during the time of this movie's production King was doing so much cocaine that he had to write with cotton balls in his nose to stop the blood pouring onto the pages. true story.
I like how King unconvincingly claimed he made this awful movie so awful on purpose, as an homage to cheesy drive-in fodder flicks from the 50's or something.
I his book, "On Writing," he pretty much owns up that this movie was a travesty.
As for "The Shining," I'm of mixed feelings on that. While the movie was good, it was "Dune" good, in that if you'd read the book, it was like seeing selected scenes from a much larger story. The miniseries didn't have the same quality of actors, but the story was presented with more depth (and the scene in it where the wife gets gut-smashed with a croquet mallet is pretty damn gruesome).