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Hills Have Eyes, The |
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A family
driving through the dessert, on their
way to California, encounters a group of horribly
mutated people when their car breaks down in
the middle of nowhere. With nowhere to go they
can do nothing but to fight these deranged,
cannibalistic people. But will they succeed?
There are just so many of them.
When you do a remake of a cult classic such as
this one, you can rarely live up to the original.
What surprised me about The Hills Have Eyes was
that it not only lived up to Wes Cravens cult
original, but it even surpassed it on so many
levels. It's more intense, it's gorier (even
though the theatrical version is heavily cut),
it's more brutal and, I never thought I'd say
this but, Alexandre Aja handles this much better
than Craven did back in the days which proves
to us that this French director is here to stay.
I'm a bit sceptical towards having TV-stars in
horror flicks these days. I mean, just look at
how horrible the remake of "The Fog" was, mainly
due to poor acting skills. Well Emilie de Ravin
benefits from the fact that she's all ready starred
in a horror flick, Santa's Slay, and knows how
to scream. She really pulled through here and
so did the rest of the cast. People that I wasn't
expecting anything from were simply outstanding
so I guess with the right director, anyone can act.
The fact that Wes Craven produced the movie
probably helped a lot and I think that the original
director for a remake should always be involved
in one way or the other to make sure that
everything is done correctly. Sure, Alexandre
Aja is an outstanding director but I don't
think that he could have done it without Wes.
I love how most of the names are the same as
they were in the original and how every little
detail can be trailed back to the cult classic.
Sure, there have been improvements but this is
what a true remake should be like. Highly
recommended - even if you're not a fan of remakes.
I can't wait to see what the uncut DVD is going
to be like. We get a ton of impalements, an
exploded head, severed arms and legs, chopped off
fingers and much more!
Naturally we get the track "California Dreaming"
in here but other than that we mainly get a very
intense suspense score which definitely does
what it's intended to do.
The Hills Have Eyes is something as rare as a
remake which surpasses the original. It's true
to the cult classic and still improves upon it
and I'm happy to say that if all remakes were
as good as this one, I would love to see more
remakes. Sadly, that's not the case.
Review By: AnthroFred
