Let Me In: another pointless remake as expected. Fuels my stereotypes about the American movie industry and audiences. It's by no means a bad movie, and the actors actually look better than in the Swedish original, the vampire girl anyway, but the remake is 95% the exact same movie/plot etc. They only changed the face-acid scene and cut the crotch shot. Even the visual theme was much alike and not distinctively American.

So, what's the point??? 

before she comes back up the stairs and sits at the side of the bed. Then she sits there for another day before the cops come in ans shoot her. It ties in. 

its in english which means more people will see it, most likely those who didnt see the original version. To them, the sameyness doesnt matter.

I'm actually interested in seeing this despite what I've read about it. 

Seen the original Let The Right One In, but not the remake yet. I think the 2 actors in the Swede version were great. She looked perfect for the role, and the boy looked good as well. Definitely memorable characters, I really doubt the American remake will improve in that area. Still I haven't seen it yet so we'll see.

The pacing of the original is quite slow, this could definitely be improved in the remake.

Cut the crotch shot? WTF? That's an important scene!

The original certainly isn't a movie for the masses. Most popcorn viewers will think it's boring crap. It doesn't seem to have a set target market, unlike ALL the American horrors. So in this respect if they wanted to make any money from it in America, it sort of had to be remade. Still... sounds like it's hardly been changed from the original. Nice one Hollywood on a pointless remake. 

Ricky: No, because in the theatrical ending she comes back up the stairs, throws her husband's body at the camera and then looks at it in a 'boohoo to be continued' kind of way. Her appearance in the second movie is set after these events.

nitin: Absolutely. But why not simply dub it then? I get the point (and probably also that dubbing might not be as 'popular' or wide-spread in the US); however, to me it always has a negative connotation, like a disrespect for the original authors/producers. 

nm all this tot. Atlas Shrugged the movie! Your excuse for being a selfish asshole now in visual form!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6W07bFa4TzM

Looks like a low-budget Dan Brown adaption to me :p Also apparently the director was replaced with a week odd to go before shooting. Pretty impressive. 

I like the comment "I wish I was fucking dead" with 16 upvotes :D 

personally I would prefer a remake to dubbing, they just sound awful to me. That's assuming subs arent an option though.

kona, pacing was a key to establishing the mood in this movie though. 

not a total success, but nice to see an ancient period-piece that isn't totally mindless, and also nice to see a film taking an anti-religion, pro-science point of view. the distant shots of the feuding city are great. rachel weisz' performance is good too. this movie had a lot more potential, and they leave too much unresolved (is it about her, about the library, about the city?) but overall worth watching. 

tell you what, it's not a great film, but it sure as hell has something about it that is very memorable.

Flawed? Quite a bit. Brilliant? Quite a bit. 

127 Hours tomorrow, looking forward to that.

Agora I've been meaning to get, Amenabar makes few films and I'm a big fan of The Others. 

The Others is amazing. One of the coolest thrillers I have seen, and the twist is very nicely pulled off. I didn't know anything about the film when I saw it and was completely surprised (yeah I know). 

With Nicole Kidman? R U SRS? That movie was abysmal, the twist was lame, the story was boring, etc etc. Agree to disagree. 

 

I thought the atmosphere was quite good, the scene with the little kid as the old creature was very creepy, BUT the ending was predictable, and given the subject matter and the ending it reminded me a little bit of m night shamylan, who I hate more than any other director. I'm getting slightly angry even thinking of him now. What an asshole. He is to film what Deepak Chopra is to... well, whatever it is Chopra claims he is doing. 

Novelty regarding the twist was a non issue to me considering how well wrought the whole thing was - the classy and non-violent type of horror. I'd say the orphanage also falls into this classy ghost mansion category as well, though there is some gore in that one.

agreed about he who should not be making films. I'm constantly amazed though, by how many huge, legitimately skilled actors have been in his films over the years. 

didnt like that one, although not sure why right now.

As for Shymalan, the Sixth Sense was good and parts of Unbreakable and Signs were good. I actually think he's quite a skilful director, especially for suspense, but he just needs to stop writing. Get him someone else's script and I think he would do a pretty good job. 

6th Sense, Unbreakable and Signs WERE all good movies, although The 6th Sense wasn't really as great as everyone made it out to be. Remove the cheap twist, and you've got a movie that no one would have wasted their money on. Lady in the Water and The Village were crap.

Then he did The Happening which I actually enjoyed. Haven't lowered myself to seeing The Last Airbender.

I'm not a big fan of his either, the plagiarism is quite obvious.

The Orphanage was decent. Didn't predict the ending twist. 

I agree that he is very pretentious, but I really loved Signs, being a crop circle fan. I thought that 6th Sense and The Village were decent and his other movies were crap, esp. The Happening, which was one of the worst movies I have seen so far. 

Otherwise only seen sixth sense I think, was good but over-hyped. 

And yeah - its sucks. 

was a bag of balls. it actually went beyond sucking and into the realms of severely pissing me off and and sending me into a tronyn-esque rant mode ;)

as for his other films i agree with sleepy, i liked signs (disregarding the terrible ending) and thought sixth sense & village were alright, but not a fan of his other stuff. i actually thought the others was one of his too prior to reading the above :Z 

Unbreakable made me angry too, it was so goddamn pretentious! Look everyone; this the new movie of the wunderkind! What an asshole. 

I like all of his movies, especially unbreakable! ;-)

Signs and Lady from the Water took a second watch to appreciate them, though. And Village sucked for everyone who had been watching the trailers and went into the movie expecting something horrorish.

I think he really excels at portraying the characters. His movies, and Signs in particular, are character portraits before anything else, or at least I see them as that (and enjoy them greatly).

I guess the movies suck if they don't succeed in making you care for the characters, but well, that's the nature of character heavy plots, isn't it? 

They all are movies that have protagonists defunct in one way or the other; what makes them interesting is how they show the way these characters interact and react to the world around them (and why), and that good (or particularly evil, e.g. in The Village or Unbreakable) can come from their defunct reactions. In that way, his movies seem to care deeply for all of their characters, even the evil ones.

I don't think his movies have a message more focused on one particular thing, like "meaning of life" or something like that. At the very least, I choose to ignore it ;-)