I dragged V to see the latest horror remake, The Hills Have Eyes, last night. First of all…and I know it’s becoming cliche just to point this out…but what is with all the horror remakes? It really seems like a majority of all horror movies being released are remakes. I can think of a hundred original concepts for a horror movie right now, that could make good, fresh movies in hands of talented filmmakers.

Example: Some children find an ancient scroll in their attic. They read it in the playground, unknowingly trapping the soul of Satan himself in the monkey bars. The jungle gym’s killing spree won’t stop until every kid at school has fallen off of it and broken their necks.

Slayground is Copyright, 2006, Phronk.

Anyway…The Hills Have Eyes is pretty good as far as remakes go. The original, while good, wasn’t an untouchable classic that couldn’t possibly be improved upon. The remake sticks with the plot of the original until about halfway through, when it introduces a few entirely new elements. It goes into more detail about the killers’ origin, which is kinda unecessary, but it worked out well and kept it from being more of the same.

The movie is surprisingly gory, which is good for horror fans (but probably not for their non-horror-fan girlfriends). Like the original, it doesn’t play nice; you never know who’s going to die when. It also does a good job of making you hate the bad guys so much that you’re right there with the good guys when they go to get their revenge.

The acting is fine. Emilie De Ravin (from Roswell, Lost, etc.) plays a whiny brat, just like she is in real life. I don’t think I’ve ever written about it here, but some day I’ll explain how Emilie and her fake lawyers cheated me out of a million dollars. Some kid plays the kid who’s smarter than all the adults, and is quite good. The cannibal things look sufficiently frightening, but all the makeup and CG in the world can’t compare to what Michael Berryman (the scary dude in the original) just looks like naturally.

Overall, nice little movie. I recommend it.