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First Doctor Sleep Reactions Tease One Of 2019’s Best Horror Films

Early reviews for Doctor Sleep offer high praise, including one from Stephen King, who compares the film to The Shawshank Redemption.

Doctor Sleep

Stephen King’s novels and short stories have been getting the big screen treatment going all the way back to 1976 with the horror classic Carrie. Between movies (Stand by Me, Misery, The Shawshank Redemption) and miniseries (It, The Stand, Storm of the Century), King’s work has been consistently entertaining and frightening audiences.

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But with the massive success of the new version of It in 2017, remakes of his earlier stories have become a priority in the industry. We already got Pet Sematary and It: Chapter Two in 2019 and there’s more to come over the next few years, including a new miniseries of The Stand and updates to The Tommyknockers and Cujo.

Perhaps the most anticipated King adaptation however isn’t a remake, but a sequel to The Shining. Attempting to remake Stanley Kubrick’s masterpiece is a daunting task, so director Mike Flanagan decided to continue the story by adapting King’s 2013 follow-up: Doctor Sleep.

And if the first reactions are any indication as to the quality of the film, it seems that Flanagan has met those lofty expectations as critics are praising Doctor Sleep as a worthy sequel and one of the year’s best horror pics.

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Even the man himself, Stephen King, is lauding Flanagan’s take on the material:

Doctor Sleep

Smart move by King to mention Doctor Sleep in the same breath as The Shawshank Redemption ahead of its release. But the comparisons to The Shining are what everyone will be interested in.

After all, King famously hated Kubrick’s adaptation of his novel. And despite the film becoming a classic in the nearly 40 years since its release, he hasn’t changed his stance.

In an interview with Deadline in 2016, King said:

“I think ‘The Shining’ is a beautiful film and it looks terrific and as I’ve said before, it’s like a big, beautiful Cadillac with no engine inside it. In that sense, when it opened, a lot of the reviews weren’t very favorable and I was one of those reviewers. I kept my mouth shut at the time, but I didn’t care for it much.”

Warner Bros.’ decision to hire Flanagan was a no-brainer, as in less than a decade, the writer/director has made five terrific horror films including a pair of Netflix gems (Hush, Gerald’s Game) and the outstanding series The Haunting of Hill House (also at Netflix). Now, it looks like he’s hit it out of the park once again and we can’t wait to see the movie for ourselves when Doctor Sleep opens nationwide on November 9th.