A man who specializes in debunking paranormal occurrences checks into the fabled room 1408 in the Dolphin Hotel. Soon after settling in, he confronts genuine terror.

Mike Enslin: [Olin gives Enslin the room key] Most hotels have switched to magnetics. An actual key. That's a nice touch, it's antiquey.
Gerald Olin: We have magnetic cards also, but electronics don't seem to work in 1408. Hope you don't have a pacemaker.
Mike Enslin: [into his tape recorder] General manager claims that the phantom in room interferes...
Gerald Olin: I have *never* used the word "phantom."
Mike Enslin: Oh, I'm sorry. Uh, spirit? Specter?
Gerald Olin: No, you misunderstand. Whatever's in 1408 is nothing like that.
Mike Enslin: Then what is it?
Gerald Olin: It's an evil fucking room.
Room 1408: Even if you leave this room, you can never leave this room!
Gerald Olin: You do drink don't you?
Mike Enslin: Of course. I just said I was a writer.
Father: [to Mike] As I was, you are. As I am, you will be.
Mike Enslin: The room's gotta be filthy. I mean, the sheets haven't been changed in... what, eleven years?
Gerald Olin: No no no. We're very professional here. 1408 gets a light turn once a month. I supervise, the maids work in pairs. We treat the room as if it's a chamber filled with poison gas. We only stay 10 minutes and I insist the door remain open. But still... A few years ago a young maid from El Salvador found herself locked in the bathroom. She was only there for a few moments, but when we pulled her out she was...
Mike Enslin: [sarcastically] She was dead?
Gerald Olin: No. Blind. She had taken a pair of scissors and gouged her eyes out. She was laughing hysterically.
[the problem about Mike staying in 1408]
Gerald Olin: Look, I'm not telling you not to stay in that room for your own good or for the profit of the hotel. Frankly, selfishly, I just don't want to clean up the mess.
Room 1408: You can choose to repeat this hour over and over again, or you can take advantage of our express checkout system.
[Mike looks into the other room and sees a hanging noose]
Gerald Olin: The causes of death in 1408 range from heart attack, stroke, drowning.
Mike Enslin: Drowning?
Gerald Olin: Yes, one Mr. Grady Miller drowned in his chicken soup.
Mike Enslin: That's hard to do, h - how did he do that?
Gerald Olin: How indeed.
Mike Enslin: [talk into tape recorder] Hotels are a naturally creepy place... Just think, how many people have slept in that bed before you? How many of them were sick? How many... died?
Mike Enslin: Look man, just give me the key.
Gerald Olin: Mr. Enslin, you...
Mike Enslin: Just give me the key! Listen, I stayed... at the Bixby House. I brushed my goddamn teeth right next to the tub where Sir David Smith drowned his whole family, and I stopped being afraid of vampires when I was 12. Do you know why I can stay in your spooky old room, Mr. Olin? Because I know that ghoulies and ghosties and long-legged beasties... don't exist. And even if they did, there's no God to protect us from them, now is there?
Gerald Olin: So I can't talk you out of this?
Mike Enslin: I think we've reached an understanding.
Mike Enslin: [after escaping from the ventilation shaft and falling back into 1408] Ah, its good to be back.
Mike Enslin: He gave me booze! Did he take a sip? I can't remember. Or maybe it was the chocolate! Don't take candy from strangers!
[Lily is reaching Mike Enslin via his laptop]
Lily Enslin: Michael? Can you hear me?
[Mike is freezing during a supernatural cold spell in Room 1408, but manages to crawl over to his laptop]
Mike Enslin: Yeah.
Lily Enslin: Oh, my God, thank God. Jesus, I've been trying to get through.
Mike Enslin: [whispering] Did you call the cops?
Lily Enslin: Yeah, yeah, they're at the hotel! Didn't you say the Dolphin?
Mike Enslin: Yes.
Lily Enslin: You're sure.
Mike Enslin: Yes. Yes. 1408.
Lily Enslin: Yeah. They're in 1408. The room's empty.
[Into tape recorder, as he prepares to step out the window onto a ledge]
Mike Enslin: If something should happen, if I should slip and fall, I want it known that it was an accident. The room did not win.
Gerald Olin: [pats documents regarding 1408's victims] I will let you have this, give you access to my office, you can take notes and put it all in your book. My only condition... is that you do not stay in that room.
Mike Enslin: You'll let me look at all that stuff?
[considering Olin's offer]
Gerald Olin: Hmm.
Mike Enslin: I never did get that drink.
[Olin pours a glass of the $800 whiskey, handing it to Enslin. Enslin takes a sip]
Mike Enslin: Ooh, that is good.
Gerald Olin: [smiling] Here, keep it. Compliments of the house.
[hands bottle to Enslin]
Mike Enslin: [after dropping the bottle into his bag and taking another sip] I'm still staying.
Gerald Olin: [yelling] Dammit to hell!
Mike Enslin: I was out!
Katie: Are there people where I'm going?
Mike Enslin: Hey... you're not going anywhere, kiddo. You're going to stay right here with us.
Katie: Daddy... everyone dies.
Lily Enslin: When they're old.
Mike Enslin: When they're much older.
Lily Enslin: Okay? And then they go to a better place. It's beautiful there, all your friends will be there.
Katie: Is God there?
Mike Enslin: Yes.
Katie: Do you really believe that Daddy?
Gerald Olin: Why do you think people believe in ghosts? For fun? No. It's the prospect of something after death.
Mike Enslin: [sobbing] No... no, you can't take her twice...
Mike Enslin: Is 1408 a smoking room?
Gerald Olin: As a matter of fact, it is. Yes.
Mike Enslin: Good, one less worry in the watches of the night.
Gerald Olin: Care for a cigar?
Mike Enslin: No thank you, I don't smoke.
Mike Enslin: Let's "Encyclopedia Brown" this bitch.
Mike Enslin: Stay scared.
Katie: Daddy!
Mike Enslin: No, you're not real.
Katie: I'm cold!
Mike Enslin: No, you're not Katie!
Katie: I love you Daddy. Don't you love me anymore?
Mike Enslin: Of course I do, sweetheart!
Room 1408: Five. This is five. Ignore the sirens. Even if you leave this room, you can never leave this room.
Room 1408: [Voice changes and handset begins to melt] Eight. This is eight. We have killed your friends. Every friend is now dead.
Mike Enslin: Why don't you just kill me?
Room 1408: Because all guests of this hotel enjoy free will, Mr. Enslin.
Gerald Olin: The first victim, Mr. Kevin O' Malley, sewing machine salesman, checked into the hotel the first week it opened, October, 1912.
Mike Enslin: Cut his own throat, right?
Gerald Olin: Well that's not the horrific part. Afterwards, in a fit of insanity, he tried to stitch himself back together using an old sewing needle before he bled to death.
[leans over Mike]
Mike Enslin: Easy, man.
Gerald Olin: Hotels are all about presentation and fertile creature comforts.
Mike Enslin: [describing the room] There's a sofa, a writing desk, faux antique armoire, floral wallpaper. Carpet's unremarkable except for a stain beneath a thrift-store painting of a schooner lost at sea. The work is done in the predictably dull fashion of Currier and Ives. The second painting is of an old woman reading bedtime stories - a Whistler knockoff - to a group of deranged children while another Madonna and child watch from the background. It does have the vague air of menace. The third and final, painfully dull painting, the ever popular "The Hunt". Horses, hounds and constipated British lords. Some smartass spoke about the banality of evil. If that's true, then we've in the 7th circle of hell.
[turns off tape recorder and pauses, then turns it back on]
Mike Enslin: It does have its charms.
Mike Enslin: [yelling at the top of his voice] We didn't do enough!
Lily Enslin: [crying] Oh god! What are you talking about? We did everything we could have done!
Mike Enslin: [still yelling] We should have helped her fight! Not filled her head up with bullshit stories of heaven, and clouds and nirvana!
[flips over coffee table]
Lily Enslin: [crying] She liked those stories!
Mike Enslin: [no longer yelling] I need to get some cigarettes...
Mike Enslin: They say you can't die in your dreams... is that true?
Mike Enslin: [staring at the endless door] Open it.
Mike Enslin: It's good to be back. That's enough of that. Alcohol.
[walks over to the mini-fridge and opens it, only to discover Gerald Olin talking to him]
Gerald Olin: I was just checking to see if the accommodations are exceeding your expectations.
Mike Enslin: YOU KNOW GODDAMN WELL THEY ARE! What do you want from me?
Gerald Olin: No, no, no. What do you want? What do you want, Mr. Enslin? You sought this room.
Mike Enslin: It was a job, I was just doing the job.
Gerald Olin: I beg your pardon?
Mike Enslin: My job, I'm a writer.
Gerald Olin: Oh, that's right, you don't believe in anything. You like shattering people's hopes.
Mike Enslin: Oh, that's bullshit!
Gerald Olin: Why do you think people believe in ghosts? For fun? No, it's the prospect of something after death. How many spirits have you broken?
Mike Enslin: What do you want from me? Huh? What do you want from me? You...
[starts violently ripping the fridge apart]
Mike Enslin: You little...
[kicks the fridge repeatedly]
Mike Enslin: WHAT DO YOU WANT? WHAT?
[slams the mini-fridge shut]
Mike Enslin: I want... my DRINK!
[repeated line]
Mike Enslin: All right. You win. You win.
Gerald Olin: Well done Mr. Enslin, well done.
[repeated line in flashbacks]
Mike Enslin: I'm going out to buy some cigarettes.
[first lines]
Mike Enslin: Hi. Mike Enslin. Checking in.
Mike Enslin: [after the toilet paper has been turned down, and the chocolates appear] Finally! Something to for me to write about! A ghost that offers turn down service!
Katie: [while room burns] Daddy... Everyone dies.
Mike Enslin: [Starts laughing hysterically]
Gerald Olin: What do you want, Mr. Enslin? You sought this room. Oh, that's right. You don't believe in anything. You like shattering people's hopes. Why do you think people believe in ghosts? For fun? No. It's the prospect of something after death. How many spirits have you broken?
Book Store Cashier: Where is the best place where I can see ghosts?
Mike Enslin: Guaranteed? Haunted Mansion, Orlando.
Mike Enslin: [yelling] I want... my *drink*!
[last lines]
Mike Enslin: [on tape recorder] I've got you now, Katie. Oh my God. I'm not gonna let you go.
[examining the mini-bar in room 1408]
Mike Enslin: Eight dollars for Beer Nuts? This room *is* evil!