Crazies, the (2010) - Crazy to Think This Could be Good  
| The Crazies has flat out one of the worst scripts I have ever come across. It has all the hallmarks of bad horror. People do inexplicably stupid things (like walking into dark rooms and going upstairs when they should be running out the door), the plot devices are terribly unbelievable (like a pick up truck ramming a fence and shutting down the military's whole defences), and people don't react like people in shock really react (cracking wise - or not so wise). Everything that you think of in bad horror is here.
But the worst thing is that the film is not even scary. There are few "crazies" in The Crazies. The "attack" scenes are few and far between. The closest the film gets to a frightening set piece is in a car wash and it's far less effective than it should be. Mostly there is just a lot of running around and bad dialogue. You'd have to be crazy to be scared by The Crazies.
There a plenty of reasons to remake a film. Sometimes society has changed and a story can have a fresh approach to its comment on social issues. Sometimes, a film was done poorly and a new take can improve on it. Sometimes studios just want a cheap way to recycle ideas instead of coming up with new ones. Bingo! I found the reason The Crazies was made.
It is not like the basic premise coudln't have made an interesting movie. Oh wait, it has... many times before. This idea has been made into a lot of bad movies too, and The Crazies is another example. There is very little that differentiates The Crazies the hordes of similarly storied films that have come before.
Does the film manage to create any real sense of terror? Nope. It shies away from anything too disheartening. Even the gore is less than I expected. Does the film manage to create a feeling of paranoia? Nope. You pretty much know what's going to happen and any suspense is completely wasted away.
The Crazies is the kind of movie where someone shows up with a shot gun just at the last possible moment and saves the hero/heroine from sure painful death....each and every time.
One piece of advice for the "crazies" in the sequel; kill your prey a lot faster. Waiting around looking at them squirm while the canned score churns on the in the background just gives the sidekick a chance to reload and blow you away. Instead kill all the "protagonists" quickly and put the audience out of its misery.
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