RIDING THE BULLET / STEPHEN KING’S RIDING THE BULLET

US/Canada, 2004, 98 minutes, Colour.
Jonathan Jackson, David Arquette, Cliff Robertson, Barbara Hershey, Erika Christensen, Matt Frewer.
Directed by Mick Garris.

Director Mick Garris has made many television horror films and series. He directed the film version of Stephen King’s The Sleepwalkers as well as the miniseries, The Stand, The Shining. He has a great familiarity with the writing of King – and is able to draw on all kinds of cinematic devices to illustrate the verbal communication by King.

The film is set in 1969, focuses on a little boy who grows up without a father, has a devoted mother (Barbara Hershey) but falls into the drug and rock ‘n roll atmosphere of the late 60s. However, he is a disturbed young man, which can be seen in his drawings of death in a live art class. He also has an alter-ego who argues with him. He attempts suicide, has visions of the possibilities of different ways of proceeding, often in threat to himself.

The basic plot is his journey from his campus to the hospital to see his mother, hitchhiking along the road. He meets a range of characters, a hippie who drives carelessly, a farmer (Cliff Robertson) who is ill and lamenting his wife’s death, a mysterious character, George Staub (David Arquette) who is really a messenger of death. He also meets one or two normal people along the road!

The Bullet of the title is a rollercoaster that he was afraid to go on as a boy, his mother impatiently hitting him after they had waited for so long. He had a premonition of falling from the rollercoaster. During his journey, he returns to the cemetery where his father is buried, hears that his father has committed suicide, goes to the theme park, imagines a ride on the rollercoaster. The moral issue presented by George Staub is that he dies at this time or his mother dies – and he chooses his mother.

The film ends rather more quietly than expected, the older Alan Parker reminiscing and refusing a lift from George Staub who drives past him on the highway.

1. A Stephen King story? Audience expectations? Horror? Twists? The supernatural?

2. Stephen King’s literary style – and the visual equivalents here: realism, surrealism, nightmares and visions, memories, home movies, the visualising of possible alternative action, George Staub’s Movie Movie? The alter-ego? Characters and distortions?

3. The atmosphere, the initial hitchhiking, the focus on Alan’s eye? The home movies tracing his infancy and his growing up? His father’s death and funeral? His mother’s love for him? The art class, his painting death? Alan and his friends? The break with Jessica? In the bath, his alter-ego appearing, his attempted suicide with a razor blade? The surprise party? His ticket for the John Lennon concert? His mother’s illness, on the road, the range of drivers, the dark, intensity, death, the cemetery? George Staub and his ride? The Bullet? Staub’s knowledge of Alan’s life, his lies? The choices for death or for his mother’s death?

4. Alan and his childhood, joy, his mother, the father, the funeral, the story of the accident (the father’s later appearances, shooting himself, the blood spurting)? The ride on the Bullet, seeing himself fall, his fears, his mother slapping him? The trauma about his mother’s treatment of him? Her apology from her sick-bed? His morbid attitude, the class and the art, Jessica’s suspicions, the break, the bath, the razor blade, the blood, the surprise party? The hospital and his stitches? Jessica and her love, giving him the tickets? His friends, giving them the tickets? Going to his mother? A puzzling character?

5. Jean, a nice woman, the audience seeing his mother through Alan’s eyes? The alternate behaviour? Her death? The issue of the Bullet? Her drinking, her illness? Her being composed in the hospital?

6. On the road, hitchhiking, the hippie, the discussions, his getting out of the car, the crash, seeing the accident, Staub and his watching? His getting the lift from the old farmer, the farmer telling his story, the talk, the alter-ego warning him, his escape from the car after the offer to drive to the hospital? The rowdy group, pursuing him in the fields, hiding in the fridge? His seeing the vicious animals on the road? The lift from George Staub, lying to him, the alter-ego, Staub telling the truth? Going to the cemetery, his father’s grave? Going to the theme park, imagining the ride on the Bullet? His alter-ego’s version of what might happen? The final ordinary driver and his arriving at the hospital?

7. At the hospital, reception, his imagining alternate scenarios? His mother, his talking with her, her love for him? His thinking over his choices, the pressure from Staub, choosing his mother’s death instead of his own?

8. The aftermath, the older Alan, the voice-over, his marriage failure, his painting? Staub passing him and his not taking the lift?

9. A nightmare story? Alternate worlds? Stephen King horror?