‘Doctor Sleep’ is a worthy sequel to ‘The Shining,’ both the book and the movie

Posted on November 15, 2019

By MARK VIOLA

Directed by film legend Stanley Kubrick and based on the novel by Stephen King, 1980’s “The Shining” is a horror film classic. It might surprise you to learn that King himself has never been a fan of the film adaptation, which strayed far from the source material.

Now we have “Doctor Sleep,” based on King’s 2013 sequel and directed by Mike Flanagan (“Oculus,” “Gerald’s Game”), who also wrote the screenplay. Managing to serve both masters (the new book and the original film), Flanagan delivers a very engaging movie that is easily one of the best adaptations of a King novel I’ve seen (although admittedly that’s not a high bar to meet, not counting “The Shawshank Redemption” and “The Green Mile”).

One of the most important things Flanagan appears to have realized is the fact that “Doctor Sleep” is not a traditional horror story. Instead, it is a dark fantasy, even if it is quite horrific at times.

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