Horror is truly one of the most hit-or-miss genres. While some horror movies based on great books havesuccessfully terrified audiences, most have stumbled, resulting in lackluster adaptations that disappoint fans and critics alike. These films tend to suffer from poor direction, subpar acting, and deviations from the original storylines. Plus,some plots that work on the page just don’t lend themselves well to the screen.
Horror legendStephen King, in particular, has penned many fantastic books that spawned mediocre movies. At their most egregious, these adaptations abandon his rich characterization and intriguing themes and instead just hit the viewer over the head with jump scares. Then there are also cases where realistic and psychological novels likeShirley Jackson’sHaunting of Hill Houseget turned into bog-standard slashers lacking all depth. With this in mind, this list explores some of the worst horror movie adaptations of good books, highlighting where they went wrong and how they fell short of the mark.
10’Cirque du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant' (2009)
Directed by Paul Weitz
“Life might be meaningless, but death I still have hope for.” This horror fantasy film is based on theCirque du Freakseries byDarren Shan, an author of young adult horror and dark fantasy. His books can be punchy and engrossing, a good starting point for younger readers interested in spookier stories, but this is not the case for the movie. In short, the film is about a high schooler named Darren (Chris Massoglia) who stumbles upon a traveling freak show and becomes indebted to the circus’s vampire master Crepsley (John C. Reilly).
There are some great performers here (Salma Hayek,Willem Defoe,Kristen Schaal, andKen Watanabeall appear) but the movie underutilized almost of all them. Worse than that, there’s just not that much story and drama here.It feels like the filmmakers were more interested in laying the groundwork for a franchise rather than making a good standalone movie.
Cirque Du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant
9’Flowers in the Attic' (1987)
Directed by Jeffrey Bloom
“You’rethe one who’s cruel and evil, Mother!” Flowers in the Attic tells the story of the Dollanganger children, who are locked in the attic of their grandparents’ mansion. After the sudden death of their father, the children and their mother, Corrine (Victoria Tennant), move in with Corrine’s wealthy parents. To secure her inheritance, Corrine conspires with her mother (Louise Fletcher) to hide the existence of her children, leading to a grim saga of abuse and treachery.
The movie was adapted from the controversial but extremely popular 1979 novel byV.C. Andrews.The book is smart and deeply unsettling, serving up several scenes that were highly provocative, even scandalous, on release. (It was banned in many school districts.) The movie, however, omits almost all of them, taming the source material and thus totally neutering it.The result is a tepid drama in search of a point.The movie was initially supposed to be directed byWes Craven, who certainly would’ve done a much better job.
Flowers in the Attic (1987)
Children are hidden away under an attic by their conspiring mother and grandmother.
8’The Dark Tower' (2017)
Directed by Nikolaj Arcel
“The Tower is all that stands between light and darkness.” One of the last decade’s most egregious cases of wasted potential,The Dark Towerattempts to condense most ofStephen King’s epic fantasy-horror series intoa single 95-minute movie.Idris Elbaleads the cast as Roland Deschain, the last Gunslinger, who is on a quest to prevent the Man in Black (Matthew McConaughey) from destroying the Dark Tower, a structure that holds the universe together.
The novels vary in quality but add up to a unique and memorable saga, spanning multiple dimensions and timelines, weaving in Western elements and connections to other Stephen King books. The movie, by contrast, is rushed and hollow (a solid Elba performance notwithstanding). This seems to have been the result of the film’s tortured, decade-long production process. Plus, the movie dramatically tones down the violence and darkness, going for a PG-13 rating, which makes little sense.There’s talk of a potential TV reboot, which hopefully avoids the movie’s mistakes.
The Dark Tower
A boy haunted by visions of a dark tower from a parallel reality teams up with the tower’s disillusioned guardian to stop an evil warlock known as the Man in Black who plans to use the boy to destroy the tower and open the gates of Hell.
7’Dreamcatcher' (2003)
Directed by Lawrence Kasdan
“Some kind of s— is going to hit the planetary fan.“Another Stephen King adaptation,Dreamcatcherfollows four childhood friends (played byThomas Jane,Damian Lewis,Jason Lee, andTimothy Oliphant) who reunite for a hunting trip in the Maine woods, only to encounter a deadly alien presence. The friends share a psychic bond, bestowed upon them when they were kids by a mysterious boy. When they come across a sick stranger and bizarre occurrences begin, they realize they are facing an alien invasion.
The book was fine, but the movie is an incoherent and overlong mess (it’s more than two hours).It’s essentially just a clichéd monster movie, recycling ideas that had been executed already by better films. Plus, some of the dialogue is laughably atrocious, like when an army man played byMorgan Freemansays with deadly seriousness: “They drive Chevys, they shop at Wal-Mart, and they never miss an episode ofFriends. That’s what it means to be American.”
Dreamcatcher
6’Queen of the Damned' (2002)
Directed by Michael Rymer
“Immortality seems like a good idea, until you realize you’re going to spend it alone.” Based on theAnne Ricenovel,Queen of the Damnedis a sequel to the hitInterview with the Vampire, thoughit falls short of its predecessor in every respect. It seesStuart Townsendtaking over the role of the vampire Lestat, who awakens from a long slumber and becomes a rock star, using his music to draw attention to the vampire world. His actions awaken Akasha (Aaliyah), the ancient queen of vampires, who seeks to make Lestat her king and reign over the world.
The book was well-received, receiving praise for its depth, intricacy and exploration of the origins of the vampires. None of that is discernible in the movie, which instead serves up uninspired direction, laughable dialogue, and subpar special effects. Worst of all,the atmospheric horror is sorely lacking.That said, Townsend and Aaliyah’s performances are solid.
Queen of the Damned
RENT on APPLE TV
5’The Haunting' (1999)
Directed by Jan de Bont
“Hey, you guys wanna hear something really scary?“The Hauntingis a remake of the classic based onShirley Jackson’s novelThe Haunting of Hill House. The story revolves around Eleanor (Lili Taylor), a troubled woman who joins a sleep study at the eerie Hill House, along with other volunteers. However, the true purpose of the study is to investigate the house’s paranormal activity. Naturally, the house’s malevolent influence soon makes itself felt.
The film starts off similarly to the original, butThe Hauntingquickly abandons any effort to develop meaningful interactions among the main characters, instead opting for visual scares in the form of animated statues and lurking ghosts. Unfortunately, the 1990s CGI just isn’t very effective. In short,SpeeddirectorJan De Bontstrips away the original story’s psychological complexity in favor of a straightforward ghost story, defeating the whole point. For more appropriate takes on the source material, check out the 1963 movie orMike Flanagan’s TV series.
The Haunting
Liam Neeson, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Lili Taylor, and Owen Wilson star in the supernatural horror The Haunting, the 1999 adaptation of Shirley Jackson’s novel The Haunting of Hill House. It revolves around a group of people who face paranormal events in a secluded house in western Massachusetts.
4’Pet Sematary II' (1992)
Directed by Mary Lambert
“You have the right to an attorney. You won’t need one because you’ll be dead.” The originalPet Sematarywas fine, but the sequel, riffing on the same Stephen King book, is a dumpster fire (except for one or two creepy shots of the revenant dog). It’s about Jeff (Edward Furlong), a teenager who moves to the rural town of Ludlow following the death of his mother. There, he befriends a local boy named Drew (Jason McGuire), who is abused by his stepfather, Gus (Clancy Brown). Soon, the kids begin experimenting with the local pet cemetery, which was supposedly cursed with dark powers.
Brown’s performance was praised, but critics generally trashed the rest of the movie. Basically,this sequel adds nothing, rehashing ideas from the already-mediocre first movie and relying upon the same scare tactics. It’s the kind of mild horror that’ll spook kids but leave adults cold. Even the bloody finale is underwhelming.
3’Firestarter' (2022)
Directed by Keith Thomas
“Liar, liar…pants… on… fire.” Once again, filmmakers take a good Stephen King premise and reduce it to utter dreck.Firestartercenters on Charlie McGee (Ryan Kiera Armstrong), a young girl with pyrokinetic abilities, who is on the run with her father (Zac Efron) from a government agency that wants to exploit her powers. Charlie’s parents, having been part of a secret experiment that gave them supernatural abilities, have raised her in hiding.
The book is definitely entertaining, and was fairly fresh for 1980, when it came out.This movie, however, is just incredibly boring.In part, this is simply because there have been so many similar, better stories in the decades since the novel came out. But thereare also pacing issues in the movie, along with underdeveloped characters, and head-scratching deviations from the source material.Finally, some of the one-liners are frankly cringe-inducing. The only positive here is the performance fromMichael Greyeyesas bounty hunter John Rainbird.
Firestarter
2’Cell' (2016)
Directed by Tod Williams
“Don’t be sorry because there is nothing to be sorry about yet.“John Cusackleads the cast of this one as Clayton Riddell, an artist who witnesses a mysterious signal broadcast over the global cell phone network, turning users into mindless, violent killers. As chaos erupts, Clay teams up with a group of survivors, including Tom (Samuel L. Jackson) and Alice (Isabelle Fuhrmann), to navigate through the devastated landscape in search of his son.
There are interesting ideas at play here; the concept of cell phones making people dull and destructive is not too far off the mark. Unfortunately,the execution is decidedly lackluster.There’s no suspense at all, and the dialogue is painfully wooden. The shoddy CGI doesn’t help. The end result feels awkwardly cobbled together from disconnected scenes, which makes sense given that it was shot in January 2014 and then dropped by the production company, only seeing the light of day in June 2016. Perhaps it should have stayed locked away in a studio vault.
1’Children of the Corn' (2020)
Directed by Kurt Wimmer
“I know it sucks so hard sometimes you can hardly breathe.” When it comes to terrible horrors based on decent source material, few movies can topthe 2020 remakeofChildren of the Corn, originally a short story by Stephen King. The 1984 movie was a tense, brutal, slightly silly slasher that connected with audiences and spawned a franchise. This version, by contrast, is just as goofy and blunt as that film, but with even less logic and almost no frights.
This film abandons the original religious themes altogether and serves up a watered-down and less menacing take on the central antagonist, a creature known as He Who Walks Behind the Rows. In the process,the movie jettisons the original mythology; a major misstep. The filmmakers attempt to replace these elements with an ecological aspect, but this isn’t enough to compensate for the lack of folk horror. Simply put, thisChildren of the Cornis all chaff and no wheat.
