The Remake Jail Break

So I already told you about my Friday Night Geekfest Horror Movie Marathon All You Can Eat Chicken Wing/Cheesy Bread Orgypalooza of Ultimate Nerditude last week, during which my friend and I watched Frankenstein's Army. Well, we also watched the remake of Friday the 13th. And I liked it. You got a problem with that? Too bad. I didn't ask you. Also, I'm too old to give a single fat fuckwaffle what you think about anything I do or say, ever. I liked the Friday the 13th remake so sue me. And then eat me. Raw. With a side dish of kiss my fat ass.

I mean, what's not to like? It had big bouncy boobies in it (although that first set looked really fakey. I've seen hubcaps with more give to them). Truckloads of people having so much sex that they were having sex at the same time that they were having sex. Massive fistfuls of substance abuse all up in your face. All of the stereotypes you could possibly want: the slut, the popped-collar douche, the black guy, the Asian guy, the stoner, the virginal brunette, the emo hero boy, the gimp, the goon, the shame filled brother, the hapless Geisha and the pull-apart voodoo Kenny.

And I ain't even gonna lie. That scene where Jason strings up Miss Torpedo Tits over a roaring campfire in her sleeping bag and lets her burn alive, screaming in agony all the while? That was fucked up. Really. Fucked. Up.

No, it wasn't a perfect movie. And yeah, it was produced by Michael Bay. But it wasn't directed by Ulli Lommel. And it wasn't any more exploitative and/or superficial than the original Friday the 13th was. No, seriously - have any of the people who swear by the original Friday the 13th as a steadfast classic even watched it lately? There's not much in the way of character development or believability going on there. Slashers are just that: slashers. You're not supposed to forge deep and meaningful emotional connections with the cast. You're supposed to alleviate stress by living vicariously through the killer, whose point-of-view we are often forced into during the murder scenes. You're watching your cheating shit of an ex get slaughtered, your boss eviscerated like a cow, your absent father getting his comeuppance, your overbearing mother stifled, That Girl who was mean to you in gym class get her pretty face stuffed right up her razor cunt, That Boy who teased you at the bus stop castrated and emasculated, etc. That's all slasher films are: pressure release valves. No remake of a slasher ever strives to be better than its predecessor, only more accessible to the current generation.

Y'know what? There's a lot of remakes I actually enjoyed. I'm not a purist by any means. I don't automatically hate remakes just because they're remakes...well, except for The Wicker Man, but come on. That wasn't even a remake, it was a cinematic ass rape. But that's a whole other article.

Anyway, I've decided to piss you all off and further alienate myself from the horror community by listing the remakes of horror "classics" that I enjoyed. I'm not saying I liked them better than the originals, just that I didn't hate them the way I was expected to by my colleagues. Oh wait, I don't have any colleagues.. I'm a curmudgeonly horror hermit. GET OFF MY LAWN!!!

Horror Remakes That I Liked So Fucking Sue Me:

The Hills Have Eyes (2006)

Remake of: The Hills Have Eyes (1977)

Things I Liked About the Remake: The carefully planned and executed car accident, because that uber-convenient bunny from the original just didn't work for me. The original also didn't age very well and the terminology was badly dated. The cast was aces. Not that the original cast wasn't, but this time around, the cannibals actually looked like irradiated mutations instead of rejects from the Spahn Ranch.

Things I Hated About the Remake: The relationship between the mutants and the gas station attendant really wasn't all that clear, and indeed, only fans of the original would know that the elderly gas station attendant was in fact the father of Papa Jupiter and grandfather to all of the various and assorted mutants, i.e. Ruby, Lizard, Pluto, Cyst and Big Brain. With that link lost, so is the idea of Family VS. Family, which is way scarier than Designated Good White American Family VS. Dirty Ugly Monsters Who Hate America. Pluto's makeup was a tad too derivative of Sloth from The Goonies and therefore instilled no terror within me. I wasn't happy about the death of Ruby either, which also did not occur in the original. And was it just me or did the entire undercurrent have the subtle stink of right wing patriotism smeared all over it?

The Grudge

Remake of: Ju-on (2002)

Things I Liked About the Remake: Yeah, I admit that the following is going to sound racist as hell, but I couldn't tell the characters apart in the original. They were all Japanese and they all looked the same, because I'm a white trash cracker with zero skin pigment and, uh...'Murrica. Anyway, throwing some blond Americans into the mix made the storyline easier to follow.

Things I Hated About the Remake: Bill Pullman. God I hate that man. I don't even know why, he just reminds me of a pervy ice cream truck driver who purposely drops your change so he can see your underpants when you bend over to retrieve it.

Dawn of the Dead

Remake of: Dawn of the Dead (1979)


Things I Liked About the Remake: Bigger cast = more action. Sure, they still make a statement about the emptiness of consumerism by indulging in all the formerly unattainable luxuries that the now abandoned mall has to offer, but there's also survivors to take in, wounds to dress, zombies to kill, etc. The boredom of the survivors never extends to the audience.

Things I Hated About the Remake: I really wish that the zombie baby had eaten its way out of its mothers womb. Now that would have been cool!

Carrie

Remake of: Carrie (1979)

Things I Liked About the Remake: The Climactic Prom Scene. Rather than standing stock still and trancelike, this Carrie is super mega hella fucking pissed. There is no doubt that she is the one who is destroying the gym and killing her classmates, and her infuriated screams and violent gestures are being released by a vessel who has been sealed shut for seventeen years. I also really liked the expanded relationship between Carrie and her mother, and the subtle hint that Mom is also telekinetic but suppresses it. Mrs. White clearly loves her daughter and is capable of expressing it, unlike Piper Laurie's unforgiving, unflinching Jesus Zombie. Also, thank you for sparing the gym teacher and casting a brighter light on the true motivations of Sue and Tommy.

Things I Hated About the Remake: The girl who played Sue Snell couldn't act worth a shit. Also, it's a little difficult to believe that, in this day and age of free internet access via the school library, Carrie wouldn't know jack shit about her menstrual period. That's a plot point that was easier to buy back in the still-somewhat-innocent 1970s.

Quarantine

Remake of: [REC] (2007)

Things I Liked About the Remake: It didn't feel the need to change the plot (much) but rather expanded on it, giving us a bigger backstory with the firemen and the handing off of Alpha Male roles. The origin of the disease is perhaps the biggest change to the story, but somehow I doubt that the largely agnostic American population would have grasped all of the cultural intricacies of [REC]'s demonic plague. Helmed by the directors of The Poughkeepsie Tapes, Quarantine retains all of the gritty realism of [REC] and casts people who look like everyday residents of an anonymous metropolis.

Things I Hated About the Remake: It spawned a really abysmal, shitcaked hemorrhoidal butthole of a sequel. That's all I got.

Maniac

Remake of: Maniac (1980)

Things I Liked About the Remake: Elijah Wood. He's diminutive, pretty cute and deceptively nerdy. Therefore, I can more readily believe that he'd attract the attention of a pretty girl moreso than I could accept Caroline Munro would be interested in anything about greasy, bug-eyed, creepy Joe Spinell unless it involved filing a restraining order against him.

Things I Hated About the Remake: I kinda wish they'd made Anna's jerky boyfriend a douchey white guy instead of a stereotypical obnoxious black guy, but that's just nitpicking.

And just to balance things out...

Remakes That Can Suck My Non-Existent Lady Cock

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre

Black Christmas

The Amityville Horror

Poltergeist

The Uninvited

Evil Dead

I Spit On Your Grave

Last House on the Left

Salem's Lot

The Omen

Psycho

Shutter

The Ring

Happy now?