tephen King's Red Rose is a tale of a haunted mansion that seems to have a life of its own. The horror master wrote the three-part miniseries specifically for the small screen, and as the story begins psychology professor Dr. Joyce Reardon (Travis) is determined to prove that paranormal phenomena exist.
She has become obsessed with a Seattle mansion called Rose Red, which was built in 1907 by Seattle oil magnate John P. Rimbauer. The mansion has a history of death and disappearances that began before it was even built, not to mention strange paranormal activity that seems to have stopped several
years earlier.
Determined to wake up the ghostly activity, Joyce gathers a team of six people with different psychic abilities and arranges a weekend visit to the abandoned mansion courtesy of her boyfriend and present owner, Steve Rimbauer (Keeslar). Key to her plan is an autistic teen-age girl named Annie (Brown) who has powerful abilities, perhaps powerful enough to wake the dead.
As the group quickly learns, the power behind Rose Red was John Rimbauer's wife, Ellen (Julia Campbell). She believed that she wouldn't die as long as she continued to build the mansion. The building continued for decades until the mansion became a maze of bizarre rooms, including a mirror-floored library, an up-side down room and stairs that lead nowhere. While the construction stopped after Ellen's disappearance, the mansion seemingly continued to grow on its own.
Things begin to happen as soon as the team arrives. Strange breezes are only the beginning, as one person in the group descends into madness and the rest are left to face their most horrifying fears. Before long, Annie and the others find themselves in a fight for their lives as it becomes apparent that
the house does not want them to leave. Ever.
A ghost story overstays its welcome
There aren't many surprises in Stephen King's Rose Red, but the miniseries has some signature moments that would have put King's stamp on it even if his name weren't in the title. No one can more effectively build tension, and using an enormous old mansion with a mind of its own as a setting is the perfect partner for a King tale. However, Rose Red isn't The Shining, and as too often happens with his past small-screen work, the miniseries would have benefited from a little less length and a lot more bite at the end.
King likes leisurely storytelling, and while the story could have easily started with Part 2 and skipped the long, drawn-out setup, it's easy to get caught up in the tiny moments of uncertainty and fear that will eventually add up to terrify his characters. Something moves under the carpet. Is there
someone under the bed? What's around the corner? As the tension builds, it becomes believable when madness or carelessness overtakes his characters. We understand why they're scared, because the same things scare us.
King can certainly be forgiven for making his miniseries two hours too long, but where Rose Red disappoints is that the material just isn't original and some of his characters are never fully realized. When the finale does come at the end of the third night, it isn't satisfying. The big secrets
aren't big or terrible enough to be scary, and there's nothing shocking.
The cast does a grand job of inhabiting King's characters. Travis, Keeslar and Brown offer strong performances and receive excellent backup from Sands, Ivey and Matt Ross. When actor David Dukes, who plays the antagonist Professor Miller, died suddenly during the production, King took on the challenge of trying to figure out how to preserve Dukes' last performance while making the story work. Overall, he succeeded; however, Dukes' presence is missed at the end.
The production is top-notch, with the house becoming a special effect all by itself. Much of the team from King's Storm of the Century was involved in the production, and it wouldn't be surprising to see a new King miniseries on ABC every couple of years.
