Greetings and welcome to my swamp shack I'm
Dr. Doc Dread (not a real doctor), a master of both time and space and a huge fan of horror movies. Come in , come in. I don't get many visitors here. Watch your step those power cords are high voltage. They are part of my experiments on dimensional travel. Pull up a chair and let me tell you about a movie I just watched "The Diary of Ellen Rimbauer".
What do you mean you never heard of it! You do know who Stephen King is?
His book sales are over 400 million and many have been made into films. Unfortunately some of those films just don't... but I digress. I was telling you about "The Diary of Ellen Rimbauer". If you haven't seen it yet you may want to first watch the TV miniseries "Rose Red".
"Rose Red" the miniseries was based on a novel by King. After King published "Rose Red" Ridley Pearson published a prequel to "Rose Red" titled "The Diary of Ellen Rimbauer : My Life at Rose Red". To be completely honest I didn't read it...but, I did watch the movie. Let me set this up a little for you. John Rimbauer (played by Steven Brand) is a filthy rich tycoon. John meets Ellen ( played by Lisa Brenner) and sweeps her off her feet. John is dashing, exciting and very very wealthy. Did I say he is also a sexual psychopath?
Ellen was too busy looking at the diamond engagement ring and the mansion named Rose Red to notice the missing girls that John was fond of visiting.
A little about the movie. Mechanically the movie was fine. It was shot well with interesting angles and edited into a coherent story. First airing in May of 2003 on ABC. Sweep week is in May and the major networks all attempted to draw huge numbers of viewers. The network with the highest rating (number of viewers) could then use those numbers to attract advertisers and determine the cost of advertising. Rose Red (the miniseries) and the King name was a huge success and ABC was hoping to capitalize again, but spent a significantly smaller amount of money.
The result "The Diary of Ellen Rimbauer: My Life At Rose Red".
(Without warning a fuzzy, white child sized critter bounds into the laboratory!) "Doc! Hey Doc! Hey Doc, do you want to hear a joke?" It interrupts enthusiastically.
Please forgive Bucky he is my creation and cohost on my show. What is he you ask? He is a "Ratbit" a rat rabbit hybrid with some human DNA thrown in. I was tampering with the laws of nature... it was a passing phase.
Bucky we have a guest. Go ahead tell us a joke.
"Why was the astronaut's diary blank?" Bucky asks his eyes wide and mouth agape in anticipation of delivering the punchline. He pauses timing is everything with comedy.
"It was filled with space." (He laughs at his own joke and bounces out of the lab as quickly as he entered.) I'm sorry about that. Unfortunately that isn't the only thing I'm sorry about. I'm sorry I'm about to give my opinion of "The Diary..." yada yada yada. I was disappointed basically that's my review. "Rose Red" was a decent ghost story reminiscent of "The Legend of Hell House" 1973 and similar to "The Evil" 1978 and let's not forget "The Haunting" 1963. "The Diary..." was more like a gothic romance with tragic themes, characters and consequences. Movies based on Stephen King's epic novels and his short stories are notorious for falling short of the base material. Though I didn't read "The Diary..." and though it wasn't written by The Master of Modern Horror my opinion is it falls short of actually being a horror movie. Thus I was disappointed. There was atmosphere and the players were adequate the sets were believable. There was even a valuable life lesson, don't marry for money. This movie may be better suited for a cable network known for appealing to female viewers than a network know for horror movies.
What do you mean you never heard of it! You do know who Stephen King is?
His book sales are over 400 million and many have been made into films. Unfortunately some of those films just don't... but I digress. I was telling you about "The Diary of Ellen Rimbauer". If you haven't seen it yet you may want to first watch the TV miniseries "Rose Red".
"Rose Red" the miniseries was based on a novel by King. After King published "Rose Red" Ridley Pearson published a prequel to "Rose Red" titled "The Diary of Ellen Rimbauer : My Life at Rose Red". To be completely honest I didn't read it...but, I did watch the movie. Let me set this up a little for you. John Rimbauer (played by Steven Brand) is a filthy rich tycoon. John meets Ellen ( played by Lisa Brenner) and sweeps her off her feet. John is dashing, exciting and very very wealthy. Did I say he is also a sexual psychopath?
Ellen was too busy looking at the diamond engagement ring and the mansion named Rose Red to notice the missing girls that John was fond of visiting.
A little about the movie. Mechanically the movie was fine. It was shot well with interesting angles and edited into a coherent story. First airing in May of 2003 on ABC. Sweep week is in May and the major networks all attempted to draw huge numbers of viewers. The network with the highest rating (number of viewers) could then use those numbers to attract advertisers and determine the cost of advertising. Rose Red (the miniseries) and the King name was a huge success and ABC was hoping to capitalize again, but spent a significantly smaller amount of money.
The result "The Diary of Ellen Rimbauer: My Life At Rose Red".
(Without warning a fuzzy, white child sized critter bounds into the laboratory!) "Doc! Hey Doc! Hey Doc, do you want to hear a joke?" It interrupts enthusiastically.
Please forgive Bucky he is my creation and cohost on my show. What is he you ask? He is a "Ratbit" a rat rabbit hybrid with some human DNA thrown in. I was tampering with the laws of nature... it was a passing phase.
Bucky we have a guest. Go ahead tell us a joke.
"Why was the astronaut's diary blank?" Bucky asks his eyes wide and mouth agape in anticipation of delivering the punchline. He pauses timing is everything with comedy.
"It was filled with space." (He laughs at his own joke and bounces out of the lab as quickly as he entered.) I'm sorry about that. Unfortunately that isn't the only thing I'm sorry about. I'm sorry I'm about to give my opinion of "The Diary..." yada yada yada. I was disappointed basically that's my review. "Rose Red" was a decent ghost story reminiscent of "The Legend of Hell House" 1973 and similar to "The Evil" 1978 and let's not forget "The Haunting" 1963. "The Diary..." was more like a gothic romance with tragic themes, characters and consequences. Movies based on Stephen King's epic novels and his short stories are notorious for falling short of the base material. Though I didn't read "The Diary..." and though it wasn't written by The Master of Modern Horror my opinion is it falls short of actually being a horror movie. Thus I was disappointed. There was atmosphere and the players were adequate the sets were believable. There was even a valuable life lesson, don't marry for money. This movie may be better suited for a cable network known for appealing to female viewers than a network know for horror movies.