Stephen King's Misery

Review of Stephen King’s Misery – movie to book comparison with special emphasis on a psychological profile of Annie Wilkes. (spoiler alert! – major plot points are discussed in the review below)

In brief the book was better than the movie (as seems to be the case with most of Stephen King’s works). The movie does change and modify certain aspects of the story, which seem to work well within the medium of a movie. Following Paul Sheldon’s car accident, the book takes place almost entirely in Annie Wilkes’ home, creating a particularly claustrophobic and confining atmosphere, while the movie had included additional characters and exposition to broaden the setting and to introduce some tension relief. For example, the characters of Buster and his wife Virginia, who are the town’s only sheriff and deputy, respectively, appear in the movie but are never mentioned in the book. Additionally, the movie really only touches on the psychological dysfunction that Annie Wilkes, the story’s primary antagonist, displays. The range in affective expression, her thought processes, and the means and methods of violence with which Annie is willing to employ are much more expounded upon and severe in the book.

Annie Wilkes describes herself as Paul’s “number one fan” and is obsessed with everything the author has produced. She rescues him after he crashes his car during a violent snow storm. Annie, who is trained as nurse, is able to provide emergency medical care and believes that it is divine intervention that she and Paul had found each other. This divine assignment is carried further when she reads Paul’s newest novel, Fast Cars, and becomes offended with the use of profane language in the book. She takes it on as her responsibility to help Paul live up to his truest potential by writing novels with “nobility”. In order to purge Paul of the profanities in the book, she has him burn his only draft. It isn’t until she reads Paul’s latest Misery novel, in which the main protagonist dies, does she become truly vindictive. She uses a variety of violently persuasive means to force him to write a new novel just for her, entitled Misery’s Return, which will bring her favorite heroine back to life. However, she’s interested in more than just this book and harbors a fantasy that she and Paul will form a romantic relationship, and in a sense, live happily ever after.

Annie Wilkes is a particularly disturbing and volatile individual. Paul learns during his captivity by reading a scrapbook of newspaper clippings Annie has collected that those connected with Annie have a way of dying from unfortunate accidents, including classmates and sick infants at the hospital where she worked as a nurse. From a psychodynamic viewpoint, Annie is an individual that operates from a borderline psychotic state. In other words, her thought processes and perceptions have a tendency to deviate from reality under stress, but at the same time, she has moments of lucidity and a self-reflective capacity that are not often observed in psychotic states. Her ability to slip into fantasy is a double-edge sword though. She maintains an active fantasy that Paul will eventually fall in love with and want to stay with her, which is consistent with what is termed as an erotomanic delusion, but ironically, it is also this very ability that makes the Misery novels so important to her. The book makes it apparent that she attempts to “keep up appearances,” in order to appear normal to the rest of the world. In this sense, she has some recognition that she has emotional problems, and she struggles to keep her more bizarre thoughts and feelings contained, which she does through several defenses. Indeed, there are glimpses where she recognizes that her imagined relationship with Paul Sheldon is only fantasy and that he will never really love her the way she desires. It is during these times, when her fantasies become threatened, we see vacillations in her affective displays that range from violent rage to despondent depression. For example, when Paul leaves his room while Annie is away in town, she takes measures (i.e., using an axe to cut off his foot) to ensure that he will not leave again or her rage when she finds out that he has “killed” Misery off in his last book. She goes to great lengths to preserve this fantasy, even to the point of killing police officers who come to investigate Paul’s disappearance. As investigators get closer to learning about what happens to Paul and as Annie struggles to maintain a façade that is slowly collapsing around her, she tells Paul that she has two bullets, one for him and one for her. This withdrawal into fantasy allows her to derive a feeling of specialness through her association with Paul and to ward off feelings of unworthiness and unlovability, which become activated when the fantasies are threatened. She responds with rage (attempts to control) or depression (feeling helpless). An extension of this is her use of self-idealization and other-devaluation. She preserves her self-esteem with the perception that her ideals and her way of doing things are the only correct way of thinking and behaving, which is reflected in her anger towards Paul for the profanity in his newest novel and her rationalization for the murders of numerous infants who were ill. She also frequently chastises and judges those who think and act differently than she does. Naturally, her behaviors are often met with judgment from others who don’t seem to understand why Annie would, for example, want to kill sick infants at the hospital where she was working in order to alleviate their suffering. Annie’s interactions with others have caused her to develop a certain degree of paranoia, which is not really fleshed out in the movie, but it’s illustrated in the book quite well with multiple locks on all the doors in the house, Annie’s extreme isolation from others, her not keeping phones in the house, and her perception that others are out to judge and persecute her.

The book and movie were both really well done. Kathy Bates’ portrayal of Annie Wilkes is spot on and fits the description provided in the book. It’s easy to see why Kathy Bates earned an academy award for her portrayal. James Caan, likewise, had the difficult job of conveying much by remaining bed bound throughout most of the film and using subtle facial expressions to convey how he was feeling. Each worked well within the medium with which they exist and both deserve your attention.

Book: 4 out of 4 stars
Movie: 3 out of 4 stars