Films based on the books of the legendary Stephen King almost always turn out to be good, because there is already an excellent plot, therefore, there is less of a problem. Moreover, filmmakers who undertake the adaptation of his books, as a rule, try to do it as efficiently as possible, because it is a great honor to do a film adaptation of S. King's works.
However, in 2017, the film version of the novel "The Dark Tower" was released, reviews of which were, to put it mildly, unflattering. The film was criticized and scrutinized by fans of the literary prototype at the promotion stage.
"Dark tower"
This is a series of books by horror master Stephen King, who has written 8 novels from this series over the years. Here is a large-scale story of the wanderings and adventures of the shooter Roland. He is a very extraordinary personality and a key character in the entire franchise.
The plot is based on three main characters: the shooter Roland, a boy at the age of ten named Jake, the main antagonist of the work is the Man in Black, who has the intention to destroy the very Tower, which is the connecting link between parallel worlds. Almost the whole world is based on it, and if it is destroyed, it will be plunged into complete chaos.
The plot of literary works is very interesting, attractive and captures the reader's attention completely. Unfortunately, the film version does not produce the same effect.
The movie "Dark Tower": viewers reviews
The film was intended primarily for fans of King's literary work and lovers of fantasy and action. Unfortunately, the potential audience could not be captured. On the contrary, the film turned out to be so low-grade that the audience to which it was oriented pushed off from it.
The audience was misled by the trailer of the film, which was mounted very high quality and really captured attention. Impressed by what they saw in it, people had high hopes for the film "The Dark Tower". The first reviews based on the trailer were mostly positive.
Discontent was expressed only by ardent fans of the literary work of the writer, who were disappointed by the discrepancy of the film to the book. However, after the release of the film, all review sites and film forums quickly began to fill up with negative reviews, as the audience was very upset by what they saw.
The audience was most indignant not by the distortion of many of the provisions written in the epic novel, but by the terrible plot, poor disclosure of characters, and poor computer graphics.
What didn’t you like?
The indignation of the people who watched the film can be understood, because they expected to see excellent fantasy with high-quality special effects and a good plot, but they got absolutely the opposite. It would seem how bad the plot in the film can be, which takes as a basis one of the best works of Stephen King, who is considered almost a genius among modern writers.
But a weak plot is not the only problem of the picture according to the viewers, which is distinguished from the "Dark Tower". The reviews show that people are outraged by the bad special effects, which should be embarrassing to show in a movie that goes on international distribution. Especially in the courtyard of 2017, and not the 80s ...
Many were upset that the main character turned out to be somehow empty, completely not attracting attention. All attention was drawn to the antagonist of the film, whose role was played by the inimitable Matthew McConaughey. He is not only praised, but also considered one of the main advantages of the picture.
The Dark Tower (film): Criticism
What did the critics say? If the audience was mostly disappointed with the movie "Dark Tower", the critics' reviews were simply devastating. Based on their extensive professional experience, they created many detailed and detailed reviews of this tape, where they identified all the main shortcomings and tried to find an explanation for the total failure of the film.
The main disadvantage of the tape, of course, is called its weak plot, which completely does not catch the viewer. Because of this, the film turned out to be boring, incomprehensible and uninteresting. It has a lot of understatements, characters are poorly disclosed, and events develop too quickly. For this reason, the tape turned out crude, and this is not surprising, because the creators of the picture decided to put the events of 8 full-fledged novels into one 95-minute film.
Ratings
According to the reviews that were written on the film "The Dark Tower", and the reviews of film critics, the film is very bad. In addition to the already noted weak plot, the film has a lot of shortcomings, including: low-grade special effects and graphics, poor character disclosure and not the best acting game for many participants in the film.
The main reason why the film was not a complete failure, critics call a good PR program, the main emphasis of which was on the fact that this is an adaptation of the great work of Stephen King. In addition, the creators did a good job on the trailer, which fueled interest in the film. However, the picture did not make a big splash, because after the very first reviews of the audience and the defeat by critics it became clear that the film was very bad.
The deceived expectations of the audience could not pass without a trace for the picture. The ratings of this tape are very low, on the most famous film portal of the Russian-language Internet "Kinopoisk" the rating of the tape barely reaches 5 points out of 10, which is extremely small for a world-class picture.
Interesting Facts
It's no secret that King is the author of the epic novel The Dark Tower, reviews of the book, by the way, are mostly positive unlike the film, but few know how much he sold the rights to the film adaptation of his a novel. A considerable number! The author of the work requested as much as 19.19 million US dollars. The number 19 is constantly appearing in the literary work, so he chose just such a value.
King himself, when writing his novels, was inspired by the poem of Robert Browning, which is called "Childe-Roland reached the Dark Tower." Initially, the cycle consisted of 7 full stories, now it includes 8 books.
An interesting fact can also be called the fact that the tower itself has a height of about 200 meters, which is impressive even in comparison with modern skyscrapers.
What are the box office fees?
As mentioned above, the movie "Dark Tower", reviews of which make it clear the general opinion about the picture, is not the most successful film at the box office.
The budget of the tape amounted to about $ 60 million, and fees in the Russian Federation today barely reach $ 8.8 million. The final figures in the world are still unknown, since the tape has not yet been shown everywhere until the end (at the time of writing).
Most likely, the creators will still be able to recoup the costs of its production and advertising, but there will be no big profit, so we are not even talking about the sequel.
The disappointment of millions of fans
The film was made over time, so many people were waiting for it, especially the fans of the writer. Interest in the future film grew every year, especially since such outstanding producers as Goldsman and Howard worked on its creation. And King himself had a hand in the film adaptation of his creation.
Due to high expectations, the disappointment from the film became even greater as people waited for the film for too long. Moreover, the picture, in which so much effort was invested, should have turned out to be at least worthy. But all expectations were destroyed by that, frankly, second-rate film, which was eventually presented to the general public.
The Dark Tower reviews are mostly negative precisely because the film, which was expected to produce good results, turned out to be very weak and of poor quality. The heated critics, viewers and fans simply crushed all the efforts of the producers who tried in vain to create a positive image for their offspring.
Finally
The film "Dark Tower", reviews of which thoroughly examined all the shortcomings of the film, shows everyone an example of how, with an excellent storyline, a well-developed brand, opportunities and everything you need to create a real blockbuster, you get a boring and uninteresting sight.
As for the film itself, it is very ambiguous, since it has both positive and negative aspects. Of course, there are more minuses in the tape, but this does not mean that the film should be completely written off.
Such a negative image acquired, most likely, due to the fact that people had high expectations for him, which the film could not justify. This significantly increased the negative effect. For this reason, the picture was defeated by critics, viewers and everyone who watched it.