MBV Compare & Contrast cont....

I didn't forget about you. I just had to take a little time off to do my taxes, curse my Internet connection, and watch a couple of crappy Final Destination movies. (Boo on you Pt. 2 and 3!)

So on to the remake of MBV (in RealD 3D). Okay, we know that Tom the owner's kid caused the mine accident. We learn through headlines (shown over the opening credits) that Harry Warden survived the incident but remains in a coma. It is later learned that he killed the others with a pickaxe to preserve his own air and the town’s sentiments quickly turn against him.

One year later, Harry, lying comatose, has a flashback to the accident. He wakes up and kills everyone in the hospital and escapes. Meanwhile, the local youths are having a party at the mine…as you do. Axel and his girlfriend, Irene, meet up with Sarah who is awaiting the arrival of Tom. Axel does not like Tom and is among the many in town who blame him for the mine accident. When Tom shows up, Irene tries to get everyone to be all nice-y and take a photo. Axel refuses and acts all put-out while Irene takes a pic of the two of them. He then urges Irene into the mine. Tom can sense that he isn’t wanted and almost begs off, but Sarah convinces him to stay. He sends her into the mine while he heads back to his truck for beer.

Inside, Sarah tries to catch up with Axel and Irene. She comes across a few random people, then a guy jumps out and scares her. As he laughs it up, someone pickaxes him through the eye. That someone is Harry Warden all decked out in his miner’s gear. He chases Sarah who can’t find her way out. Luckily, Axel grabs her and pulls her into a hidey-hole he and his girlfriend have found. As Harry searches for her, some random dude comes in asking if his friend “Jason” (heh heh clever) is trying to play a trick on him. He gets good and killed for his trouble, exposing the others’ hiding place in the process. They run, but Axel trips and has to fight off the killer. As they exit the mine, Tom comes in. They try to get him to run, but he stands in shock as Harry confronts him and knocks him down. Axel is trying to stuff the girls into his truck, but Sarah doesn’t want to leave Tom. After Harry lobs a pickaxe into the windshield, Axel revs up the truck and books it out of there, leaving Tom behind.

Tom manages to get up and run deeper into the mine. Harry catches up to him and the two battle, but Harry gets the better of Tom. Just before he can land his death-blow, the sheriff (whom happens to be played by Tom Atkins) and another cop come in and shoot him up. Despite being hit numerous times, Harry manages to escape. Tom is left all sorts of traumatized.

Ten years later, Axel is now the sheriff of the little town and is married to Sarah who runs the local grocery store. They have a little boy together, but Axel is also having an affair with a local chippy who works at his wife’s store. Tom apparently disappeared from town after the mine incident and hasn’t been heard from since. Recently his father has recently died and he is now back to sell off the mine. No one is exactly thrilled to see him. Even worse, some guy in a miner’s get-up starts going around killing mo-fos and ripping their hearts out.

First up is Irene, whom we find, um, taking care of business with a trucker at the local no-tel. She finds out the trucker has been secretly taping their trysts and demands the tapes. He dumps her and strolls out of there with his camera (still recording oddly). She pulls a gun from her purse and goes out to confront him. He blows her off and is about to get in his truck when he takes a pickaxe to the top of the head. The killer then chases Irene into the motel where she hides under a bed. After he dispatches the no-tel manager, he finds her under the bed and kills her. She is later found with her heart ripped out.

Meanwhile, Tom shows up at the grocery store to see Sarah. She is all moony-eyed, but Tom sees the picture of her and Axel and their son. He takes off. He then heads over to a local tavern where he meets up with an older guy, Ben Foley, who his “helping” him with the sale of the mine. The locals are none to pleased to see him and he gets in a fight with one guy. Tom Atkins, now retried, steps in and demands he leave. Tom rants about people making everything that happened his fault. Tom tells him he won’t save his ass again.

Later, Axel is at home reviewing the trucker’s videotape. Sarah comes in and he confronts her about seeing Tom. She tries to play it down, but he whips out a picture of her and Tom that she’d taken out earlier and oogled all over. He then shows her a shot of Tom outside the window of the no-tel room where Irene was killed.

The next morning, Tom shows up at the grocery store before it opens. He and Sarah go for a stroll to discuss their old relationship and how selling the mine will ruin the town. Sarah calls him out for leaving town without a word. She gets all heartfelt and tells him he’ll destroy the town if he shuts it down and then walks away.

Since this is a fairly new flick and I know some folks like to wait for DVD, I will stop there before I start spoiling stuff.

This movie has little to nothing to do with Valentine’s Day. Like in the original the mine accident happens on Valentine’s Day, but it isn’t as integral to the plot in this film as it was in the original. The killer does leave hearts in Valentine candy boxes, but that’s about all the connection to the holiday we really see. The killer’s motivation is also different in this film, but I won’t go into that because it is spoiler-y. This movie does emulate some of the kills from the original, but this is not a shot-for-shot remake. Also, we get a similar love triangle, but it isn’t played quite the same way. If it had been done by better actors, I would say it was actually more believable than the triangle in the original film.

I know many horror fans have been panning it. Some think the film is no better than recent remakes such as Prom Night and April Fool’s Day which have only the title’s in common with the originals. I have not seen either of those films, so I can’t say. I guess I can kind of understand the disappointment since I am still bitter about Zombie’s Halloween (and I must admit that after listening to the Hollywood Saloon’s fucking BRILLIANT Halloween podcast, I might even consider re-evaluating Zombie’s film, trying my damndest to not think about John Carpenter at all). I didn’t think MBV 3-D did a disservice to the original. Despite a bit of bad acting, I thought the story was good. Some parts were a little clunky (what was with the attempts to make a certain someone a red herring?) and people occasionally did just plain stupid shit (um, apparently some ladies didn’t get the memo about a crazed killer in town…don’t go looking to see if someone is in the store), but overall it was a really fun ride and I had a great time seeing it.

(Aside: I especially enjoyed seeing the film the 2nd time around. I was the only person in the theatre which gave this a much spookier edge. I must admit that I had to look behind me a couple of times when I thought I heard a noise.)

As for the 3-D, well I only have two things to compare it to: the old blue/red action of the 80s (still waiting on my F13:III DVD from Amazon) and a trailer for Coraline that was shown before this movie. Overall, I thought it was pretty good. It was better for me the 2nd time as I was able to sit closer to the screen which limited side-eye distractions. Some of the CGI was damn obvious, but I it still looked good in my book.

Overall, I have to give this movie a rousing thumbs-up, so much so, that I am pretty dang sure I will buy the DVD when it comes out.