This Lesser-Known Stephen King Horror Is A Must-See In 4K

There’s a comforting familiarity to checking into a hotel — the reliably unchanging layouts, the fluffy pillows, the convenience of room service. At the same time, settling into strange new quarters can unsettle the more imaginative of us. How many people have slept in this bed before? Could any of the mirrors be two-way? Have you checked every little crevice for hidden cameras?

Two Stephen King adaptations tapped into the more disconcerting aspects of a prolonged hotel stay. Jack Torrance took over as winter caretaker of the isolated Overlook Hotel in The Shining, only to spiral into madness in a chilly retelling of King’s novel that’s cemented itself as a horror classic. With an auteur like Stanley Kubrick at the helm, unspooling unease from the Overlook’s labyrinthine layout and sordid spectres, and a cultural afterlife of viewers inventing conspiracies out of its ambiguity, it’s easy to see why King’s other haunted hotel adaptation has been overshadowed.

With a new 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray now out, though, there’s no better time to check into 1408. Based on King’s 1999 short story, the 2007 film follows supernatural skeptic Mike Enslin (John Cusack), who books the title room at New York’s Dolphin Hotel. No one lasts longer than an hour inside, he’s told, and 56 guests have perished there over the years. He’s unfazed by its macabre reputation, but over one unending hour, Mike experiences the malevolence firsthand.

How Was 1408 Received Upon Release?

The psychological horror grossed a tidy $132 million against a $25 million budget, good for a second-place opening at the US box office. Calling it the year’s best horror movie — high praise, given that 2007 also gave us Paranormal Activity, The Orphanage, and REC — critic James Berardinelli named it “among the best King-inspired motion pictures to-date.” It was also warmly received by Mick LaSalle, who called it “a more genuinely scary movie than most horror films” and “one of the good Stephen King adaptations.”

Inevitable (and unfavourable) comparisons to The Shining, however, spawned less enthusiastic takes. Admitting he was “thinking fondly of Kubrick’s film”, Wesley Morris said it lacked “the lunging horror and dramatic architecture to be remotely comparable.” Rob Salem got right to the point: “1408 is certainly no Shining. Not even the TV-movie version.” Still, most reviews were positive, even if the movie isn’t as well-remembered as other King adaptations.

Why Is 1408 Important to See Now?

It’s easy to see why 1408 might immediately call to mind Kubrick’s masterwork — aside from the setting, both center prickly fathers with fraying family units who seek out a stay at a haunted hotel and are forewarned by managers citing an on-site history of violent murders. Both persist anyway, anticipating the experience to be conducive to their writing careers. Both are oblivious to the horrors awaiting them.

Much like the impossible to map Overlook, room 1408’s layout shapeshifts, expands, and loops in on itself, adding to the sense of disorientation. Rather than induce claustrophobia, the space instead seems boundless, and the initially sarcastic and unimpressed Mike now appears small, alone, and helpless. A roving camera reflects his POV as his eyes dart around nervously. Painful memories intrude, blurring the line between present reality and past regrets. 1408 builds up its unsettling atmosphere gradually, with dread and confusion heightened through its sound design — the whistling wind is a constant presence, Mike suffers a sudden onset of tinnitus, and he eventually experiences auditory hallucinations.

The room is even calculated in its menace, turning on the sprinklers and shorting out the author’s laptop as he attempts to summon help. Unlike Jack’s rapid mental unravelling in The Shining — which King complained robbed audiences of “the entire tragedy of his downfall” — watching the rational Mike break and finally acknowledge the existence of a supernatural evil is what makes 1408 so harrowing.

The film is also terribly sad. Mike is revealed to be a talented writer who’s taken to churning out hack work after a shattering personal tragedy, and it becomes clear that he spends so much time seeking out ghosts so he doesn’t have to examine his own.

While the room tries to goad Mike into taking his own life, it also doubles as a portal into what his life could be like if he makes amends. In showing him all his lowest points, it makes him see how he could’ve acted differently. Four endings were shot for 1408, but the theatrical version got the “happy” conclusion, supplying a welcome catharsis absent from The Shining’s enduring, inescapable horror.

What New Features Does The 1408 Blu-ray Have?

Lionsgate’s three-disc combo pack includes the theatrical and director’s cuts, each on its own 4K UHD disc, and a Blu-ray containing both versions. Other features include:

• A featurette called Don’t Enter 1408
• Audio commentary by director Mikael Håfström and writers Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski
• The film’s three alternate endings
• Deleted scenes with optional audio commentary
• The Secrets of 1408: A behind-the-scenes featurette
• An interview with John Cusack
• Inside Room 1408: A making-of featurette focused on the room and special effects
• The original theatrical trailer for 1408