The Dark Half

George A. Romero – 1993 – USA

  

There’s no doubt the film is effective, and I’d place it fairly high on the list of good films that have been adapted from Stephen King books.  Having said that, I regret that Romero’s voice seems to be so muted since his string of personal and provocative micro-budget films throughout the 1970s, such as Jack’s Wife (1972), The Crazies (1973) and Martin (1976).  Obviously, he was able to parlay his reputation as a horror-meister into various directing jobs throughout the 80s and beyond, and I can’t blame him for taking advantage of the opportunities, but the sad reality is that all of Romero’s earlier films – spanning Night of the Living Dead (1968) to Knightriders (1981) – reveal something about the man himself and his interests; which reached beyond horror.  There is humor and biting commentary, as well as thrills, in those films, but those elements are noticeably strained in the later work.  He’s a man struggling to keep up not only with younger rivals but with his own exemplary reputation as a young guerrilla filmmaker.  As it is, The Dark Half is moody and thoughtful, if not remarkably scary, but it’s hard to see it as a Romero film.  It’s easier to fold it into the group of very similar Stephen King movies made around the same time, which all seem like they could have been made by the same director; Pet Sematery (1989), Misery (1991), It (1991), The Stand (1994), etc.