Misery

Rob Reiner’s hobbling scene differs from the novel: in Stephen King’s book Annie Wilkes cuts off Paul Sheldon’s foot with an axe and cauterises it with a propane torch, while here she breaks his ankles with a sledgehammer. The book’s version cost the project its first director, George Roy Hill, who could not hear himself calling action on it. Reiner and producer Andrew Scheinman rewrote the scene without William Goldman, who was furious. Goldman later wrote he was wrong: at the screening it was horrific enough, and done his way the audience would have hated Annie. Under it plays Liberace’s Moonlight Sonata, which composer Marc Shaiman believes was Reiner’s idea, and the legs are KNB EFX gelatin prosthetics cast from James Caan’s. Goldman wrote Annie with stage actress Kathy Bates in mind, and Reiner says he cast her after the first line of her reading. It was the film’s only Academy Award nomination, and she won Actress in a Leading Role. Genoa, Nevada got four working buildings to play Silver Creek. A good fit if you want what Reiner called a chess match between artist and fan, with Caan in a bed or wheelchair for most of it. Not for anyone unwilling to see an ankle buckle in close up; it is brief but shot for exactly that.