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Misery [Blu-ray/DVD] | ![Misery [Blu-ray/DVD]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51Sm8WdwReL._SL160_.jpg)
 enlarge | Director: Rob Reiner
Actors: James Caan, Kathy Bates, Richard Farnsworth, Frances Sternhagen, Lauren Bacall
Studio: MGM (Video & DVD)
List Price: $19.99
Buy New: $9.49
You Save: $10.50 (53%)
New (28) Used (7) from $9.49
Rating:  201 reviews
Format: Ac-3, Color, Dolby, Dts Surround Sound, Dubbed, Subtitled, Widescreen
Languages: English (Subtitled), French (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled), English (Original Language), French (Dubbed), Spanish (Dubbed)
Rating: R (Restricted)
Media: Blu-ray
Discs: 2
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
Running Time: 107 Minutes
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 6.7 x 5.3 x 0.5
MPN: 883904150213
UPC: 883904150213
EAN: 0883904150213
Theatrical Release Date: 1990
Release Date: September 15, 2009
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Amazon.com
Based on the chilling bestseller by Stephen King, Misery was brought to the screen by director Rob Reiner as one of the most effective thrillers of the 1990s. From a brilliant adaptation by screenwriter William Goldman, Reiner turned King's cautionary tale of fame and idolatry into a mainstream masterpiece of escalating suspense, translating King's own experience with obsessive fans into a frightening tale of entrapment and psychotic behavior. Kathy Bates deservedly won an Academy Award for her performance as Annie Wilkes, an unbalanced devotee of romance novels written by Paul Sheldon (James Caan), whose books provide Annie with a much-needed escape from her pathetic life and her secret, violent past. After Annie rescues the injured Sheldon from a car accident, she seizes the opportunity to nurse her favorite writer back to health, but her tender loving care soon turns to terrorism as she demands that Sheldon write his latest novel according to her wish-fulfillment fantasies. From this point forward, Misery percolates to a boil as equal parts mystery, thriller, and cleverly dark comedy, with the helpless author pitched in deadly warfare against his number one fan. While Bates carefully modulates her role from doting kindness to sympathetic loneliness and finally to horrifying ferocity, Caan is equally superb as the celebrated author who must literally write for his life. It's essentially a two-actor film, but Richard Farnsworth and Lauren Bacall are excellent in supporting roles as they investigate the writer's mysterious disappearance. Frightening, funny, and totally irresistible, Misery was such a hit that some of Bates's dialogue entered the popular lexicon (particularly her nagging reference to Caan as "Mister Man"), and its nail-biting thrills remain timelessly intense. --Jeff Shannon
Product Description
Suffering injuries from a car accident, novelist Paul Sheldon is taken in by his biggest fan, Annie Wilkes, whose care turns to torture when she disli
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| Customer Reviews: Read 196 more reviews...
 "You're going to be just fine. I'm your number one fan." June 6, 2010
Eric S. Kim (Southern California)
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Paul Sheldon (James Caan) crashes his car during a hard-hitting blizzard, and ends up being cared for by Annie Wilkes (Kathy Bates), a former nurse who lives alone in her cabin. She claims that she is Paul's #1 fan, and she just about proves it to the extreme. She berates him about his latest novel called "Misery's Child," in which the main character (her favorite character) dies. She orders him to rewrite his upcoming novel and have the main character return from the dead. And you know that she'll do anything to make it happen.
Kathy Bates is so convincing as the painfully crazy nurse that you instantly forget that she's playing a character. She IS Annie Wilkes. And BOY did she deserve the Oscar for Best Actress! James Caan is also brilliant as the helpless writer who finds himself in Annie's dangerous little world. Director Rob Reiner has done a wonderful job with this movie, and even though I have never read the original novel by Stephen King, I'm sure it's a great adaptation. This is one heck of a psychological thriller, and I easily recommend it to anyone who loves Stephen King and thrillers in general.
Grade: A-
Maybe having a number 1 fan isn't such a good thing April 19, 2010
Elisabeth
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
Before seeing this movie, I had also read the book. In the past when I've read a book and then seen the movie version of that book, I've been disappointed in who was selected to play the leads. For example, in the movie, "An Interview with a Vampire", I thought Brad Pitt, Tom Cruise, and Antonio Banderas were totally wrong for their respective roles and it ruined the movie for me. That, and turning a horror book into a comedy ruined it, too.
But in this movie, I thought Kathy Bates absolutely nailed the part of psychotic No. 1 fan, Annie Wilkes. In the book, Annie is portrayed as both nurturing and cruel...and without warning or much provocation. In this movie, Bates does an excellent job of changing her facial expressions from loving to raging mad within seconds.
I also loved how she could dish out the most insanely cruel punishments, but act like a wise schoolteacher while doing it...with the attitude that this is for his own good.
However, although I thought Bates nailed her part, I thought James Caan did a very weak impression of the tortured writer (both literally and figuratively), Paul Sheldon.
Bates was giving her A-game here and Caan seemed kind of lethargic...when he should've been acting scared out of his wits, but trying to play it cool so as not to set off one of her psychotic spells.
If you've read the book, I should warn you that many of the scenes are different from the book. For example, in the book, Sheldon is addicted to the pain killers, but in the movie, he's not and instead stores them to poison her.
The book is also WAY more gruesome than the movie. For example, in the book, Wilkes kills one character by mowing his head with a lawn mower. But in the movie, she simply shoots this character with a gun.
Overall, I was very pleased with Kathy Bates' performance, disappointed with James Caan's performance, and pleased that this movie turned out similarly to how I pictured the scenes would be in the book.
The Blu-ray edition - It's better than perfect, it's divine :) March 26, 2010
A. Dent (Minas Anor, GD)
4 out of 5 found this review helpful
This 2-disc bundle is an interesting edition in the sense that you get the movie twice, on Blu AND on DVD.
DISC ONE
The Blu-ray disc has the movie only in beautiful 1080p Blu resolution, of course, and featuring DTS-HD MA 5.1 surround sound plus French and Spanish audio tracks and English SDH, French and Spanish subtitles.
Disc one is why I bought THIS Misery - I already have a DVD edition - and, at this price, I'm glad I did it. Misery's Blu treatment is nothing short of spectacular. Since I was able to compare the 2 versions, with the DVD and the Blu playing simultaneously, it was easy to see the difference. It's not only Blu's higher resolution that reveals more detail - James Caan's 5 o'clock shade anyone? - but the colors are brighter and the picture overall is crisper. Same for the sound. The lossless (uncompressed) audio is a big plus even on a movie like this where most of the sound is dialog and creepy music.
DISC TWO
Is the 'curious' one, featuring the entire movie as a DVD and a relative large number of featurettes. I call it 'curious' because there is no mention on the back of the box of the movie's duplicate on the second disc - a mistake?
Anyways, besides the movie there's the obligatory 'this is how we made this and we had so much fun making it' featurette, named 'Misery Loves Company'. We get to hear from James Caan, the always lovely and talented Kathy Bates, director Rob Reiner and so on.
In addition, there is a SERIES of featurettes discussing 'stalking' which I will list because they are fun to watch:
- Advice for the Stalked
- Profile of a Stalker
- Celebrity Stalkers
- Anti-Stalking Laws
This is interesting because Annie (Kathy Bates) is not really a stalker. She is sick and she is Sheldon's (Caan) biggest fan but she's not stalking him, she only takes advantage of an opportunity.
Also good is the "Diagnosing Annie Wilkes" featurette where a psychiatrist explains that Annie was:
- psychotic
- bi-polar
- delusional
- paranoid
- abused as a child
and a few more other defects that I can't remember now.
THE MOVIE
I love Stephen King, I've read a lot of his work and watched nearly all King-inspired movies but I'm not his biggest fan. While a fan, I am objective enough to admit that not all of the King movies are great and some are quite terrible. It's not the case with Misery. Thanks to Kathy Bates (Oscar for best actress) incredible performance, Caan's showing that he can act and inspired work from director Reiner and photography wizard Sonnenfeld, Misery is one of those few movies that you can watch again and again and never get tired of it. I do watch it every couple of years and, thanks to the Blu edition now, I will enjoy watching the movie even more.
RATING THIS EDITION
This Misery earns high grades for the Blu version. While inside a cheap plastic case - the kind that has holes cut in it to save a few pennies - the 2 discs feature enough quality and content to qualify this as the best Misery so far:
- superior Blu rendering of the movie
- unexpected second copy as a DVD
- interesting, informative, actually watchable featurettes
- reasonable price
The 5 stars are well earned.
A chilling story that puts you in the face of fear! March 6, 2010
Joe Krenn (Pittsburgh, Pa USA)
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I love this movie. Stephen King is a master. You keep thinking thru out the movie, 'What is she going to do next?!' 'Will he come out of this alive?' Its such a suspense. If you enjoy this movie I would certainly suggest you get the book also which is even better, and a lot more grusome!
Misery February 14, 2010
Arnita D. Brown (USA)
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
A movie with both a plot, directing, definitive surprise. Makes you cringe when the "hammer" comes out. Well acted and suspensful, with two great actors. A very good thriller by King.
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