Thomas Jane doesn’t think THE MIST’s controversial ending would have happened today

First time I’ve seen Franco Darabontfilm adaptation of Stephen King’S The haze, was at a test audience screening. I was a huge fan of King’s story and also enjoyed that 3D audio play that was released, and when the movie ended with that new ending, I felt like I was getting punched in the stomach. It hurt so much, but at the same time I admired that Darabont made such a big hit. Up until that point, I had never felt anything like this while watching a movie before.

The question is… if that movie had been shot today, would that ending have made it into the movie? The star of the movie Thomas Jane not sure if they would have gotten away with it. During a past interview with the Daily Dead, he said:

“I know [director] Frank Darabont was offered more money, such as double the budget, if he just changed the ending. And we all said, ‘No, we’ll take less money.’ […] I don’t know if you could get away with a ‘Mist’ today, it might be tough, but we sneaked it in and we’re proud of it.”

King’s novella ends with the story’s main character, David Drayton, catching a possible word through radio static; then he whispers a few words in his son’s ear. King writes, “One of them is Hartford. The other is hope.”

In the film, Drayton (Jane) shoots her son and three of the other survivors to spare them the horrors of being brutally killed by terrifying monsters. The gut punch came when not long after Drayton killed them all, help arrived.

Jane may be right. I think the studio could have pushed harder to keep the promising ending, and I don’t think the studio would have made the offer they did to Darabont, to give the film a bigger budget if they had kept the original ending. Regardless, what’s done is done, and that’s something they don’t have to worry about now. They had it their own way and while some people liked it, it also pissed off a lot of audiences.

Darabont has already spoken about the film and said he has no regrets about it:

“Hey, I love a happy ending just like anyone else. It’s satisfying. I have a happy ending, God knows. But I also love ‘Night of the Living Dead.’ I also love ‘The Thing’. I also love those movies that really dare to challenge the audience. Sometimes things just don’t work out and sometimes you’ve made the wrong decisions even though you had good intentions. That’s life.”

King was actually supportive of Darabont’s new ending, and the director continued:

“When Steve read the script and I said, ‘I’m not going to make it if you don’t want me to,’ he said, ‘We need movies that dare to piss people off. We need movies like that too. ‘ We need of that ‘Night of the Living Dead’ thing, where it’s not just tied up in a nice bow and there’s just this reassuring Hallmark bumper sticker.”

What do you think? Do you think Darabont would have gotten away with that ending today?