The Dark Tower (2017)

There is a scene in The Dark Tower where Roland Deschain (Idris Elba) is looking for a back exit from an Manhattan gun shop where he is being menaced by evil forces, he finds his escape behind a pin up of actress Rita Hayworth, an obvious homage to The Shawshank Redemption. This little moment, which pays tribute to a truly great Stephen King film adaption, only further serves to remind the audience what a piss poor one this is. Now I've not read any of the (currently eight) books in Stephen Kings Dark Tower Series, but I know they are generally well regarded, and even from this film one gets a sense that there is an interesting mythology here to explore. Unfortunately director Nikolaj Arcel and the screen writers blow through it all for a 95 minute mediocrity which is perhaps the worst movie I've seen theatrically all year. Were that this was at least interestingly bad, instead its lifelessly generic. Elba does the best he can in this situation, while the films technical lead character Jake Chambers (Tom Tyler) is just kind of there. Matthew McConaughey's villain 'The Man in Black' is hammy and never really given a chance to develop or seem truly menacing, even while he employs his mind control powers in ways that could have had quite the creepy effect if better handled. This should have been the start of a series of films with a slow burn approach to the material, instead its disposable and the length of a TV pilot. Sad. *