Trailer Review: Point Break

Yeah, that's right. Point. Break.

Despite it being remade once already as The Fast and the Furious, some genius at Warner Brothers thought he'd mine XXX for inspiration for a(nother) Point Break remake.

Because being an expert in one extreme sport means your're an expert in all extreme sports. And demolition. Does Warner Bros know how long it takes become brilliant at gliding? Surfing and snowboarding are not interchangeable. You can't just replace waves with snow and have at it. Okay, I admit I'm not an extreme sportsman. -woman. -person. I am a really good skier, though, but that doesn't mean I can rollerblade worth a damn.

And I can't be sure who's side I'm supposed to be on. The cops or the robbers. I mean, I understand that's the point, but these guys are dropping dollar bills on impoverished communities, for chrissakes. But the lead robber looks like kind of a douche, so that's a strike against.

And another thing: that "law of gravity" line might sound good, but it points to a general misunderstanding of both gravity and law. I know no one'll ever say, "The only law that matters is Newton's Law of Universal Gravitation that allows us to calculate the gravitational pull between me and the Earth," before heroically pitching themselves off a cliff. But still. What he really means is the theory of gravity. Unfortunately, there's no good set-up for that.

Johnny Utah

Do you have any idea how many laws 

you've broken? A lot. The answer is a lot. 

That makes you a bad person, in theory.

Bodhi

The only theory that matters is gravity.

I say scrap the whole gravity word play and with it all attempts at cleverness. Because you're bad at it.

Johnny Utah

Do you have any idea how many 

laws you've broken?           

Bodhi

Do you have any idea how many 

fucks I give?                 

I'm guessing the answer is zero. Zero fucks. Which is exactly the same amount of fucks given by everyone who brought this idea to life.

(Re)making Mistakes

Indeed, a music video may be visually stunning, but few have any narrative structure.  Is it reasonable to expect a director skilled in short bursts of non-linear eye candy to be able to interpret and visually recreate a feature-length script?  Or is it more a problem of the filmmakers not understanding the subject matter?  I ask because Platinum Dunes' A Nightmare on Elm Street remake is about to hit theatres, which I view as yet another misguided and lazy cash-grab.

In his article, 'Horror Will Eat Itself', Kim Newman reflects on a recent trend in horror: the remake.  He points out that horror has been "remade, sequelised and recycled" from the very beginning.  The Universal monsters, Dracula and Frankenstein in particular, as well as Night of the Living Dead, are proof of that.  The problem, however, is that remaking a movie "because its title has lingering name-recognition value...isn't the same as tackling a primal gothic myth".  Dracula, for instance, has been remade numerous times, but each film owes its genius to the original, whereas, to follow Newman, Let The Right One In, offers another take on the classic vampire.  A remake, he writes, "[confirms] a movie's place in some pantheon while suggesting we really don't need to look at it any more."

Type "Dracula" into IMDB and see what happens. 

Although I certainly don't respect the greed that dives the remake business, I can understand it.  But what I don't understand is how these films manage to miss the mark.  And I'm not talking about updated themes for modern audiences, wherein communism is replaced with home-grown terrorism.  I mean remakes that fail to capture the essence of the original.  Permit me to borrow once again from Newman who notes the remake of Dawn of the Dead was modernized through the use of fast-moving zombies, and Romero's original commentary on consumerism is downplayed "to the point of invisibility".  Indeed, there is much to be feared from a speedy zombie, but societal collapse from within is more terrifying in the long run.  Alas, Zack Snyder didn't seem to think so.

The heart of the problem, I think, is culture.  Friday the 13th, remade by Platinum Dunes in 2009 was one the most highly anticipated movies of the year. Preying upon the cult status of the F13 franchise, F13 '09 was meant to be part remake, part sequel, appealing to old and new fans alike.  An unabashed rip-off of Halloween, F13 was made to capitalize on audience blood lust.  The two are very different films, and though Cunningham owes much to Carpenter, the movies diverge on almost every point.  The thing about F13 is that is was a mystery--the killer's identity was shocking, unexpected, possibly idiotic, but still a surprise.  Jason only made his first appearance in the sequel, and it wasn't until part III that he donned the hockey mask.  Four years after the original premiered, Jason Voorhees was canonized.  Ironically the film that gave us the iconic Jason--masked and macheted--was titled Friday the 13: The Final Chapter.

Platinum Dunes' ambitious requel had 10 movies and 29 years of history to draw upon--much too much to cram into one film.  Accumulated over the years, the culture and fandom of F13 is far greater than the sum of its parts, and any remake of the original would necessarily have to transcend the source material and still remain faithful to the story; it's an near-impossible task, and the resulting film was a disjointed, unimaginative flop that failed to resonate with either the old guard or the new.  Part of my argument here is the franchise was simply too big to remake all over again: the story told over parts I and II changes drastically as the killer switches from mother to son, and then changes again in part VI from human to undead thing.  F13 '09 sought to cover all this ground, and in so doing, managed to shift the story's focus from victim to killer.

Muscling in on My Bloody Valentine's territory, the film could have premiered in March, which also had a Friday the 13th.

What the first slashers (perhaps subconsciously) figured out, and what many subsequent remakes have failed to grasp is these movies are about the victims.  Not a single entry in either the Halloween, Friday the 13th, or A Nightmare on Elm Street franchise (with the possible exception of Freddy Vs Jason, which is a duck of a different colour) feature their killer as the lead.  Indeed, over the years Michael, Jason, and Freddy developed star power, but the narratives always focused on the experiences of the victims.  As noted by Noel Carroll, the audience takes its cues from the positive human characters in the film; if the protagonist is afraid, so too are the people watching.  But, if the audience has no one to identify with, they won't invest emotionally in the proceedings and the film will cease to be frightening.  Recasting the monster as the lead does just that--it precludes the audience being afraid.

Cannibalizing genre staples, as Platinum Dunes seems intent on doing, is indeed putting an end to horror, or at least the slasher.  Movies about teens getting killed have given way to films about guys killing teens, and though it may well be disgusting, it's just not that scary.  So, as originals give way to remakes and audiences are increasingly alienated from the horror onscreen, are we indeed witnessing a genre in transition? 


References

Carroll, Noel
1984  The Nature of Horror. The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 46(1), pp. 51-59.

Newman, Kim
2009  Horror Will Eat Itself. Sight and Sound 19(5), pp. 37-38.

The Echo

Recently I posted a rant about remakes of foreign horror movies. I complained they were unnecessary and, by definition, of low quality. Well, I might now have make room for a large serving of humble pie because I just watched The Echo and it was all right.

After being released on parole, Bobby moves into his dead mother's apartment. He doesn't know much about what happened to her, but he finds out that she had locked herself in her closet and eventually starved to death. While cleaning up, Bobby finds a tape recorder, and message from his mother--the mad ravings of a woman haunted by strange noises. But Bobby hears the noises too. He can also hear his neighbours fighting, and is privy to the domestic violence taking place next door. Eventually he decides to take action against the abuser, but when that proves to be unsuccessful, Bobby is at a loss as to what to do. After another neighbour dies, and the sounds in his apartment begin to haunt him at work, Bobby is determined to get to the bottom of things. Only, he doesn't like what he finds.

This film is a remake of a 2004 Filipino horror movie called Sigaw. Both Sigaw and The Echo were directed by Yam Laranas, and from what I understand, the latter preserves a lot of the atmosphere of the original. In truth, I know very little about Sigaw, but I do know the main character was recast as an ex-con for the American version--a change I find to be wholly unnecessary.

Without embarking on too much of a tirade, I will say that I can think of no good reason why Bobby should be a newly-minted former criminal. His backstory adds nothing to his character and reads as a deliberate attempt to infuse some extra drama into the proceedings. Though Bobby is trying to put his life back together, he encounters a certain amount of opposition because, unsurprisingly, people are wary of him. However, when his neighbour dies, Bobby is questioned by the police but he's never suspected of murder even though we're meant to expect it. What's more is that when we come to the film's climax, Bobby's checkered past does nothing to influence the events onscreen.

I won't go so far to say the film doesn't live up to expectations, it's just that it appears to be building up to something that is quickly forgotten when the main plot kicks in. The movie also delivers a strong message about civic duty, but, in counter to this is another message about consequences, which has the unfortunate effect of undermining the movie's point. Because Bobby was sent up for involuntary manslaughter, he was, essentially, punished for protecting his girlfriend from a potential rapist. Should he now attempt to protect a complete stranger, when it's likely he might suffer for it? His mother chose not to help and it drove her insane. Thus, The Echo seems to ask its audience to first consider the consequences of your actions (or inaction) before making a final decision even though, in the world of the film, taking action is always the right thing to do.

I'll admit, I had this movie figured out early on, but the film still succeeds in creating a brooding atmosphere. The plot's slow-burn is piqued by a few good creepy moments. All-in-all not a bad film, and it speaks out loudly against domestic violence, abuse, and apathy.

Bad Ideas About Good Things

I found out today that Spielberg will not be remaking Oldboy with Will Smith. This is good news.


I had a conversation/argument with a friend about film. He argued that all movies should be made with *all audiences* in mind. To be fair, he was extrapolating from Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds, believing the movie to be both insulting to Germans and inaccessible to Anglos. But his point was that a filmmaker must keep in mind that diverse audiences around the world will likely see his film and said filmmaker must therefore make a movie to which all peoples can relate. I disagreed.

His argument brought to mind this one time I went to TIFF. My friends and I saw Mechanism. It's a great movie, very violent and painted a grim picture of Yugoslavia. The director was there for Q&A and this woman in the crowd stood up and denounced him and his film, telling him that as an artist, it was his responsibility to produce something beautiful and positive. In response the director said that, as a filmmaker, it is his responsibility to make movies. Nothing more.

Movies are made to be seen. That's a given. But most filmmakers are working within a particular culture, following a particular set of rules or values, and are, at times, circumscribed by particular directives within the film industry. All this is to say that a film made by country X is generally best understood by audience X. But that doesn't preclude the film from being shown in countries Y and Z--it's just the nature of the business.

Maybe I'm missing the point.

The remake industry is huge--I understand that. But I don't understand why. I don't understand why Hollywood deems it necessary to "Americanize" foreign film. A good movie will get asses in seats, weather it be in English or Greek. Granted there are movie buffs out there who prefer not to "read the movie" (my roommate is one), but I feel these people are both being cheated and cheating themselves out of a lot a really great films. The cultural appropriation and assimilation that takes place when a film is remade by Hollywood strips the movie of what made it special in the first place. I'm not only talking about story, I mean the movie as a whole--they way it looks, its atmosphere, sounds, editing, etc.

So, getting back to my disgruntled friend, what he fails to understand is that film will always find an audience. I, for example, like J-horror and though I don't speak the language or understand a lot about the culture, my personal enjoyment isn't lessened any because of these shortcomings. However, it would seem to me that Hollywood thinks differently. And what's worse is their apparent (or presumed) misunderstanding of the source material. Let The Right One In is being remade as Let Me In and this change in title puts an entirely different spin on things.

Do I think Spielberg could have done something interesting with Old Boy? Possibly. Do I think Will Smith is up to the task? I guess. But the film's morality, violence, and conclusion are so far outside the accepted norm for mainstream American cinema that I doubt Hollywood could actually make the same film. I'm sure there's a script sitting in a desk somewhere that's written in English and just as good.

Funny Games (2007)

I learned about this movie from a poster in the Tube. I used to be on top of this stuff. I asked a friend about it. She said it was a good movie, a remake of an Austrian film. She said the original was good, too. So while trolling the web for something to watch, I found a link to Funny Games, and that was that.

Let me get something out in open: there's nothing funny about this movie. The title sets up an expectation that what you're about to watch is indeed horrific, but also perhaps darkly humorous; our ability to find humour in or make light of tragedy, albeit a coping mechanism, is horrific in itself. But in this case, this is not the case. Rather, the title reflects the mindset of the antagonists but at no point are you allowed to glimpse their psyche or understand them at all.

Tim Roth and Naomi Watts play husband and wife George and Ann. They and their son, who is also named George, arrive at their summer lake house (which, by the way, is HUGE--these people are loaded) and soon find themselves hosting some unwelcome guests. Peter and Paul, though they seem like clean-cut boys are psychopaths. I can't, at this point, draw any parallels to American Psycho because a) I'm not that well informed about American Psycho and b) I didn't really like American Psycho, but I'm going to assume that parallels can be drawn. Anyway, Peter and Paul set about tormenting the family by constantly thinking up demeaning and torturous games for them to play. Eventually, a bet is laid down that Ann and the two Georges will die by 9am. But Peter and Paul make it perfectly clear that it's a loose-loose situation for the family because, if they survive the night, they'll just kill them at 9 anyhow.

And so the narrative progresses towards the inevitable. I can't say if or how the story deviates from the original, but the weirdest things happen along the way to what is ultimately a horrifically depressing and unsurprising end. Paul keeps looking at the camera and talking to the audience. Is it meant to draw us in, to become part of their sick game as we make our own wager on the family's lifespan? Or is it meant to alienate us? Peter and Paul are so unknowable to begin with that it would seem almost impossible to further separate the audience from the film.

The first time it happened, it caught me off guard. Which I suppose was the whole point. But then he did it again, and I was like "shut up, I don't need to be reminded I'm watching a movie". I don't have a problem with self-reflexive cinema, so long as it's well done. And I'm not entirely convinced this brand of post-modernism is good or even necessary for this film. Indeed it lends a creepy and surreal atmosphere to the proceedings, but it also forces the point that the family is well and truly fucked. Paul is in complete control. He is in control of Ann and the Georges, and he is in control of you. There is no hope for the family and you're a fool if you think otherwise. So why bother watching if everyone's just gonna die?

Because it's about how. Not why or even who. And that would be fine except for the one enormous gaping hole film's logic. Like I said, Paul is in charge. So much so that at one point, when things don't go his way, he rewinds the movie a couple of minutes and starts over. But he can't control all time and space and his sphere of influence is limited. Else he wouldn't have had to kill the dog, nor would George Jr. have been able to escape next door. So when Ann also escapes and is later captured on the main road by Peter and Paul who are, inexplicably, driving around in the middle of the night, there is no plausible argument for this turn of events.

That one large problem aside, Funny Games wasn't terrible. It wasn't funny either. But also wasn't bad. I imagine this American version was watered down some, as most remakes are, so I'd be interested to see the original which I think is supposed to comment upon our desensitization toward violence in the media. And if that is the case, then I likely totally misunderstood this version because they were both made by the same man.

A minute to recoup my losses: I asked, why bother watching if everyone's just gonna die? Because we want to. We paid our ticket (figuratively if not literally) to see two men torture and murder a family. We even hope to enjoy it.

Plot holes and all.