions, anomalous "indoor" snowfalls, which definitely clash with the suggestive first part and lean more towards the spectacular side, certainly not suitable for the story. Even the usual story of family tragedy with the death of the little girl, separation from the wife, and the ghost of the child have now been proposed and re-proposed in a thousand ways and can be considered overused, contributing to compromising the success of the film. It must be said that some scenes are very successful (just think of the neighbor in the building opposite and the attempt to escape out the window) and the staging is generally very pleasant. Also, Cusack appears at his best and manages to make his character very credible and human, as is the incisive presence of the always great Jackson, albeit in a very marginal role. In conclusion, "1408" appears to be an unsuccessful operation. From a good premise and a first half of excellent preparation, the work is inflated to such an extent that it leads to an explosion, denying the viewer both the atmosphere that a horror requires and the subtle unease that the plot promised. What a shame.