Ammon Gilbert,
Mar 04, 2009
Remakes of horror films are a dime a dozen these days. It's only March, and we've already seen three remakes hit theaters this year (My Bloody Valentine, The Uninvited, and Friday the 13th), with more on the way (The Last House on the Left, Sorority Row, and Night of the Demons). We'd like to say all remakes suck, but that's not entirely true. There are a few horror remakes out there that aren't half bad. In fact, over the years we've seen some pretty rockin' remakes come and go, and they're the reasons why we keep checking out the crappy ones -- just in case.
Here's a list of the top 10 horror remakes of all time.
10. The Grudge
This may be the last successful J-horror remake we've seen: Sarah Michelle Gellar showering with mysterious fingers in her hair, a creepy ghost-kid living in the attic, longs strands of hair coming out of the ceiling, and that croaking sound that's heard right before you die. Say what you will, but The Grudge scared the bejesus out of me in the theater, and for that reason alone it deserves a spot on this list.
9. House of Wax
Instead of making a full-blown remake, the filmmakers took the premise of a House of Wax and turned it into a slasher movie -- great idea! What made this slasher stand out above the rest was the creepy wax house itself, the brutal and overall mean-spiritedness of the killer, and Paris Hilton's awesome death. I don't think there was anyone who didn't cheer when she bit the dust.
8. House on Haunted Hill
The first of Dark Castle's string of 1950s horror remakes (including number 9's House of Wax), House on Haunted Hill not only has an awesome cast (including Geoffrey Rush, Famke Janssen, Taye Diggs, and Ali Larter), but it had fun with the haunted house concept and gave us something that wasn't too serious, but delivered just the right amount of scares when it needed to. (The images of the insane asylum doctor still give me the willies.)
7. The Ring
Before you die, you see The Ring. I had this tagline stuck in my head for months after seeing this, the first in a long string of J-horror remakes. The Ring created a unique and scary urban legend with the videotape that kills 7 days after viewing it (the film's opening sequence is amazing), and every time I see the chick crawling out of the TV, I scream like a little girl. That level of filmmaking is nothing to bat an eye at.
6. Dawn of the Dead
We thought remaking George A. Romero's zombies-in-a-mall classic was blasphemous, that they couldn't possibly make a better movie, no matter how hard they tried. Then about the time Johnny Cash chimed in during the opening credits, it became all too clear: not only did director Zack Snyder pull it off, but he was able to deliver one of the coolest zombie movies ever made. And not just regular slow-moving zombies ... but running zombies! It may not be better than the original, but it's a close second.
5. My Bloody Valentine 3-D
This film is a prime example of what a remake should be. It took the original story idea, tweaked it for today's audience, amped up the imaginative kills and body count, kept it rated R, and gave us something new by making it 3-D. Put all those elements together, and you have yourself a modern-day slasher classic all its own, making you (almost) forget that it was a remake in the first place.
4. The Hills Have Eyes
Director Alexandre Aja is one of my favorite directors working today, and this movie is a prime example of why. Packed with high-tension moments and an unmatched amount of sadistic violence and extreme gore, The Hills Have Eyes easily surpassed Wes Craven's original horror romp and then some. After witnessing the horror of what happens to this family, I decided that I would never set foot in New Mexico. Ever.
3. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
Remaking a grindhouse classic like Tobe Hooper's The Texas Chainsaw Massacre was no small task, but the folks at Platinum Dunes pulled it off with flying colors. By throwing in the diabolical Sheriff Hoyt (R. Lee Ermey) on top of the iconic Leatherface, this Chainsaw Massacre held its own as one of the scariest movies of the decade. I've never felt so much discomfort and unease while watching a film in the theater as I did with this one.
2. The Fly
Jeff Goldblum is the fly in David Cronenberg's 1986 remake of the 1958 classic, a film that's so unique, so disturbing, and so downright disgusting that it belongs in every horror fan's film collection. While the original gave the ill-fated scientist a caricature of a fly's head, the remake shows us what would happen if a person really turned into a fly, in excruciatingly graphic detail. After one viewing, you'll never look at a Twinkie the same way again.
1. The Thing
From the steady beat of the film's amazing score to Kurt Russell's snow-frosted beard, John Carpenter's The Thing is cinematic horror at its absolute finest. Based on 1951's The Thing from Another World, the film introduced us to terror like we'd never seen before, and it still features some of the best (and most bizarre) special effects ever created for the big screen. The tension is thick, the scares are plentiful and genuine, and it features one of the most memorable scenes ever filmed ("The Blood Test"). The Thing made you forget it was a remake by taking the original's initial concept, making it its own, and delivering something that was not only fresh, unique, and exciting, but downright scary as well -- exactly what a remake should be.
Ammon Gilbert covers the latest in horror and sci-fi weekly for Film.com
