Movie Review: 1408

This movie isn't going to win any awards which is further proof that the Academy Awards people have their heads up their collective asses.

"1408" is one of the best horror movies ever. John Cusack plays an author of "10 Most Haunted [insert noun]" books. He did one book a long time ago that was really good, but now he just goes around the country visiting "haunted" places and writing them up. But he's never seen a real haunting. Not until he hears about room 1408 in the Dolphin Hotel. He lawyers up and demands that he be allowed to stay in that room. The manager tries to talk him out of it. We learn about the history of the room and how nobody who lives through the room has stayed a whole hour.
This takes up a good part of the beginning of the movie. It's part time filler and part mood setting.

Finally, Mike Enslin (Cusack) gets to the room and settles in. Almost immediately things start to get weird. Soon the clock radio starts a one hour countdown. The room tortures him with visions of his dead daughter, the building changes shape, he sees spirit leaping from the window. All this and so much more.

It's hard to describe just what makes the movie so unsettling or even convince you that it is. So let me tell out about the audience. I've found that, generally, people talk more in really scary movies. It's a defense mechanism. They have to remind themselves that it's only a movie. They start to mock things they normally wouldn't and get louder and louder as things get worse. They talked a lot in the last 45 minutes or so.

If you liked "The Others" or "The Shining" you should like this.

I'll get this on DVD, too.