There is currently no shortage of Stephen King adaptations as the author's legacy continues to provide material for film and television, especially now that streaming services have provided more opportunities for longer storytelling. Considering the variety of filmmakers looking to tackle his work, it would be a horror fan's dream come true if visionary director John Carpenter were to return to the movies for another crack at King.
The works of Stephen King have experienced a bit of a renaissance lately, even considering the massive amounts of adaptations in the past. The two chapters of It have received two of the biggest box office returns for the horror genre, HBO's The Outsider has enjoyed critical acclaim for its blending of crime and horror, and there is a seemingly unending list of King adaptations in development, including CBS All Access' upcoming series The Stand and a host of remakes like The Dark Half, 'Salem's Lot, and The Tommyknockers.
John Carpenter himself has filmed a Stephen King feature, surprising audiences with his deftly fun take on Christine, a novel about a killer car that seems like it would be a schlocky disaster on screen. Unfortunately, despite his esteemed reputation by cinephiles of the cult and low-budget, Carpenter has expressed that he is all but retired from filmmaking, instead choosing to focus on music to satisfy his creative urges nowadays. In an interview with Consequence of Sound, he stated that he has no intentions on adapting any further Stephen King properties, stating, "Are you kidding? That's work. I don't want to do that".
John Carpenter Could Perfectly Adapt King's Style
It's a shame that the legendary director probably won't return to cinema at a time when Stephen King movies are all the rage. The two have similar sensibilities about the horror genre, relying on ordinary, relatable characters to face extreme manifestations of malevolence. There are certainly parallels between the everywoman Laurie Strode, who fights for her life against what Dr. Loomis describes as "purely and simply evil" in Halloween and characters like the Losers Club in It or Jake Chambers in The Dark Tower series, both of whom are pulled into a world of danger to combat ancient, unadulterated malignance.
There's a genius in the way Carpenter and King are known for their ability to mine horror out of the mundane, finding evil and corruption in the seemingly slightest encounters and occurrences. The suburban setting of Halloween is an obvious example of this, but Carpenter also explores this theme in films like They Live, in which a pair of glasses reveals anyone might be a tyrannical alien. He does this as well with the creeping cloud of The Fog, a premise that draws immediate comparisons to King's own novella, The Mist. This sort of storytelling is why both King and Carpenter were able to successfully portray a villainous car in Christine.
In Carpenter's Lovecraftian film, In The Mouth of Madness, the author-turned-harbinger of the apocalypse is even named "Sutter Cane" in a clear nod to Stephen King. Carpenter almost directed Firestarter before Universal took the job away from him following the financial failure of The Thing, and one can only hope that Blumhouse's upcoming remake will resemble this unrealized vision. Carpenter could have improved on The Thing-like extraterrestrial body horror of The Tommyknockers, the dystopian brutality of The Long Walk, or even The Running Man considering his classic, Escape From New York. In the meantime, John Carpenter has at least returned to Christine in the form of a haunting music video.