The year was 1987 and I had become my dad’s little movie buddy. We saw Aliens, Stand by Me, Cobra and Platoon, to name a few – but the film that traumautized me more than anything was Paul Verhoven’s RoboCop. The movie is hokey and cheesy and full of all kinds of bad 80s action, but the scene at the beginning of the movie, in the abandoned warehouse, where Murphy (Peter Weller) is tortured and shot, was shockingly real and …
Tag: Remake
Supposedly, The Thing, due in theaters on October 14, 2011, is not a remake of John Carpenter’s 1982 sci-fi horror movie of the same name, but rather a prequel. Odd, though, since the trailer basically feels and seems like the same…exact…movie. And that’s what producers Marc Abraham and Eric Newman want with The Thing. They want to remake the movie without slapping John Carpenter in the face, so what you see from director Matthijs van Heijningen Jr. is the same …
One of my favorite movies from the 1980s is the horror/comedy, Fright Night. It was released in theaters on August 2, 1985 and starred Chris Sarandon, i.e. Prince Humperdinck from The Princess Bride, William Ragsdale (who can be seen as Gary in the FX series Justified) and Roddy McDowall (best known for his role in the Planet of the Apes movies in the late 1960s an early 1970s). The movie was about a teenage boy who discovers the suave, single …
The Coen brothers, Joel and Ethan, have produced some of the most enjoyable, an acclaimed films, of the last 25 years. From Raising Arizona, Fargo, The Big Lebowski, O Brother, Where Art Thou? to No Country for Old Men and Burn After Reading, the sibling’s eclectic directorial and storytelling sense is as wide as the subject matter they cover and as laser-focused as Hollywood’s best and brightest. You can imagine the giddiness, despite me never seeing the original (Shuuuuuun! Shuuuuuuun …
I’ve never seen the 1973 version of Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark, and I’m not sure how the remake, due in theaters on January 21, 2011, is going to fare, but I do know this: the recently released, gimmicky, see-it-coming-a-mile-away trailer did, in fact, make my netherregions pucker something fierce. My loins went into turtle mode and my bum went to Defcon 1. Something about flashlights under blankets and creepy creatures crawling around in said blankets make me tense. …
This post has less to do with some actress whose last name is another word for farting and more about the remake of Fright Night, a beloved movie of my 1980s teenagehood. In case you missed it, DreamWorks is overseeing the Fright Night remake (due in theaters October 2011) and has already cast Colin Farrell (Crazy Heart), Anton Yelchin (Star Trek), Toni Collette (The United States of Tara), Christopher Mintz-Plasse (Kick Ass) David Tennant (Doctor Who) and, of course, Imogen …
Ogden Marsh is Hollywood’s typical snapshot of small-town, Podunk, Midwest America. Located in Iowa, it’s the kind of place where hunting, pickups, farming, the gentle smell of manure and voting Republican are generally the norm. It’s the type of town without strangers, where kids ride bicycles gleefully and without fear down Main Street, and where the entire town shows up to cheer on the high school baseball team. It’s idyllic, old-fashioned and charming. And when The Crazies opens you already …