Surprised no one has posted a thread rant on this remake.
everyone is cool with it or what?
Late,
grmpysmrf
I never saw the original. I don’t really watch new films until they end up on the back of an airplane seat, but it looks like something I could enjoy.
I never saw the original. I don’t really watch new films until they end up on the back of an airplane seat, but it looks like something I could enjoy.
Uber violent even for 1971.
Late,
grmptsmrf
the original is a brilliant piece of work. i wrote a pretty long paper on it as a piece of ‘authoritative reclamation in a time of loss’ a while ago for a class…
but this remake will be horrible. it is beyond moronic to even think of remaking a classic like this. i wont watch it, i dont care.
Original is a fine film. Ignore the existence of the remake.
Same thing, I’m sure. I ate at Straw Hat Pizza once. Do you think I can use my receipt as a ticket?
remakes always suck
remakes always suck
I thought the Texas Chainsaw remake was bad ass!!!
but for rule of thumb I’ll agree with you.
Late,
grmpysmrf
[reply]remakes always suck
I thought the Texas Chainsaw remake was bad ass!!!
but for rule of thumb I’ll agree with you.
Late,
grmpysmrf[/reply]
WAIT!?!?!? you HAVE to be kidding!
that remake was ASS! it destroyed the mystery and the horrifying americana of the original. (second time i used that word on this forum… blech!) it took away the amazing interplay of gender and disability and the roles therein, it removed the sense of peace in the family unit, and least shockingly of all, it replaced violence with gore.
[reply][reply]remakes always suck
I thought the Texas Chainsaw remake was bad ass!!!
but for rule of thumb I’ll agree with you.
Late,
grmpysmrf[/reply]
WAIT!?!?!? you HAVE to be kidding!
that remake was ASS! it destroyed the mystery and the horrifying americana of the original. (second time i used that word on this forum… blech!) it took away the amazing interplay of gender and disability and the roles therein, it removed the sense of peace in the family unit, and least shockingly of all, it replaced violence with gore.[/reply]
Yeah, gotta agree with Rusty.
The remake seem focussed on shocking people with the gore.
It wasn’t bad though- I still think it was good, if gore’s your thing.
But I’ll take the original any day; it’s just genuinely frightening, shocking and the level of attention to detail is fucking great. The camera work, music, setting… awesome.
Even the way leatherface is stumbling around at the end with the chainsaw not knowing what the hell he is doing with himself; brilliant. Apparently, the guy playing him was completely delirious from dehydration and heat stroke while they filmed that.
And the 70s version massacres the remake. Only good thing about the remake was a wet shirt. But they even had some nipplage-through-shirt in the original. No f contest.
Sometimes grmpysmrf has the worst taste.
What gore?
there was really no gore in the remake.
dude gets his leg chopped off with a chainsaw and then salt rubbed in it other than that all other “gore” is not shown in detail.
the original was creepy enough but poorly acted. and really it was the setting/atmosphere that made the movie scary.
I own the original and the new one but I prefer the the remake.
Late,
grmpysmrf
the original was creepy enough but poorly acted. and really it was the setting/atmosphere that made the movie scary.
There’s just something about those grainy shaky camera’d 70’s psychological horror/ slasher flicks that can’t be beat . . . . “Last House on the Left”, “Texas Chainsaw Massacre”, “Henry, Portrait of a Serial Killer” (yeah, 80’s, I know, but it’s in the same vein for me). These films, to me, are actually scary.
Now it’s all Matrix-style camera work, CGI effects, and a bunch of other crap that I couldn’t care less about.
That being said . . . . . I actually did kind of like the TCM remake (I finally watched it in a hotel one night and it was pretty intense).
[reply]
the original was creepy enough but poorly acted. and really it was the setting/atmosphere that made the movie scary.
There’s just something about those grainy shaky camera’d 70’s psychological horror/ slasher flicks that can’t be beat . . . . “Last House on the Left”, “Texas Chainsaw Massacre”, “Henry, Portrait of a Serial Killer” (yeah, 80’s, I know, but it’s in the same vein for me). These films, to me, are actually scary.[/reply]
Never seen henry but I’ve heard it’s great. I’ve come in on it about an hour in and tried to watch but I think I’ve missed too much to get into it. I stuck with it for 15 minutes or so.
the grainy camera of the old film definitely adds to the scariness. it makes you feel like you’ve happened upon your pervy uncle’s 8mm stash and you’re watching something only a handful of people have seen.
I wasn’t to into last house but it’s a masterpiece compared to the remake.
wonder if “I Spit On your Grave” remake is as bad as the last house remake.
Now it’s all Matrix-style camera work, CGI effects, and a bunch of other crap that I couldn’t care less about.
I don’t think TCM remake qualifies under this category. it was just better acted and a better script. if they would’ve shot it with the same type of film and camera’s then i think we would’ve had something really special!!
Late,
grmpysmrf
it was just better acted and a better script.
better acted is a possibility, ill give yout hat for some of the actors, but the original hitcher was fucking perfect, and gunner is the ONLY leatherface worth watching.
but better script?! are you kidding me? it was just paint by numbers boring teen horror. it explained away too many mysteries and gave too many stupid insights into what is supposed ot be backwoods and strange. in the original there is a methodical mythological quality to the house and the ‘art’ within. the ‘arm’ chair, the layer of feathers, the hanging bones, there is such horrible beauty that has almost religious fanaticism about it. there is so much that is never spoken, the mummification of the living grandfather, the implications of the fucking stuffed dog, the questions of patri/matriarchy, the gender ambiguity with leatherface, the fear and sadness in his/her actions, the protectiveness… then you look at the remake and it is so bland, so boring, so post-Scream slasher… its like enjoying burger king when you could havereal food…
i donno, and i dont wanna seem all rude and disrespectful, but holy god damn, the original is a work of art with what it DOESNT reveal, the remake is just another in a long line of heartless chumbuckets on the dock.
^
Yeah. That. Thank you. Part of the magic of that first film was just like you said . . . it was just a mindscrew of a mystery that haunted your sensibilities and disoriented the crap out of you.
I mean . . . . The scene with the grandfather who can barely even hold the hammer . . . so absolutely terrifying in his near death frailty. You just do NOT get that kind of horrific awesomeness nowadays.
EDIT: It’s been over 15 years since I’ve seen it and I just looked up YouTube to try and find the hammer scene. All I found was this, but damn! Even on my crappy laptop, just this 50 second clip is scary as heck.
wonder if “I Spit On your Grave” remake is as bad as the last house remake.
Thanks! That’s the other one I was going to mention and brainfarted it off of my post. Are you saying there was already a remake of it? If so, yes, I’m sure it was total crap.
[reply]wonder if “I Spit On your Grave” remake is as bad as the last house remake.
Thanks! That’s the other one I was going to mention and brainfarted it off of my post. Are you saying there was already a remake of it? If so, yes, I’m sure it was total crap.[/reply]
there was, and it is.
but to be fair i wasnt a HUGE fan of the original. it (like a lot of films based around revenge after a rape) seemed… like a hollow excuse for violence. it did have some really interesting elements though… but the bathtub scene… ohhh fuck.
and yeah, the grandfather in TCM is fucking brilliant. is he disgusted by the family? i get the feeling that there is fear in him. that he doesnt want to be there, that he is just as much a victim in his own way as the ‘visitors’. he may have started the family on this path, but is this horrible mutation what he imagined?
the thing that digs me about horror film remakes is that the climate of our culture has shifted. its the same thing even with Ministry. negative space is ignored for total compression. movies, music, art in general is being brickwalled to be the loudest, hardest, biggest, most vibrant, and as a result is losing a lot of finesse.
the remake of the hills have eyes is a perfect example as well. or the overwhelmingly pointless remake of the hitcher. or black christmas! for fucks sake, even Freddy.
in the original nightmare film, freddy isnt a molester. he is a child killer, something much, MUCH less understandable. i mean, while a horrible offense, the molestation of a child has a lot of understandable and identifiable roots, whereas the simple killing of children is… stranger, less normal, less understandable. but int he remake he is simple made a rapist and thats that. the craft, the oddness, the true unsettling nature is removed. his evil is replaced with nauseating redundancy.
or rob zombie’s mall-kid remake of halloween. suddenly michale isnt just evil, just a bad seed, he is the victim of rob zombie’s inability to make anythign without steeping it in the most comicbookie white trash possible. he isnt as Loomis int he originals says, ‘pure evil’ he is this vindicated abused child who just so happens to be a beast of a man. and then look at the way Loomis is painted int he remake and its sequel… god, its disgusting.
ok, thats enough of a rant from me. haha. sorry.
[reply]wonder if “I Spit On your Grave” remake is as bad as the last house remake.
Thanks! That’s the other one I was going to mention and brainfarted it off of my post. Are you saying there was already a remake of it? If so, yes, I’m sure it was total crap.[/reply]
Yeah there is already a remake. I think it was straight to dvd though.
The near mummified grandfather barely being able to hold the hammer was a deal breaker for me. I’ll concede the paint by numbers teen slasher point (Although this one works for me) but the scariness of grandpappy holding a hammer? Never! That ruined the films momentum and damn near made it a comedy.
I kinda like some of the mysteries explained, for the simple fact that you wonder how the family got away with it for so long. With the new one the explanation is at least somewhat believeable. Whereas, the old one doesn’t even offer an explanation and has the watcher going in ready to make fun of the plot holes.
Don’t get me wrong the old definitely has merit and is still watchable for what it is but it views almost like a sideshow in a dirty backwoods house more than a horrror movie. It’s not the characters that are really disturbing so much as it is the atmosphere that is created by the sets.
In the new one I think the characters do a decent job of creating the suspense.
Forgot the chick blowing her head off at the first scene was pretty gory, But all told, the gore makes up less than 2 minutes of screen time.
Late,
grmpysmrf