Excellent horror film remake, much better than the original.

Rating: 8/10 (24 December 2006)

The Hills Have Eyes tells the tale of Big Bob Carter (Ted Levine) & his wife Ethel (Kathleen Quinlan) who are celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary by driving from Cleveland to San Diego with their family, including their son Bobby (Dan Byrd) along with their two daughters Brenda (Emilie de Ravin) & Lynn (Vinessa Shaw) plus her husband Doug (Aaron Stanford) & their baby daughter Catherine (Maisie Camilleri Preziosi) all couped up together in one 4x4 & a trailer in the 100 plus degree heat of the New Mexico desert miles from civilisation. They stop off at a gas station where they fill up & are given bogus directions by the attendant (Tom Bower) which leads them even further from civilisation, however that's not all they have to contend with as deliberately set spikes on the road puncture the tyres on their car which causes them to crash. At first everyone is annoyed as they are miles from anywhere & nobody can get a mobile signal but Bob says he can walk back to the gas station & get help so it's no major problem, that is until a gang of mutant cannibals turn up looking for their next meal...
Co-written & directed by Alexandre Aja I thought this remake was absolutely top class & enjoyed it infinitely more than the dull & drab original Hills Have Eyes (1977). I think I am right in saying that there are two versions of The Hills Have Eyes readily available, the cut 'R' rated one & an 'Unrated' one, I will be basing my comment on the uncut edit (the only one available here in the UK anyway). The script by Aja & Gregory Levasseur is slow going for the first half but still manages to retain ones interest with decent character's & a good opening massacre along with the suspicion that it will explode into life at any moment & boy does it. Once it gets going there's no stopping it, there's loads of gory violence, some nasty exploitation including pointing a magnum at a baby & an unpleasant rape scene you don't usually expect from Hollywood, some nice ideas that distances itself from the original but not greatly & it makes for a terrific blood-soaked, mutant filled, special effect leaden twisted quality piece of film-making! The first half plays almost the same as the original as it introduces exactly the same character's from the original while it takes a few twists & turns later on with the introduction of a town & the mutants origins but it doesn't muck around with the basic story of survival at all costs that the original was all about. A top notch horror film & one well worth watching.
Director Aja does a great job, the desert locations are magnificent with some really striking jagged rock formations & some just plain cool landscape shots. The feel of isolation is definitely there & Aja keeps on reminding us of it, it has a great atmosphere, it has some great action & gory set-pieces & it has a underlying tension to it. Now onto the violence & gore, while it's not packed with the stuff what's here is cool, there are pick axes in eyes, axes in heads, severed body parts galore, burnt corpses, someone commits suicide by literally blowing their head off with a shotgun, fingers are severed, people have their brains shot out, there's gutted dogs, someone has their throat torn out, impalings, spikes through throats, the family's pet bird has it's head bitten off & there's even a bit of cannibalism in there all of which comes accompanied with plenty of he red stuff splattered all over the place. The special effects on the kills & the mutant killer's are excellent.
With a supposed budget of about $14,000,000 The Hills Have Eyes is technically brilliant, the production design, the special effects, the locations, the fights, the stunts, camera-work & music are all as good as one would hope. It was actually shot in the stunning deserts of Morocco. The acting is fine from everyone with the actors playing the mutants doing a particularly good job under all that latex, foam, rubber & fake blood. Even Billy Drago makes an appearance & he gets to eat a human heart...
The Hills Have Eyes is a top remake that easily surpasses the original in my opinion. There's not a lot of love around for the majority of classic horror remakes but this along with the equally brilliant The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003) remake means many may have to start & think again. I was throughly impressed, definitely recommend & worth watching (even on Christmas Eve!).