What would Horror Week at Capes and Tights be without a top-list featuring our hometown author Stephen King. This year we list our favorite Stephen King movie adaptations.
This list of 15 movies is not necessarily the best movies to have been adapted from King novels, nor is it a list of the most accurate adaptations. It’s a list of our favorite movies that are based on King works and in no particular order.
Our list of our favorite Stephen King move adaptations…
Shawshank Redemption (1994)
Andy Dufresne is sentenced to two consecutive life terms in prison for the murders of his wife and her lover and is sentenced to a tough prison. However, only Andy knows he didn’t commit the crimes. While there, he forms a friendship with Red, experiences brutality of prison life, adapts, helps the warden, etc., all in 19 years.
Watch on Amazon | Read the Book
The Shining (1980)
Jack Torrance becomes winter caretaker at the isolated Overlook Hotel in Colorado, hoping to cure his writer’s block. He settles in along with his wife, Wendy, and his son, Danny, who is plagued by psychic premonitions. As Jack’s writing goes nowhere and Danny’s visions become more disturbing, Jack discovers the hotel’s dark secrets and begins to unravel into a homicidal maniac hell-bent on terrorizing his family.
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Stand by Me (1986)
After learning that a stranger has been accidentally killed near their rural homes, four Oregon boys decide to go see the body. On the way, Gordie Lachance, Vern Tessio, Chris Chambers and Teddy Duchamp encounter a mean junk man and a marsh full of leeches, as they also learn more about one another and their very different home lives. Just a lark at first, the boys’ adventure evolves into a defining event in their lives.
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Misery (1990)
After a serious car crash, novelist Paul Sheldon is rescued by former nurse Annie Wilkes, who claims to be his biggest fan. Annie brings him to her remote cabin to recover, where her obsession takes a dark turn when she discovers Sheldon is killing off her favorite character from his novels. As Sheldon devises plans for escape, Annie grows increasingly controlling, even violent, as she forces the author to shape his writing to suit her twisted fantasies.
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Carrie (1976)
In this chilling adaptation of Stephen King’s horror novel, withdrawn and sensitive teen Carrie White faces taunting from classmates at school and abuse from her fanatically pious mother at home. When strange occurrences start happening around Carrie, she begins to suspect that she has supernatural powers. Invited to the prom by the empathetic Tommy Ross, Carrie tries to let her guard down, but things eventually take a dark and violent turn.
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It (2017)
Seven young outcasts in Derry, Maine, are about to face their worst nightmare — an ancient, shape-shifting evil that emerges from the sewer every 27 years to prey on the town’s children. Banding together over the course of one horrifying summer, the friends must overcome their own personal fears to battle the murderous, bloodthirsty clown known as Pennywise.
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The Green Mile
Paul Edgecomb walked the mile with a variety of cons. He had never encountered someone like John Coffey, a massive black man convicted of brutally killing a pair of young sisters. Coffey had the size and strength to kill anyone, but not the demeanor. Beyond his simple, naive nature and a deathly fear of the dark, Coffey seemed to possess a prodigious, supernatural gift. Paul began to question whether Coffey was truly guilty of murdering the two girls.
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The Mist
After a powerful storm damages their Maine home, David Drayton and his young son head into town to gather food and supplies. Soon afterward, a thick fog rolls in and engulfs the town, trapping the Draytons and others in the grocery store. Terror mounts as deadly creatures reveal themselves outside, but that may be nothing compared to the threat within, where a zealot calls for a sacrifice.
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Christine
Unpopular nerd Arnie Cunningham buys a 1958 Plymouth Fury, which he names Christine. Arnie develops an unhealthy obsession with the car, to the alarm of his jock friend, Dennis Guilder. After bully Buddy Repperton defaces Christine, the auto restores itself to perfect condition and begins killing off Buddy and his friends. Determined to stop the deaths, Dennis and Arnie’s girlfriend, Leigh Cabot, decide to destroy Christine.
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Dead Zone
When Johnny Smith awakens from a coma caused by a car accident, he finds that years have passed, and he now has psychic abilities. Heartbroken that his girlfriend has moved on with her life, Johnny also must contend with his unsettling powers, which allow him to see a person’s future with a mere touch. After shaking the hand of aspiring politician Greg Stillson, Johnny sees the danger presented by the candidate’s rise and resolves to kill him.
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Pet Sematary
Doctor Louis Creed moves his family to Maine, where he meets a friendly local named Jud Crandall. After the Creeds’ cat is accidentally killed, Crandall advises Louis to bury it in the ground near the old pet cemetery. The cat returns to life, its personality changed for the worse. When Louis’ son, Gage, dies tragically, Louis decides to bury the boy’s body in the same ground despite the warnings of Crandall and Louis’ visions of a deceased patient.
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Gerald’s Game
A woman accidentally kills her husband during a kinky game. Handcuffed to her bed with no hope of rescue, she begins hearing voices and seeing strange visions.
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Dolores Claiborne
In a small New England town, Dolores Claiborne works as a housekeeper for the rich but heartless Vera Donovan. When Vera turns up dead, Dolores is accused of killing her elderly employer — so her estranged daughter, Selena, a well-respected New York City journalist, decides to visit her mother and investigate the matter for herself. As Selena digs deeper into the case, she uncovers shocking truths about the murder and her own childhood.
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Doctor Sleep
Struggling with alcoholism, Dan Torrance remains traumatized by the sinister events that occurred at the Overlook Hotel when he was a child. His hope for a peaceful existence soon becomes shattered when he meets Abra, a teen who shares his extrasensory gift of the “shine.” Together, they form an unlikely alliance to battle the True Knot, a cult whose members try to feed off the shine of innocents to become immortal.
