It’s not often that a Hollywood movie which starred heavyweights like Samuel L. Jackson and John Cusack to achieve a 0% approval rating in rottentomato.com—I mean, even movies that you’ve not heard of, like Fathers and Daughters, get 28% rating. After all, with so many Hollywood movies, only the good ones come to Singapore, right?
Well, there is. It’s called Cell, and it’s now in cinemas, but I guess the only audience would be the people working there.
When I first saw the trailer for the movie, I knew it had to be my next to-watch movie, primarily for one reason: I’ve read the novel many years back, and it was one of the best Stephan King books ever. I remember being hooked into the book in a library, wanting to find out what caused the “pulse” in the page-turner.
I walked out of the library satisfied, but I walked out of the cinema extremely unsatisfied.
Like what a reviewer in CV Independent mentioned, it could well be “easily one of the worst adaptations ever of a King story.” That, I fully agree.
The premise of Cell is ingenious: people who used their cellphones will lose their mind and be “zombified”. The movie follows a group of people, Clay Riddell who is on his way to his house to look for his family, Tom McCourt, Alice Maxwell and Charles Ardai. Their journey to Clay’s house is a faithful adaption of Stephan King’s novel, and all is good until thirty minutes later when it becomes a mess.
Firstly, the film seems undecided on the genre: is it a horror / slasher film, a post-apocalyptic film, an action film or even a family film? It incorporates everything, and you might just cry in anticipation of a jump scare when the movie wants you to cry over the death of a character.
Secondly, the movie is slooooooooow. Unlike the novel in which the plot is unpeeled every page, pushing you to read the book in its entirety, Cell shows you scenes that drag and drag without providing you with any context. It’s so slow, the couple in front of me left the cinema just halfway through the movie.
Lastly, it’s a movie with absolutely no storyline. Okay, that’s quite an extreme description, since it’s after all an adaptation of Stephan King’s novel, but here’s the thing: the movie itself completely diverts from the novel. There’s no explanation of why people become zombies after using their phones, the purpose of the man in red hoodie and the meaning of their dreams. All these, plus more, are explained in the novel—but not at all in the film. Watching the movie is like watching 1/4 of a full movie: you get questions and you didn’t even get a slightest hint of the answers.
While reading the book would fill in the blanks, I don’t think it’s the movie’s objective: how could it be that a 2016 movie is used to promote a 2006 novel?
The movie, to be very honest, deserves its 0% approval rating—it’s not an easy feat to achieve this kind of results, but Cell did it. If you’ve got $10 this weekend, do yourself a favour and buy the book instead. It’s much more entertaining.
Cell is unfortunately in cinemas now. Check out the showtimes here.
This article was first published on goodyfeed.com
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