Craven’s 1977 original saw a wholesome American family butchered by a bunch of psychotic cannibals – mutated years earlier by secret US military atomic tests – in the depths of the Nevada desert.
Determined to save some time on their cross country trip “Big Bob” Carter (Levine) does the only sensible thing… takes advice from a bloke who wouldn’t look out of place in “Deliverance” and follows a supposed short cut down a dust road through the hills.
Before long, the Carter’s car and caravan are stuck in a ditch miles from civilization with night rapidly approaching.
Bob’s solution? Head off on foot with no idea where he’s going, leaving the children and good looking chicks to fend for themselves. Genius.
They say:
Total Film: “Split skulls and spilt guts: Wes Craven's ravaged savages get real nasty in a ballsy, bloody update. It's all messed up.”
Empire: “Fans of the original won’t be disappointed, but ultimately it’s just another decent, arguably unnecessary, ’70s horror remake.”
BBC: “Gut wrenching violence and well handled suspense will have you squirming, despite a reliance on what have become, since ’77, stock horror clichés.”
We say:
The French love a bit of violence – just look at their rugby teams – and director Alexandre Aja is no exception.
His previous effort “Switchblade Romance” was an ode to gore with more bloody corpses than a Barrymore pool party, and THHE lifts the bar even further. There are deaths by guns, bats, rocks, knives, screwdrivers, axes and even frying pans.
Men are burnt alive, dogs torn apart and, in a scene that may actually drive you out of the cinema, the pregnant girl from “Lost” (de Ravin) is raped by one of the deformed mutants.
There’s also a vaguely interesting political subtext behind all the gore about the effects of nuclear warfare, although most people will probably be too busy hiding behind their sofas to notice.
Part of the new “horror porn” movement that replaces nudity with carnage THHE is definitely not for the faint hearted, but the thrill packed plot and tongue in cheek finale makes this one of the better recent horror remakes.
CAST
Aaron Stanford, Ted Levine, Kathleen Quinlan,
Vinessa Shaw, Emilie De Ravin
DIRECTOR
Alexandre Aja
TIME
107 mins
POSTED...
Sat 24 Jun 2006 at 9:22am
