it was awesome

Rating: 10/10 (20 November 2006)

I'm not much for remakes of film's that doesn't really require being remade. Some classic examples being Psycho, Dawn of the Dead and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre remakes came to mind. Both Gus Van Sant's Psycho remake and the Michael Bay-produced Chainsaw remake were critical failures from both fans and critis alike. Zack Snyder's Dawn of the Dead remake only succeeded for the fact that it's more of a reimagining than a straight remake. The only thing that film had in common with Romero's classic was the location. Now we have another remake of a horror classic (though to some calling Craven's second film a classic might be somewhat of a stretch.) in the Alexandre Aja directed and Wes Craven produced The Hills Have Eyes. Aja's The Hills Have Eyes becomes the rare horror remake in that its more than a match to Wes Craven's original.
The first half of the film was very slow as it slowly built up the tension and dread as the Carter family's journey through a supposedly short-cut through the desert put them closer and closer to the dangerous people who dwelt amongst the desert hills bordering the desert road. Once the family becomes purposely stranded in the middle of nowhere the fun begins for horror-aficionados. For those who have seen the original this remake doesn't deviate from the main story. The hill people who, up until now have only been glimpsed through quick shadowy movements across the screen, were the true cause of the family's predicament attack in a brutal and grisly fashion. None of the Carter family members were spared from this attack. From Big Bob Carter, his wife Ethel, their three children, son-in-law and young granddaughter they all suffer in one form or another. The night attack on the camper is the main highlight of the film and shows that Aja hasn't lost his touch for creating a cinematic setpiece that doesn't hold back. From the brutal rape of the Carter's youngest daughter Brenda to the sudden deaths of several Carter family members. This sequence was both fast-paced and chaotic in nature. It also helped push the definition of what constitute a very hard R-rating. Just like Zombie's The Devil's Rejects and Roth's Hostel, The Hills Have Eyes push the limits and boundaries of what the MPAA has allowed so far in terms of on-screen violence. I'm very surprised that some of the violence and deaths in this film made the final cut. This film definitely brings back the 70's style horror.
The cast for this remake was one high point that the original didn't have. Where Craven had a very inexperienced cast for the original film, Aja had the luxury of a bigger budget to hire a more competent and able group of actors. A cast that was led by Ted Levine who shined in his role as the patriarch of the civilized Carters. Kathleen Quinlan as the mother of the bunch soldiers on even though its almost predestined in films such as this that she would be one of the doomed. The two daughters as played by Vinessa Shaw and Lost's Emilie De Ravin did extremely well in roles that involved some of the more graphic rape sequences put on film that wasn't from a film called Irreversible. Much kudos must go to De Ravin for having to perform through her scene during the trailer-camper attack. But the two actors who excelled in the film has to be pacifist turned avenging angel Doug as played by Aaron Stafford. We see in his character Doug the lenghts a civilized human being would go through to survive and protect those he cares for. Even if this means resorting to becoming more brutal and primal than the inbred, mutant hill dwellers. It's in Doug's character where the basic premise of the clash of the modern with the primitive comes close to matching the same theme in the original. To a smaller degree this was also echoed in the Carter's teenage son Bobby. Dan Byrd of Entourage plays Bobby Carter and its in him we see the level-headedness of the family. Despite all the horror and carnage he has seen the hill dwellers have inflicted on his family, Bobby remains somewhat calm and level-headed to protect what is left of his family. The only drawback as to the cast itself was that the opposing family seemed to have been shortchanged. In the original we actually got to understand some of the motivations that drove the hill dwellers to prey on unsuspecting travelers through their area. In this remake the hill dwellers seem more like superhuman monsters and boogeymen. It didn't bother me as much, but then it also lessened the impact of the story's basic premise of civilization versus primitives.
In the end, Alexadre Aja has cemented himself as this generations premiere horror auteur. The Hills Have Eyes might not be the original second helping some have expected from Aja after his brilliant, if somewhat flawed first major film with Haute Tension, but it does show his growth as a filmmaker and his clean grasp of what makes horror cinema truly terrifying and uncomfortable. Two ingredients that makes for making a genre exploitation fare into something of a classic. I'm sure that outside of the horror-aficionado circles this film will either be met with indifference or disgust, but for those who revel in this type of film-making then it's a glorious continuation of the grindhouse horro revival that began with Aja's own Haute Tension, continued by Zombie's The Devil's Rejects and Roth's Hostel. It truly is a great time to be a fan of horror. And Aja's The Hills Have Eyes more than holds its own against Craven's original.