Last Friday’s new movies included two 80s reboots—one about dancing teens and the other about a scary alien monster—and a comedy about obsessed bird-watchers. Unfortunately, with Halloween just around the corner, the scary movie was the most disappointing.
The 1984 Footloose starring Kevin Bacon and Lori Singer isn’t a masterpiece by any stretch of the imagination, but it’s still an 80s goodie that many people remember fondly… so why remake it?
The new Footloose starring Kenny Wormald and Julianne Hough is a shinier and more up-to-date version of the same story with only minor variations from the original, almost playing out scene-by-scene and line-by-line. For those who don’t know the story, Ren MacCormack (Wormald) is a city kid who gets transplanted into a small Texas town where dancing has been outlawed. There he meets Ariel (Hough), the rebellious preacher’s daughter, and together they decide to fight the system and put on a school dance. This of course creates quite a stir, especially with Reverend Shaw Moore (Dennis Quaid).
Dennis Quaid is likable enough, but he is no John Lithgow who played the reverend in the original film. This to me was the biggest let-down of the new movie. Because while the “we just really wanna dance” plot is fairly cheesy, the character of Reverend Moore is really what gives the story any depth and importance. The original movie featured a very interesting subplot where some in his congregation begin burning books that they find to be immoral, and that is where the reverend realizes that there is no way to root out evil entirely. He realizes that outlawing dancing isn’t much different than burning books. He realizes that he needs to change.
This movie cuts all of that out along with another few scenes between he and his wife Vi (played in the original by Dianne Weist and now played by Andie MacDowell much less effectively), and what we do see of the two of them sounds much too rehearsed, lacking in emotional gravity.
Of course, nobody else going to see Footloose cares about what I just said. They just want a “feel good” movie and Footloose does deliver. Wormald and Hough do well enough in their roles and the dancing in the movie is still a lot of fun to watch. And since this is an MTV Production, it’s also fun to hear all of the old songs like “Let’s Hear it for the Boy”, “Almost Paradise” and the titular “Footloose” covered by newer artists. My favorite character in the remake is Ren’s new buddy Willard (Miles Teller) who is pretty darn adorable as he tries to learn to dance. Overall, the new Footloose is cute and perfect for its target audience.
The Thing, which funnily enough is another 80s remake, is probably the dullest horror movie I have ever sat through. Ever. I honestly had trouble keeping my eyes open because it was so boring! Mary Elizabeth Winstead stars as a graduate student named Kate who goes to help Dr. Halvorson (Ulrich Thomsen) at a research site in Antarctica. There she meets a crew of researchers, including the helicopter pilot Sam (Joel Edgerton). They discover a creature frozen in the ice, which breaks free and goes on a killing spree. The filmmakers decide to skip out on character development or even tension-building fear. Instead we get to watch a silly-looking computer-animated thing walk around killing random researchers with its tentacles. Not scary. Not even remotely interesting.
From the preview I saw, I had no idea that this was a movie about bird-watching. For some reason the big shots in charge of marketing thought that we wouldn’t be interested if we knew that, so we just get the vague idea that Steve Martin, Jack Black and Owen Wilson are just out on some sort of year-long adventure akin to The Bucket List. In fact, “The Big Year” refers to a goal many birdwatchers have to see as many bird species as they can in a calendar year. Kenny Bostick (Wilson) is the current record-holder, and when he finds out a retired businessman named Stu (Martin) and a thirty-something year old slacker named Brad (Black) are trying to beat his record, the three compete and come together in interesting ways, each dealing with their own personal lives. The movie is plucky and quirky and while not particularly memorable, was enjoyable to watch. I even learned a little bit about birds!
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