The Eye
One Missed Call
The original Pang Brothers’ version of The Eye was a cheesy mix of the forgettable Madeleine Stowe thriller Blink and the early, funny films of M. Night Shyamalan. But the film nonetheless got solid reviews, so it was only a matter of time before a studio decided to mount an English-language remake. It’s hard to imagine someone out-hacking the Pangs, but David Moreau and Xavier Palud, making their English-language debut following the middling French home-invasion chiller Ils, look to be giving it the old college try. And as shoddy as most of the Asian horror remakes have been thusfar, at least some have been cast with interesting actors. That this one stars Jessica Alba doesn’t inspire confidence. But why should Lionsgate do any different? The formula of hot chick + semi-proven commodity + February release worked for When a Stranger Calls, right?
No less dire-looking is the remake of One Missed Call. The original film was one of roughly forty-seven movies Takashi Miike made in 2003, and was a decent movie that fit comfortably in an era of J-horror gimmickry. By comparison, the Hollywood version looks like another long-overdue nail in the coffin of J-horror remakes, bearing a closer resemblance to the spate of Ring knockoffs than the original version and starring the hottest cast of fall 2001 (Shannyn Sossamon, Ed Burns, etc.) You’d think audiences would start objecting to lousy horror movies, but then, we’re already on the fourth Saw.
The Orphanage
I saw this movie in Toronto, and I recommend it. But genre movies are a tough sell, so instead of accurately portraying The Orphanage as an atmospheric thriller in the vein of Guillermo Del Toro (who produced the film and gets his name prominently featured in the trailer), this trailer makes it look like a schlocky Asian-horror wannabe, complete with lots of flash cuts and horrified reaction shots and absolutely no dialogue. It’s a shame, since the audience that embraced Pan’s Labyrinth might avoid this on the basis of the lousy trailer, while the rest will probably be pissed at having to read subtitles. Still, it’s nice to see a horror movie with a heroine over forty who isn’t a spiteful old biddy.
— Paul Clark