You know, giving it some thought, maybe it’s a good idea seeing the remake first. I can see the headlines now… that is if I was a famous film critic – I’ll just expect a scoff from Rory then. Needless to say however, this is a rather controversial viewpoint, that with discussion, I’ve gotten few people to concur with or even continue talking to me afterwards. As I begin this review, I have only a distant memory of the opening ten minutes of the original The Crazies (1973) but don’t worry, thanks to the majesty of written text and the “save” feature on my word-processor I will have miraculously seen it by the end of this page.
As if that wasn’t bad enough walking into a cinema to see a remake of a classic, I have a theory that it may be the right thing to do. Nowadays, it seems nothing sacred with remakes constituting a lot of what is released. Two main categories are most heavily “re-imagined” – foreign horror (the suits evidently thinking the people will not tolerate a film with subtitles) and the golden age of gore, 70s and 80s horror movies. As it stands a lot of my beloved films are set for this treatment, Robocop (1987), The Evil Dead (1981), A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) and most worryingly for me Tony Scott is rumoured to be remaking The Warriors (1979). The justification for this would appear to be that simply there’s only so many “Special”, “Collectors” and “Ultimate” editions people will buy of the originals before they decide enough is enough in their groaning DVD collections. The sad truth is that nine out ten of these movies will disappoint as has been the case – Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003), Halloween (2007), Friday the 13th (2009) and the essential reason for this is that often these films are shameless cash-ins on the original films hallowed name. Let’s remember, however, that “remake” shouldn’t necessarily be a dirty word. After all John Carpenters The Thing (1982) did wonderful things with the original 50’s sci-fi film given the advent of mind bending effects work by Rob Bottin, and Cronenberg’s The Fly took the Vincent Price classic to a whole new level with his body-horror stylings. Remakes can bring something fresh and exciting to the mix.
You’re probably thinking this should be in the “Ramblings” category now given I haven’t really mentioned Mr Eisner’s film yet but what did you expect, I’m not Jonathan Woss. The point I’m trying to get at this weary Saturday morning is that sometimes having to much love for the original may blur your judgement of a film, so logically seeing the remake first should be much less prejudicial approach.As much as I would like to have seen all of Romero’s back catalogue at this stage in my life – I’ve seen all the zombie ones, okay? – the fact that I hadn’t seen the original meant I could judge it without my emotions getting the better of me; as happened with Zack Snyder’s remake of Dawn of the Dead (1978) which I hated but many thought was decent enough. So here goes.
The plot of The Crazies is fairly simple, and influential enough for you to be fairly familiar with it. In a small and fairly isolated town, townsfolk suddenly start acting all weird and violent until before you know it the place is out of control. Sheriff David Dutton attempts to work out what is going on while the whole place descends into chaos around him, his wife Judy (Radha Mitchell) and his deputy Russel (Joe Anderson) and the military become a ever more sinister presence, as the nightmare continues.
Watching The Crazies I did still have the original in my head – “I wonder if that was in the original?” – but I was engrossed enough in the film at hand for it not to bother me. Director, Breck Eisner, as is evident in interviews, clearly didn’t want to do what a lot of these painful horror remakes have done in recent years. The changes in tone from the original, the political undercurrent so strong in Romero’s work, seem justified in the updated form this movie is – reflecting modern issues surrounding America. This is obviously a big plus as this is at the heart of many of George’s films – the novelty of zombies in a mall would wear thin in “Dawn” if there wasn’t the back bone of cricism of materialist 1970’s America. The other key change; shifting the perspective to the small group of characters, seems a good choice to make a more intimate and horrifying journey for our group through the film. And one more thing, I shouldn’t have to say it but this horror film has some pretty good scares in it.
So, now I’ve seen the original and I like it a lot but let’s be honest it’s not like it isn’t a film that benefits from a little big budget magic, in many respects. I’m not someone to be put off by low production value but others might and what’s more Eisner’s remake scales up the film and puts a modern spin on it. This could be justification enough but the real reason the film stands up is that its a really solid horror film and that is all too rare – almost as rare as a good remake. I enjoyed this film a great deal because enough thought was put into and well executed and you can tell it what wasn’t made with just the money in mind or without care of defaming the original. It’s no breakthrough in cinema but a surprisingly good night out at the at the movies – too few films of this genre are worth the ticket price. The Crazies (2010) will always be a companion piece to most but for me as a stand alone film it’s an impressive effort. So looking at it in reverse, as I have, it’s almost a shame this film won’t last anywhere near as long as the original but hey, maybe you should come up with your own ideas, eh?
As if that wasn’t bad enough walking into a cinema to see a remake of a classic, I have a theory that it may be the right thing to do. Nowadays, it seems nothing sacred with remakes constituting a lot of what is released. Two main categories are most heavily “re-imagined” – foreign horror (the suits evidently thinking the people will not tolerate a film with subtitles) and the golden age of gore, 70s and 80s horror movies. As it stands a lot of my beloved films are set for this treatment, Robocop (1987), The Evil Dead (1981), A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) and most worryingly for me Tony Scott is rumoured to be remaking The Warriors (1979). The justification for this would appear to be that simply there’s only so many “Special”, “Collectors” and “Ultimate” editions people will buy of the originals before they decide enough is enough in their groaning DVD collections. The sad truth is that nine out ten of these movies will disappoint as has been the case – Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003), Halloween (2007), Friday the 13th (2009) and the essential reason for this is that often these films are shameless cash-ins on the original films hallowed name. Let’s remember, however, that “remake” shouldn’t necessarily be a dirty word. After all John Carpenters The Thing (1982) did wonderful things with the original 50’s sci-fi film given the advent of mind bending effects work by Rob Bottin, and Cronenberg’s The Fly took the Vincent Price classic to a whole new level with his body-horror stylings. Remakes can bring something fresh and exciting to the mix.
You’re probably thinking this should be in the “Ramblings” category now given I haven’t really mentioned Mr Eisner’s film yet but what did you expect, I’m not Jonathan Woss. The point I’m trying to get at this weary Saturday morning is that sometimes having to much love for the original may blur your judgement of a film, so logically seeing the remake first should be much less prejudicial approach.As much as I would like to have seen all of Romero’s back catalogue at this stage in my life – I’ve seen all the zombie ones, okay? – the fact that I hadn’t seen the original meant I could judge it without my emotions getting the better of me; as happened with Zack Snyder’s remake of Dawn of the Dead (1978) which I hated but many thought was decent enough. So here goes.
The plot of The Crazies is fairly simple, and influential enough for you to be fairly familiar with it. In a small and fairly isolated town, townsfolk suddenly start acting all weird and violent until before you know it the place is out of control. Sheriff David Dutton attempts to work out what is going on while the whole place descends into chaos around him, his wife Judy (Radha Mitchell) and his deputy Russel (Joe Anderson) and the military become a ever more sinister presence, as the nightmare continues.
Watching The Crazies I did still have the original in my head – “I wonder if that was in the original?” – but I was engrossed enough in the film at hand for it not to bother me. Director, Breck Eisner, as is evident in interviews, clearly didn’t want to do what a lot of these painful horror remakes have done in recent years. The changes in tone from the original, the political undercurrent so strong in Romero’s work, seem justified in the updated form this movie is – reflecting modern issues surrounding America. This is obviously a big plus as this is at the heart of many of George’s films – the novelty of zombies in a mall would wear thin in “Dawn” if there wasn’t the back bone of cricism of materialist 1970’s America. The other key change; shifting the perspective to the small group of characters, seems a good choice to make a more intimate and horrifying journey for our group through the film. And one more thing, I shouldn’t have to say it but this horror film has some pretty good scares in it.
So, now I’ve seen the original and I like it a lot but let’s be honest it’s not like it isn’t a film that benefits from a little big budget magic, in many respects. I’m not someone to be put off by low production value but others might and what’s more Eisner’s remake scales up the film and puts a modern spin on it. This could be justification enough but the real reason the film stands up is that its a really solid horror film and that is all too rare – almost as rare as a good remake. I enjoyed this film a great deal because enough thought was put into and well executed and you can tell it what wasn’t made with just the money in mind or without care of defaming the original. It’s no breakthrough in cinema but a surprisingly good night out at the at the movies – too few films of this genre are worth the ticket price. The Crazies (2010) will always be a companion piece to most but for me as a stand alone film it’s an impressive effort. So looking at it in reverse, as I have, it’s almost a shame this film won’t last anywhere near as long as the original but hey, maybe you should come up with your own ideas, eh?
No comments:
Post a Comment