The situation, though, is quite different for
Flanagan et al who are working in Kubrick’s
medium, and doing everything they can to
mimic him, right down to the dissolves. Flanagan,
who previously adapted King’s “Gerald’s Game,”
also wrote the script, which adds a return to the
Overlook Hotel not in the book.
Yet when “Doctor Sleep” stakes out its own
ground, it’s a far more palatable supernatural
thriller. Danny’s adult life is one of bar fights,
cocaine and one-night stands; he has been
working hard to submerge his “shine” with
alcohol. He gets clean, though, and finds his place
working as night attendant at a hospital where
patients, grateful for his ability to gently force
slumber, give him the “Doctor Sleep” moniker.
Scenes early on establish the movie’s wider
mythology — “The Shining-verse” — includes
others who, like Danny, shine. It’s a small number
of clairvoyant kids who shine brightest — fewer
all the time because of cell phones and Netflix,
we learn. Among them is 13-year-old Abra (the
exceptional newcomer Kyliegh Curran), whose
great powers she, and her family, are only just
beginning to realize.
But the downside to possessing the Shining
is — like the side effects of so many things —
psychic vampires. A gypsy-like band of them,
led by Rose the Hat (Rebecca Ferguson), feast on
their souls, sucking up their last breaths — their
“steam” — like a drug. The Shining is like food
to them, and as one of them says, “the world is
a hungry place.” They can recruit new members,
too, by turning those who shine into one of
them with the promise of near immortality. “Live
long. Eat well,” says Rose.