Great for modern horror but did not live up to the original...

Rating: 8/10 (13 March 2006)

...nor my expectations.
I had great fun watching this on opening night in a packed theater, and thought overall it was as good or better than almost any of the recent sea of horror releases. However, I have two primary complaints (which involve spoilers to some degree):
1. NOT GORY ENOUGH. Having read reviews that said things to the effect that the director didn't know the difference between scaring and assaulting the audience, and that this movie was unbearably gory, I have to ask what kind of sissies the reviewers are. Did none of them see High Tension? Now *that* was gory.
2. WHY DUMB IT DOWN? It's not like the original was a very complex movie to understand, but the remake actually removes nuance and complexity rather than adding it. I'm talking specifically about the elimination of any back story with the mutant family, their connection to the old man in the beginning of the movie, etc.
Given the atrocious, out of place patriotic gesture in the last quarter of the movie (if you've seen the movie, you know what I am talking about), I actually wonder if that and the reduction of story are a French Director's snobby comment on (the lack of) intellectualism of American audiences. Not that he'd be entirely wrong - the flag schtick drove the teens in the audience to hooting cheers.
I thought the remake was great at nearly mimeographing the 'normal' family, but why the reduction of story re: the mutant family? Still, I love me some horror, and this was still good horror, despite not comparing well, in my eyes, to the masterpiece original.