User Reviews

The bestseller writer Mike Noonan (Pierce Brosnan) is autographing his new release in a bookstore and his beloved wife, the painter Jo Noonan (Annabeth Gish), goes to a store on the other side of the street to buy a pregnant test. When she is crossing the street back to the bookstore, a bus run over her and she does not survive. Mike grieves the loss of his wife and decides to go to the house by the Dark Score Lake, in Maine, that he had inherited from his grandfather and Jo had spent a long time repairing it. Mike starts to drink and suspects that Jo might have betrayed him since his sperm counting indicates that he is sterile.

In the isolated house, Mike has nightmares and believes that Jo is trying to contact him. He also has daydreams and ghostly visions with the jazz singer Sara Tidwell (Anika Noni Rose) in a local fair in 1939. Mike stumbles in the town with Mattie (Melissa George) and her daughter Kyra Devore (Caitlin Carmichael) and he discovers that the powerful and mean Max Devore (William Schallert) is disputing the custody of his granddaughter Kyra with Mattie. Further he discovers that there is a curse in Dark Score Lake due a despicable action of Max in 1939. Mike decides to help Mattie against Max and to investigate further the mysterious curse.

"Bag of Bones" is a dark tale of evilness and curse in a town in Maine. The supernatural story is very well constructed along 157 minutes running time and is a combination of drama, thriller and horror. I did not read the novel by Stephen King but I liked this TV mini-series. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Saco de Ossos" ("Bag of Bones")

Listen, I read the book a few years ago, and it was amazing until the end. Way too fantastic to be legit. I am hoping this end is more in tune with the creepy supernatural aspect than an unbelievable crescendo storm on the lake. That being said, the problem, as always with King "movies" is that you just can't embody the fright of your own imagination into a movie, when you have already read the book. Also, the Max Devore character leaves little thus far to be desired in the field of visual horror. The way I envision him would be akin to a living poltergeist who smells like death. So, undoubtedly King fans are doomed to disappointment, but if you are seeing this with fresh eyes, it is totally entertaining. I will say, I hate that it is cable. Commercials disrupt the rhythm.

Was really looking ahead to this A&E production of Bag Of Bones. Been advertised to the hilt. My expectations ran high for a good Stephen King novel that would, for once, transfer beautifully to film. I was disappointed. The movie was bland and seemed to have little to offer. Noisy scare tactics and a voice repeating itself on vinyl became annoying. I was always looking at the moose thinking it would come to life as Jo. Brosnan did OK. All others labored on. No Standouts. William Schallert, AKA The Smucker's jam spokesman and his rock-hurling sidekick were actually the lowpoint of this effort.Hate much to be a "Half Full' guy but that's the way I see it.

Thank you

I'm reviewing this from a different perspective than most of the other folks here -- I don't remember if I read the book or not...although I am tempted now to do so. When I was young, and when Stephen King was a young writer, I scarfed down several of his novels, and adored every one...until "Desperation", which I didn't really enjoy. But, everyone can't be a gem. So I went on to "Lisey's Story", quite that book about a hundred pages into the story, and never picked up another Stephen King novel. And, I agree with other posters than more often than not, King's novels have not translated well into film.

Again, I either haven't read THIS book, or have forgotten it. So I am going to review the mini-series based on the mini-series...not the book.

I thought it was great. And I say that because I never could quite figure out where it was going (which is good in a mystery), but it also didn't jerk me around with implausible shifts in plot.

I enjoyed Pierce Brosnan here, thought he played his character just right. It made me recall that the first time I ever saw Brosnan was in another mini-series -- "The Manions of America" -- back in 1981...and thought he was a young actor we'd be seeing a lot of.

I also enjoyed this film because of the presence of William Schallert, one of those character actors who always had a solid career. Frankly, I thought he had passed over years ago, so it was good to see such a fine actor again.

Anika Noni Rose was intriguing as the blues singer. I'd like to see more of her in the future. Not sure I'd like to see more of Melissa George...played her part a bit too immaturely.

The pace of the photo-play was perfect. The first night built up questions in the viewers mind and some suspense. I wondered how they would have time to complete "the story" in the second night, but it was just about right. It was appropriately violent and gory...I wouldn't say anything was done to excess.

If you like old-fashioned horror stories, this is a good one. In a small way it reminds me of "Ghost Story". In fact, "Ghost Story" (by Peter Straub) predated "Bag Of Bones" by several years. I wonder if...

Save your soul, God's Butterfly trapped in a cocoon of flesh, and read the book! Or better yet - Listen to the audiobook read by Mr. Stephen King himself!! This mini-series was just terrible! The storyline was hacked to pieces and then put back together in a vague shape that in no way resembles the book, except that maybe it is about a writer suffering from writer's block up at a lake house. Everything else is just smashed together, doesn't make sense or is completely and utterly changed into something that had nothing to do with the book.

Pierce Brosnan is just okay as Mike, but he has no relationships with the other characters - which is the whole point of the story. He is supposed to be romantic and attracted to Mattie and yet it is not even believable because he talks to her something like two times the whole movie. There is no connection between Mike and Kyra. Kyra is far to old to even be believable and understandable with the storyline. (Most seven to eight year olds don't "play" in the street in my opinion) Other characters are just straight up changed or even gone from the screenplay. The lawyers are completely eliminated which is ridiculous! Suddenly Mike, who is a writer, can quote the law well enough that a lawyer/guardian-ad-litem just gives up his questioning.

Now I understand that fitting a book that takes around 20 hours to read into 4 hours of movie time requires some editing. But this was just chopped and hacked beyond all recognition. Save yourself and run to the library for any version of the book!

Better than average TV event presented in two two hour parts by the A&E Network. BAG OF BONES is an eerie mystery based on Stephen King's novel. Mike Noonan(Pierce Brosnan)is an admired novelist that gives a lot of credit to his wife Jo(Annabeth Gish), who always types the last line of his scripts. After the sudden death of his beloved soul mate, Mike is inspired by a dream to return to his lakeside retreat in Maine. His agent(Jason Priestley)presses him to come up with a new book with little time to work in; the pressure bogs down his writing process. Little things assure Mike that the spirit of his dead wife has traveled with him. Upon arrival at the retreat an unstable feeling permeates; Mike's dreams compel him to aid a pretty young woman(Melissa George)in a child custody case and at the same time go up against the most powerful and feared man(William Schallert) in town. A supernatural and compelling mystery unwinds with the visions of a dead blues singer(Anika Noni Rose) and her daughter. Is Jo's spirit somehow helping Noonan write his next novel? If only the first half of this movie was as good as the second, where the strange special effects tell the story. Being a King fan, I was not disappointed. Others in the cast: Deborah Grover, Matt Frewer, and Caitlin Carmichael.

I watched Bag of Bones straight through today and after sifting through all of the negativity, here and elsewhere, my thoughts are that while execution of the plot elements were pretty clunky at times, Pierce Brosnan was absolutely brilliant and engaging. The child who played Kyra was precocious and sweet without being annoying, and Anika Noni Rose (a Broadway actress) as Sara Tidwell is very effective. I'm irritated that reviews I've read have dismissed the novel as well, as being "blah". I haven't read it since its original publishing but my memories of it are quite good. It is one of my favorite of King's novels. The quasi father/daughter relationship between Noonan and Kyra is as touching as, maybe even a precursor of, the father in Duma Key. When you care about the people in the story, the supernatural elements are that much more shocking.

I also think people get too hung up on wanting a film adaptation to adhere to everything in the novel they love (and I have been guilty of this myself). However, I saw what was good about it. Enjoyment was definitely had.

That said, as far as films about ghosts wanting revenge goes, I wish it had been as perverse as a favorite of mine, Ghost Story (which is somewhat similar. The novel on which it was based was written by King's colleague on The Talisman, Peter Straub).

Like many of the other reviewers here I have to say I was VERY disappointed with this film adaptation. This book is in my top 5 of favorite novels that Stephen King has written so I was excited when I saw that they were doing a movie based on the book. WOW was I ever wrong to be excited....not only was the movie so chopped up and unrecognizable from the book I Loved (I've read it about 4 times and listened to it on audio even more than that) but the casting was absolutely HORRIBLE!!! Mike Noonan is only supposed to be 40 when he decides to return to Sara Laughs after being away for 4 years since his wife died of a brain aneurysm (not being hit by a bus!!!) I don't think that Pierce Brosnan has seen the right side of 40 in a NUMBER of years!! Oh, and Kyra is only 3 years old and therefore is more likely to be seen walking down the center of the road...not the 7 or 8 year old we all saw in the movie. When I read the book I really felt invested in the characters and even cried a time or two, while watching the movie I just cried because the move was so BAD!!! I just really have to wonder if Mick Garris or anyone else actually read this book at all? I am also curious of what Stephen King thought of the movie because he has said that this is one book that he really Loved...So sorry it got botched...

Writer Mike Noonan, trying to overcome writer's block following the accidental death of his wife, falls in with some oddnesses on going to the old family lake house.

I read Bag Of Bones on publication (the first novel after Stephen King's near-fatal accident, it was touted untruthfully as his final novel - this turned out to be inspired press in tieing the predicament of the main character to the personal circumstances of the author. I thoroughly enjoyed it: time constraints have prevented me from re-reading, so much of the detail of the novel has slipped from my memory. This miniseries therefore arrives fairly fresh and I shan't be comparing it to the book.

It's OK. There is nothing exceptionally good about it, nor anything exceptionally bad - it is simply a generic ghost story, mildly horrific, but with most of the scares coming from sudden shock moments. I can't warn viewers away from it: neither can I recommend it.

Director Mick Garris has had a lot of stabs at directing Stephen King stories - at least 7 by my count - and at best they have been adequate. Would that he could take a leaf out of Frank Darabont's book, with a success rate of 3 out of 3 so far.

Self-arranging fridge magnets ... self-ringing bell ... phone ringing with no caller ... regular recurring scary visions under the bed/in the murky water ... poltergeist-style flying objects ... self-playing gramophone/appliance of your choice.

... and as I sit here writing this ten minutes or so into the the second episode I'm thinking it's a shame it doesn't have the cliché-of-all-horror-movie-clichés : the cat springing out of a dark corner at a tense moment ... and then I nearly fall of my chair laughing... It does! (Using a raccoon doesn't make it any less cliché)

I really enjoyed the novel, and against my better judgment I was looking forward to this production. Very few SK novels have made great movies, but I thought the long two-episode format might give this one a chance to tell the story. But strip out the ridiculous abundance of ads (especially in the first half) and you're a left with little more 'content time' than a regular movie, and much of that time used only to pile on the scary-music build-ups to the in-your-face shock moments.

Yet another good Stephen King novel mutilated by Hollywood :(

Stephen King's Bag of Bones was one of the best supernatural dramas i have ever read, and the miniseries truly captured the setting and emotion of that story. A famous author, Mike Noonan (Pierce Brosnan) and his wife (Annabeth Gish) are at the book signing of his new novel when his wife decides to run across the street to get something. On her way back, she is hit by a bus and fatally injured. Trying to move on with his life, Noonan decides to take time off from writing his next book, a trunk novel, and vacation at his grandfather's old home, where his wife used to visit every summer. When he arrives, he begins to investigate a little bit into his wife's life there because before she died, she picked up a pregnancy test from the store.

Pierce Brosnan is ever-so convincing as Mike, a very distraught but faithful man with nothing to look forward to, and is easily manipulated by some of the old "demons" that reside in the small town in Maine. The effects and make-up are phenomenal, capturing the eerie tone of Stephen's works, as well as the emotional tone on the levels of Frank Darabont who has previously done Stephen's favorite adaptations of his works (The Mist, The Green Mile, and The Shawshank Redemption). This is definitely a worthy adaptation of Stephen's novel and should be seen by anyone who was a fan of the book.

9/10 Stars***

The suitability of Pierce Brosnan for the role of Mike Noonan, as the lead in "Bag of Bones" (2011) directed by Mike Garris, has been a hot topic among amateur commentators and professional critics alike. This miniseries, an adaptation of Stephen King's eponymous novel, has sparked much debate. One major gripe many have with the Irish actor, and there's some merit to their argument, is the seemingly shallow decision to cast him in a role that he dominates almost entirely.

His portrayal in this roughly three-hour adaptation of the Maine writer's tale, which apparently was another best-seller for King in 1998, has also been criticized for its lack of depth. It's undeniable, I must stress, that Brosnan could've delved deeper into such a dramatic character, especially given the ample screen time. We've been so used to seeing him in light-hearted roles like "Remington Steele" (1982-1987), as the "super spy" 007 in four installments (1997-2002), or in John Le Carré novel adaptations like "The Tailor of Panama" (1997), that it feels odd to see him as a grieving writer wrapped up in a ghost story. And I emphasize "ghost story" because, while King's work undeniably fits squarely in the horror genre (sometimes leaning into psychological thrillers or even sci-fi), this one flirts with drama. It could've been grittier if Garris had pushed the envelope, but he played it rather safe.

The thing is, Brosnan was the "chosen one." Perhaps it's no coincidence, considering his first wife passed away in 1991, and then in 2013, two years after his role in "Bag of Bones", his stepdaughter succumbed to the same illness as her mother. It's hard to gauge how much this real-life parallel might've influenced the producers' expectations. It wouldn't be surprising if the haunting pain of such profound loss created a palpable gap between Pierce Brosnan and Mike Noonan.

I won't make excuses for the overshadowing of secondary characters (including the villains) and their respective subplots, which I'm sure are fleshed out more comprehensively in King's original novel.

The plot does get a tad convoluted. It's caught between the punch of a standard 90-minute film and a longer series that could've better explored the intricate tapestry of stories King wove together.

To add to the mix, the screenplay by Matt Venne (and whoever else was on the job, as they seldom get a shoutout) crams so much information into the final act that it blindsides the viewer, creating a whirlwind of events and scenarios that's quite dizzying.

What struck me in several reviews is the flak one of King's go-to directors has caught, with many accusing him of overly sweetening a story that demanded a more distilled horror approach. In essence, they argue there's too much drama, reminiscent of the '90s trend in fantasy cinema that sprinkled feel-good vibes on characters who were once the embodiment of pure evil. Think "Dracula" (1992) by Francis Ford Coppola or "Frankenstein" (1994) by Kenneth Branagh. Both films, nodding to their original authors in their titles, championed this more romantic, adventurous, and even epic vibe. "Bag of Bones" isn't quite in the same boat, but if Garris decided to soften the edges, with King's blessing no less, there's probably a good reason. It's more in line with films like "What Lies Beneath" (2000) by Robert Zemeckis, starring Harrison Ford and Michelle Pfeiffer.

Technically, the film is on point; the cinematography does justice to the gothic settings blended with the old-world charm of lakeside cultures. This backdrop, rich in ghostly tales, contrasts sharply with the bustling city life from which our writer protagonist hails. The score by Nicholas Pike, in my opinion, is decent but not outstanding. And I can't help but roll my eyes at some of the rather basic special effects, which, as other reviewers have pointed out, border on laughable at times. I also found the blue-tinted, spider-woman-esque ghostly figures, reminiscent of early 2000s Asian horror flicks like "The Ring" or "The Grudge", a bit clichéd.

For those who prefer shorter films, fearing they'll nod off during anything over 120 minutes, the first half of "Bag of Bones" feels stretched, leading to a rushed second half with murky revelations. These swift conclusions can throw off those not in the know, much like the twists and turns in mystery series like "Poirot" (1989).

Often, movies and TV films follow a pattern: a slow start followed by a rushed climax. It's as if, after lulling the viewer into a near slumber, the creators try to jolt them awake, hinting that the best is yet to come.

Diving into the symbolism of the characters and settings, it's fascinating to see King's (and by extension, Garris's) projection of our collective fears, anxieties, and challenges. At the heart of it all is the image of the homo creatus (the artist, the writer), trapped between past traumas and future uncertainties, epitomized by the "writer's block" following his wife's death. The lake symbolizes the unconscious realm where we "bury" our unresolved issues, inherited from ancestors who rejected or even killed what was new or different. Enter Brosnan's character, thrust into the thick of it, tasked with breaking the curse. He's at the crossroads, following clues left by his late wife, both when she was alive and after her death.

Like any horror movie hero, Brosnan needs a medium. Plot demands place her in the "beyond," following a tragic accident where she's hit by a bus (I won't delve into the moot point of whether King's original had a different cause of death).

I reckon (and this is pure speculation) that Garris's choice to send the protagonist's loyal wife to the other side in such a dramatic fashion was to amplify the trauma's impact. Not as a paralyzing event, but as a catalyst for change. Her untimely death, and subsequent existence in limbo, serves as a bridge between Noonan and the spirit world, guiding him to uncover the truth. This need for her final redemption might stem from hints of infidelity suggested in the script, especially when Noonan, potentially sterile after a semen test, discovers she's pregnant just before her tragic end. This moral twist in the narrative forces her to play the role of a conduit between Noonan and the spirits, helping him navigate his journey, confront his own demons, and bring peace to a haunted community.