The Stand (1994)

Fanciful, disturbing, and wildly original, it announces the arrival of a fresh, bold voice in American cinema.

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

I was absolutely blown away with the mini-series. I have really enjoyed reading the novels and then viewing the mini-series, including IT and 11.22.63. I feel that the only true way to represent a Stephen King novel is to do a mini-series. You just need a great deal of time to capture all the important details of a King novel, let alone the 1000+ pages of the Stand. I do believe the movie watered down some of the more horror scenes in the book but Randall Flagg was spot on. Also, Gary Sinise was a perfect choice for Stu Redman. Even Stephen King, the legend himself, appears in the movie. Oh how wonderful it is to see him interact with the characters his imagination created. Wonderfully done and I can't wait to watch it again!

I enjoyed this TV adaption of the classic novel, It was definitely not as good as the book, But it succeeded! The Stand is my favorite Stephen King novel, so I had high expectations for it. I knew it was dated and it was from 1994 so I knew it would be pretty cheesy, that's not a problem though, I love Goosebumps and that's 90's... But I thought it was good and it was somewhat true to the book! 8/10

I have read the novel numerous times and had never seen the TV miniseries .Noticed it was on The Horror Channel , read the reviews and thought fantastic .Wonders if The Horror Channel had edited it and cut things up because it did not make any sense . Unless you had read the novel then abrupt cuts from one scene to another would have left you perplexed.Great first 5 minutes or so and then rapidly down hill .Has none of the subtly or detail of the novel . Badly acted and nonsensical drivel . Did I see another version to the great reviews given here ?Has been led to believe a new series of movies based on the novel are being planned .They can not be worse than this stinker . Gave up half way through .

TV mini-series adapted from Stephen King's epic apocalyptic novel about a plague that wipes out most of the world's population. A group of walking clichés survive, some joining the forces of good (led by Ruby Dee) and some joining the forces of evil (led by Jamey Sheridan, sporting a hilarious mullet). "The Stand" was never my favorite King novel, although I did enjoy it when I read it probably twenty years ago or so. This mini-series was almost doomed to failure from the start for trying to accomplish a story with such grand scope on a TV budget. It's directed by Mick Garris, who has directed many Stephen King adaptations (most of which are garbage). I'm not a fan of Garris but I will say this is definitely him putting forth his A effort. He's limited by his budget and lack of talent so he does remarkably well considering. Most of the Love Boat-style cast are adequate, with some standing out for good performances (Gary Sinise, Rob Lowe, Miguel Ferrer) and others standing out for how hammy they are (Ruby Dee, Jamey Sheridan, Matt Frewer). Others are just plain awful (Laura San Giacomo, Parker Lewis). On the whole, it's very watchable for its length but never reaches its potential, TV excuse notwithstanding. At times it is extremely campy and even corny. There's some entertainment in that, of course, but it hurts the film more than it helps because the story really needs you to take it seriously for it to work.