As expected from a film made from the work of Stephen King, 1408 is really that terrifying.
In 1408, we have Mike Enslin, a once talented writer who led a lame life by writing pulp stories of haunted locations. His books were that cheap that you could easily find them on discounted books section. But then Enslin chose to make a full blast epilogue by spending a night in the famous 1408 room in the Dolphin Hotel, thanks to a no name postcard sent to him with a message: Don’t Stay in 1408.
No one was allowed to stay in that room due to the order of Gerald Olin, the hotel manager. It’s not like Olin hated to have a full house in his hotel, but as he said to Enslin, he detested cleaning up the “mess” after that. Well for sure, it would be a shame if we said only a few grisly deaths had happened in 1408..But not even a bottle of rare champagne, a complete documentation of tragic events in that room, or even Olin’s warning that no one had ever survived that room for more than an hour could stop Enslin. Well, he simply did not believe in ghost…or God..or anything else that he could not see with his bare eyes.
But as Olin said too…there’s no ghost in 1408. The room was simply evil on its own.
And with a old-fashion wooden key to room 1408 (as magnetized key never functioned in the room), Enslin was ready to start his adventure..that if he was smart enough to stay alive to tell the story after.
Ironically, despite its menacing reputation, 1408 was really a genuine hotelier at heart…It’s started when the room even provided a turn down service for Enslin, although he could not see who put the two sweets on his pillow. The problem came when the room opted to stop being nice with Enslin.
Simply saying, the room tried it best in that one hour to persuade, prod, and even force Enslin to the brink of insanity and finally chose the express check out way from the terror, as the lady from the hotel operator suggested….or to kill himself, since according to her, a hotel should always respect the guest will. All of them in a short duration 0f 60 minutes. But in a room where everything could happen, even a short one hour could last longer that it’s supposed to be, don’t you think so?
John Cussack as Mike Enslin was really the center attention in this movie as most of the scenes here were starred only by himself. But he did it amazingly. His wonderful act and the plot together would torment the viewers to their worst nightmare and even tears at the same time. Most importantly, it made my heart jump at the most unexpected time…you simply could not guess what would happen next, which made me really got caught up in the story. If what you are looking for is classic horror movie that could raise the hair on the back of your neck, you’ll get your answer here.
Lesson learned: Sometimes you just can’t get rid of your bad memories and you just have ti live with them.
