The Prisoner, the Pen, and the Number One Fan

Abstract

While much has been written about The Shawshank Redemption (1994) and The Green Mile (1999), two prison films that stick out as anomalies in Stephen King’s cinematic landscape and often garner shocked responses such as, “That’s a King film?” or “Stephen King wrote that?” from self-professed antihorror fans, no critical analysis currently exists that posits the film Misery in it’s rightful place: as one of King’s prison movies. Although set in a semi-comfortable rural farmhouse in Colorado, a far cry from the stagnant walls of Shawshank Prison or cell block E on Death Row with the infamous green mile, Misery’s main character, novelist Paul Sheldon, is an innocent man unjustly sentenced to a life of solitary confinement with no one to rely on but his cruel and irrational jailer, Annie Wilkes. Like Andy Dufresne of The Shawshank Redemption and John Coffey of The Green Mile, Paul Sheldon must somehow find redemption in the face of extraordinarily cruel circumstances and seemingly insurmountable obstacles. These circumstances and obstacles, along with his inner resolve to free himself from his unjust imprisonment and his eventual personal growth as a result of this experience, place Misery as the first of King’s prison film trilogy.