Misery: Book vs. Movie
Rob Reiner’s 1990 film Misery adapts Stephen King’s 1987 novel. Injured author Paul Sheldon depends on Annie Wilkes for his survival, but her devotion to his books soon becomes a means of controlling him.
From Books Adapted
What changed from the book
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Annie's punishment changes from amputation to broken ankles
The movie follows the novel's captivity story through Paul's escape, but changes the punishment Annie uses to stop him getting away. The book has an amputation; the movie has the attack on his ankles.
William Goldman's first screenplay kept the amputation. Rob Reiner wanted to replace it with the hobbling seen in the finished movie. Goldman initially resisted that change, then later said he accepted Reiner's decision.
Where the book came from
King imagined Dickens as the prisoner
King traces the idea to Evelyn Waugh's story The Man Who Loved Dickens. In Waugh's story, a captive is made to read Dickens aloud to the man holding him.
While dozing on a flight from New York to London, King imagined a variation: what if the prisoner were Dickens himself? Misery turns the demand for more stories into a demand that their author write them.
About the book and the movie
- Author
- Stephen King
- Year
- 1987
- Pages
- 368Buy book
- Audiobook length
- 12 hr 11 minGet audiobook
- Narrator
- Lindsay Crouse
Paul Sheldon wants to leave his bestselling Misery romances behind, but a car accident places the injured novelist in the care of a reader who refuses to let him. Trapped in Annie Wilkes’s house, he must write to satisfy her demands while privately studying her moods, his surroundings, and every possible means of staying alive.
- Director
- Rob Reiner
- Writer
- William Goldman
- Year
- 1990
- Runtime
- 1 hr 43 minWatch on Amazon
- Cast
- James Caan, Kathy Bates
- Genre
- Crime, Drama, horror, Mystery, psychological horror, psychological thriller, Thriller
- IMDb
- View on IMDb
Rescued from a snowbound car wreck, Paul Sheldon wakes in an isolated house with broken legs and no means of contacting anyone. His rescuer, Annie, controls his medication and becomes enraged by his latest novel, while outside the house a local sheriff begins piecing together what happened to the missing author.
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