If you were to statistically break down the Stephen King stories that have been optioned for screen adaptation — the tightly designed dread of The Shining, the many unrealized versions of The Stand or It — you’d be left with more scripts like The Mangler than any other type of story. Based on one of the author’s 200-plus short stories, The Mangler follows a familiar pattern: an object or machine with some pre-existing eerie quality becomes possessed and contrives scenarios to butcher innocent passersby, while a flawed, fragile protagonist attempts to untangle the barbarism of both fate and human nature within their B-movie parameters. If you want an example of the dependability of this less ambitious King formula, check out Osgood Perkins’ The Monkey.
