A Bloody Good Time 09.11.08: Six Remakes To Be Excited About

Posted by Joseph Lee on 09.11.2008

Sometimes remakes can be good!

Welcome to A Bloody Good Time. Last week of course we discussed the Poltergeist trilogy, as well as the curse. The responses were varied. Varied in the sense that only one of them mentioned Poltergeist. I love the comments though guys. Somehow there was a bit about Freddy's Revenge...I blame Arnold Furious. One comment I enjoyed though, was Ryan's diatribe:

I bet you could find coincidental deaths/problems in a lot of movies from the 1980's. I find your "evidence" unconvincing, relying on the fallacious notion that correlation proves causation. It doesn't..

I bet it made him feel good to use all those big words. Thanks for the laughs, Ryan.

This week I'm going into a topic that usually gets a lot of debate: remakes. Now I'm not covering the history or anything like that. I've done that before. Although I think my opinion from there is still the same as it is now.

My personal opinion of remakes is a negative one. I think that as a rule most remakes turn out to be pretty terrible. I also feel like movies that still hold up do not need to be remade. While some of them turn out to be fairly enjoyable, they still pale in comparison with the original and I've always felt most of them are unnecessary. However, in some cases it could be necessary. Horror producers could easily take an exciting concept that previous filmmakers couldn't get to work as a movie, and make it work. As is the case now, it seems as though they'd rather remake films that were very successful in hopes of remaking that success.

For the most part, nothing's changed. I still feel like remakes are, on the whole, unnecessary. However there have been some good ones like Halloween and Texas Chain Saw Massacre, but there have been many, many bad ones. This is usually when when a remake is announced, most horror fans cringe. It doesn't even have to be dubbed a classic. Something obscure like April Fool's Day can get remade into teeny-bop straight to DVD trash. Or Prom Night can get remade into teeny-bop theatrical trash. Most horror remakes ditch what make the movie good, stick in either a big name cast or an all teen cast, and go from there.

Horror fans don't get treated well when it comes to remakes. Is it any wonder we dread them? I'm here to say to you, dread no more! There are some remakes out there which look to be good! There could be various reasons why the remake is bad, but I'm presenting six horror remakes you can look forward to in the upcoming years. Some as recent as October, some as late as 2010. I'll give you the reasons why you should enjoy it, and as much information as I can. Some of these have just been "announced" and haven't had anything done yet.



Child's Play(2010)

Remake of: The 1988 film of the same name.

Director: Don Mancini

Starring: Brad Dourif

Yes, Chucky's getting an update. Should you be outraged? Maybe. I'm sure there are some of you who are. Let me calm those worries. First of all, Chucky creator Don Mancini and the voice of Chucky (as well as body of Charles Lee Ray) Brad Dourif are both coming back. That means we'll still hear Dourif's foul-mouthed voice and demonic laugh. I don't think anyone else could do as good of a job. They basically want to make Chucky scary again, and that makes perfect sense. Do you know where we last left Chucky? He had a gender-confused son (daughter?) and was shown masturbating into a cup. Now granted Chucky was only scary to me when I was a kid, but I sure appreciate the demonic doll more than the one we got in Seed of Chucky(2005).

The remake is more or less due in 2010, but no work has been made on it just yet. More positives included updated special effects, but there will be no CGI Chucky wondering around, if that's what you're afraid of. Mancini wants to make Chucky something that's not a joke, and I don't blame him. I'm looking forward to seeing Chucky get re-tooled and hearing Dourif's voice give him life again.



Friday the 13th(2009)

Remake Of: The 1980 film of the same name

Director: Marcus Nispel

Starring: Derek Mears, Jared Padalecki, Amanda Righetti

Oh no! Not Jason too! Yes, Jason's getting an update too. Although really, and this has been confirmed by several people, this is a reboot. Think of it as Jason Begins. Much like Batman Begins or Casino Royale, this is an attempt to reboot the eleven-part franchise. There are several reasons for this. The first is that New Line wants to establish their own continuity for Jason Voorhees, instead of going on Paramount's, which they purchased in the late 80's/early 90's. Another reason for the reboot is, what is there left to do with Jason as it stands now? He's already been given supernatural origins, went to Manhattan, became a zombie, went into space and fought Freddy. There's nothing left to do except take him back to Crystal Lake.

This is more of a reboot/sequel to re-establish the franchise, based on parts 1-4. From what I've read, Jason will not be much different than he was before. In fact, he won't be an undead being anymore, but more grounded in reality. This Jason will still stalk and kill teens, but he'll also set traps to catch them. No more teleporting and just showing up wherever teenagers are. This will not attempt to explain why Jason does what he does (that's obvious anyway) but instead give him more realistic means to pull off showing up everywhere and kill everyone. Why else should you be excited? This is back to basics with Jason. There will be a high death rate, lots of sex and lots of gore. So basically, all the essentials of a Jason movie are intact. It opens February 13, 2009.



My Bloody Valentine 3D (2009)

Remake Of: My Bloody Valentine(1981)

Director: Patrick Lussier

Starring: Jensen Ackles, Jaime King, Kerr Smith, Tom Atkins, Kevin Tighe, Marc Maculay

The evil coal miner Harry Warden is not known by many, but the original My Bloody Valentine was Paramount's attempt to cash in on their own successful Friday the 13th. Twenty-eight years later, they're dragging it out of the mothballs for an update. The director is the same guy behind Dracula 2000 and White Noise 2: The Light. The plot is about a man returning to his hometown ten years after a massacre that took the lives of 22 people, only to be suspected of those crimes when new murders start happening. The original had an evil miner and lots of unique kills, and is infamous for having nine minutes of gore cut out.

Why should you be excited? Well the original kind of sucked. It was nothing more than a cheap cash-in on Paramount's part and it showed. It was low-budget, poorly acted, and worst of all, boring. This new one promises a lot of gore, and best of all, 3D gore. How awesome will it be to sit in a theatre and watch a 3D movie again? Not only that, but 3D horror? That fact alone is enough to make this worth viewing at least once. Plus, Tom Atkins is in it! Harry Warden and his pickaxe return to theatres to kill more people on January 16, 2009.



Piranha (2009)

Remake Of: The 1978 film of the same name

Director: Alexandre Aja

Starring: No one yet

This creature feature was originally a Joe Dante film from the seventies. It was a horror comedy that was basically an attempt to cash in on Jaws. This is actually the second remake of the film, the first was in 1995. Obviously the movie is about killer piranhas infesting the waters of a summer resort. The original was generally well-liked and regarded as being equal parts terror and camp.

The remake will be directed by Alex Aja, who has High Tension, The Hills Have Eyes and Mirrors on his belt. He already has two remakes on his belt and now he's directing the Piranha one. He has said in interviews that it won't be a remake, really, but more of an homage. An homage to similar monster B-movies that were released at the time. Dimension has been working on getting this one made for about a year now. There have been rumors that this movie too will be in 3D, potentially giving us two 3D horror films in the same year. Not only that, but it's a new monster movie. It could be a lot of fun, and something to look forward too. The piranhas are back July 24, 2009.



Quarantine(2008)

Remake Of: [●REC](2007)

Director: John Erick Dowdle

Starring: Jennifer Carpenter, Steve Harris, Crystal Lowe, Jay Hernandez, Johnathon Schaech, Columbus Short, T.I.

To start, I haven't seen the original spanish film that this was based, but I'd really like to. While it's ridiculous that a movie is being remade only a year after it originally came out, that's what you can expect when it comes to foriegn films. [●REC] was critically acclaimed on it's original release, winning a few awards and being very popular in Spain. The original was about a television reporter her cameraman, who are assigned to spend the night shift with a Los Angeles Fire Station. After a routine 911 call takes them to a small apartment building, they find a woman who has contracted a rare strain of rabies. When they try to leave the building with those injured from a wild attack by the infected woman, they find that they've been locked in. Indeed, there are police, SWAT and CDC crews securing the building. But phones, internet, televisions and cell phone access have been cut-off, and officials are not relaying information to those quarantined inside.

The remake stars Jennifer Carpenter, both of Dexter and The Exorcism of Emily Rose fame. She's already got some horror credibility right there. She'll do fine with the screaming and playing the victim of the insane events that occur. The trailers have all looked decent and it looks like Cloverfield's style of filming with rabid people attacking everyone. I would compare it to Diary of the Dead but that actually was better shot and looked less handheld. Expect a lot of night vision spookiness and jump scares. If it's half as good as [●REC] apparently is, horror fans should be in for a treat. Quarantine goes into effect October 10.



The Wolfman(2009)

Remake Of: The Wolf Man(1941)

Director: Joe Johnston

Starring: Bencio del Toro, Anthony Hopkins, Emily Blunt, Hugo Weaving

This is my most anticipated film of 2009. Not just horror, but of everything coming out that year. Of course if you haven't seen the original that this is based on, you're in the wrong genre. The original Wolf Man was released in 1941 and starred genre legend Lon Chaney Jr as Larry Talbot, the titular Wolf Man. The original was such a classic that it doesn't need me to praise it. But if you're one of the few who haven't seen it, it's about a man who becomes a werewolf after being bitten. Lon Chaney brought emotion to the role, and he was playing a conflicted character who couldn't help the fact that he was a monster and sought desperately to die so he could be rid of the curse. That's pretty dramatic stuff for a horror film.

Bencio del Toro has some big shoes to fill when he attempts to make the role his own. But why should you be excited? The picture above is a start. How awesome does Bencio look in that makeup? No CGI werewolves here, my friends. That's Rick Baker's work, known for doing practical makeup effects. I don't know if you've seen the bootleg trailer, but it's quite awesome as well. It looks like the movie will be a period piece like the original, but with lots of gore and great werewolf effects. That cast is also pretty amazing so we can expect some great performances as well. Bencio del Toro should be able to give the amount of pathos that a character like Larry Talbot needs. I'm not saying the original needs an update, because it's timeless. What I am saying that if they're going to update it, they're certainly going about it the right way. I'm excited, because it's been a long time since we've had a decent werewolf movie. The Wolfman hits theatres on April 3, 2009.

And that's it for my look at what remakes you should keep an eye out for. I hope you're as excited as I am, and if you have any thoughts, spill them below.

Next week I'm going to look at the history of the Igor character, in anticipation for MGM's new animated feature. And I don't think it needs to be said at this point, but in October, you're getting The Top 100 Greatest Horror Films Ever. Still working on it, and the first installment will happen on October 2.