Any Stephen King fan knows that The Shining, the film directed by Stanley Kubrick, is one of the writer’s least favorite adaptations. Although it is a classic horror film and gave us an incredible soundtrack and a memorable performance by Jack Nicholson, for King the film strayed far from what he was trying to say in his novel, plus the character of Wendy was poorly adapted (and not because of the great Shelley Duvall, but because of Kubrick himself).
As much as Stephen King hated The Shining, it was not his least favorite adaptation of his work (and there have been dozens, some better than others). In fact, his least favorite is The Man in the Garden, a film directed by Brett Leonard in 1992 and starring Pierce Brosnan.
“Dr. Lawrence Angelo (Pierce Brosnan) is a brilliant scientist obsessed with perfecting virtual reality software,” says the synopsis. “When his experiments fail, he finds the ideal replacement: Jobe Smith (Jeff Fahey), a slow gardener. Dr. Angelo’s goal is to benefit his human guinea pig and, consequently, all of humanity, but evil prowls around ‘The Shop,’ a mysterious group seeking to use the technology to make an invincible machine. When the experiments change Jobe into a superhuman, the stage is set for a Jekyll and Hyde-style conflict for control of Jobe’s mind and the future of the world.”
It’s such a bad movie that it gets to be good and turns around to be bad again. The special effects have not aged well at all, but it became a cult film after what happened with Stephen King. The master of horror didn’t like the movie at all and even sued New Line Cinema, receiving two and a half million dollars for the damage done to his name. He was ashamed that his signature was present on a piece of “junk” that did not represent him or his work.
Despite the court’s ruling, New Line Cinema reinstated Stephen King’s name when it released the film on VHS. And everyone knows that anything with the writer’s signature, even any piece of horror that he didn’t want anything to do with it, attracts King’s fans and those who want to enter his universe.
Story originally published in Spanish in Cultura Colectiva
