The Hills Have Boredom

Rating: 2/10 (12 March 2006)

A really cool precredit sequence and title sequence set you up for a long long wait until there are any real scares in this film. The "normal" family characters are, like the original films, pretty hard to be with, they bicker and nag each other and are generally unappealing and with not much going on it's a pretty tough sit. Nice locations adequately filmed helps as do some nice, matte painting style CG elements. But there just isn't much going on other than a few fake scares and a not very good dead dog prop. Then suddenly lots of stuff goes on, none of it very coherently staged, then another lag. The night photography is kind of grainy and occasionally even slightly bluish in a, not exposed right, kind of way. The whole thing sticks relatively close to the original, the makeup work is uneven--rubbery looking with blood that looks like candy--and just nothing in this remake is very thrilling or horrifying. The characters, both good and evil keep the plot going long after it should have ended by doing stupid things and you don't get any sense of the mutant family as to size or does the film offer much in the way of interesting mutant family behavior. Their home is cool when you see it, but what goes on inside isn't interesting. During one fight scene the one mutant seems to be more interested in chopping up the cool set than actually chopping up the good guy, who could easily be chopped to death many many times. Retro bad music doesn't help, but the film isn't too much in the jump cutty style that is so trendy--though that might have helped.
I suppose some of the shocks work if you haven't seen the original but this film lacks the rough edge that made that rough violence more convincing. Given the number of torture and violence films lately there's nothing here that you haven't seen done better in SAW or the like.
The audience I saw the film with opening weekend grumbled and scoffed loudly at the non ending and shuffled out bitching about the film. All and all a pointless remake, there are lots of those, but this one is just dull and dumb aside from a few sparks of strong production design the movie doesn't show much competence or feel for the material.
Anyone who finds this film overly shocking really needs to either see more movies or just stay home. This film offers nothing of much note in the shock and gore department.