The Crazies (2010) a Review by DjfunkmasterG

[DjfunkmasterG]

George A. Romero's The Crazies has always been a weird treat for me. I never hated it, but I never loved it. However a friend and I have sort of always considered it a pre-cursor to DAWN. The film is very weak at times but it laos has its strong moments... but it needed a lot of work. Ok, so last night I finally checked out The Crazies remake and I have got to say I consider it one of the best remakes of Romero's work. This is one of those times the remake supasses the original, at least in my opinion. This new version starts off pretty much right from the jump and keeps the suspense pegged during the more intense action sequences. What was really nice about this is that it strictly focused on the perspective of the town's inhabitants whereas the original focused more on the military aspect. Brett Eisner, gave the film some really solid direction, and a lot of intense horror moments were just right, brutal and pretty much everything that has been lacking in conventional horror films. While I am not a huge fan of Timothy Olyphant aka Olyphatistic as Kevin Smith call him, I thought he did ok here. I would like to have seen someone with a wider range play the towns police chief, but maybe, it is best that he portrayed it as he did, since it was only one viewing and I was so immersed in the post contaminatin vision, I wasn't exactly 100% focused on Tim's performance the whole time, but I won't come flat out and say he sucked because he did not, he just left a lot to be desired. The rest of the cast was decent and really pulled off some nice work, especially for a zombie style film, shot on a measely $12,000,000.00. The cast that made up the infected did a fabulous job. I mean they were fucking creepy from start to finish, just when I was starting to give up on modern horror films, out comes this Crazies remake to firmly make me believe a great horror film can be made once again. The nice thing about TC2010 is that while it only runs 90 minutes it doesn't feel long, nor does it feel short. The right amount of time was put in to make sure it all came together without too many mistakes and errors. Its just too bad that the marketing campaign for the film was lackluster, but then again it did open while Avatar was still smashing box office records, which to me was a mistake. This flick should have been delayed until October of this year and I think it would have faired better, but alas... it's $38 million dollar US haul is nothing to sneeze at, hell no. One side note: George was listed as Exec Producer for the flick, but being an exec producer isn't much these days. Still it was nice to see his name attached to something good for a change. All in all I recommend checking out The Crazies. It is 90 minutes well spent.

[SymphonicX]

interesting review there's a little hope for it - but what I saw of the trailer just screamed "wait for it to come on Sky"...so I'll do that.

[DjfunkmasterG]

Its a decent flick. I even liked it more than the DAWN remake. So that is a plus for me and I am sure MZ will chime in with his thumbs high on that comment alone.

[LouCipherr]

I will be the first to admit I've never seen the original, however, the remake was a pretty damn good flick (whoa, did I actually say that out loud?!). I quite enjoyed it, which surprised me.

[Trin]

I've never seen the original on this one either... and I've always wanted to. But you're telling me, Deej, that I'm okay to just go see the remake? This isn't going to screw me on seeing the original the way it was meant to be seen? I can't shake the feeling that Deej is suckering us into a Night 3D practical joke here.

[LouCipherr]

I can't shake the feeling that Deej is suckering us into a Night 3D practical joke here. He's not. It's actually a pretty damn decent flick. I have to admit, I went into it thinking "remake? again? really?" but I wasn't let down, it was pretty damn good.

[DjfunkmasterG]

I've never seen the original on this one either... and I've always wanted to. But you're telling me, Deej, that I'm okay to just go see the remake? This isn't going to screw me on seeing the original the way it was meant to be seen? I can't shake the feeling that Deej is suckering us into a Night 3D practical joke here. No Joke here man, and honestly seeing this first may help you stomach the original a bit more, but I do have to say this was much better than the original film.

[SymphonicX]

the original happens to be 90 minutes of people shouting at each other....a sort of early Day of the Dead really, but not as enjoyable...

[soulsyfn]

I really enjoyed this remake also. I am not very happy with the potential for a sequel the ending left, but hey who knows they could make another entertaining flick...maybe?

[AcesandEights]

I wanted to catch it in the theater, even scheduled a day for it, but it never happened. Glad to hear more positive reviews about it, as I still hold out hope it'll be an enjoyable rental or purchase.

[LouCipherr]

Could this possibly be one of those extremely rare occasions where the remake is better than the original?!

[DjfunkmasterG]

could this possibly be one of those extremely rare occasions where the remake is better than the original?! hell yes!

[bassman]

I too missed the chance to check this out in theater. So would you rate it as a purchase, rental, or "acquire"? I've heard many people hating on Olyphant, but I personally really like him. Especially in more comedic roles. Go, The Girl Next Door, Dreamcather(not a comedy, but his character was funny). And most people would REALLY disagree with me here....but I thought he was a good "modern" villain in Die Hard 4. He was no Alan Rickman or Jeremy Irons, but good for the story.

[Danny]

my biggest problem is that there where onyl about 6 crazies in it, and the burning town is rarely shown. like it was just cheaper to film 3 people walking through empty fields for 30 minutes. Its good, and entertaining, but feels incredibly constrained, it starts by hitting the ground running, but quickly gets out of breath.

[DjfunkmasterG]

I too missed the chance to check this out in theater. So would you rate it as a purchase, rental, or "acquire"? I've heard many people hating on Olyphant, but I personally really like him. Especially in more comedic roles. Go, The Girl Next Door, Dreamcather(not a comedy, but his character was funny). And most people would REALLY disagree with me here....but I thought he was a good "modern" villain in Die Hard 4. He was no Alan Rickman or Jeremy Irons, but good for the story. I say Acquire, Rental or Purchase... YMMV on how it appeals to you. For me it will be a purchase.