Emily Browning plays a troubled teen recently released from an institution after being horribly affected by the tragic death of her mother in a house fire. She returns to her family in Maine, including smart-mouthed older sister Arielle Kebbel (cute as ever), dad David Strathairn and his new, youngish girlfriend Elizabeth Banks (in a most curious casting decision). Browning’s mum was sick with cancer when she died, and Banks used to be her nurse. Needless to say, Browning is none too pleased at this usurper’s role in her father’s life, hell even Kebbel doesn’t trust her. After a while, Browning starts to get visitations from ghostie types who, along with a local teen boy (who knows something about that tragic day in her family’s past), give Browning the impression that Banks is dangerous and wants to kill her and her sister. But is horny old dad listening? Or is Browning just loony?
If you’ve seen the enjoyable 2003 South Korean “A Tale of Two Sisters” you don’t really need to see this 2009 Americanisation from directors Charles and Thomas Guard, which is inferior. The original was well-acted, extremely tense, actually quite sad, and thankfully not entirely in the J-horror vein I’m whole-heartedly sick of. This remake is entirely unnecessary. The story has already been told, and if you don’t like subtitles- suck it. That’s your problem, not mine nor the film’s. Still, this isn’t bad at all, it must be said. Kebbel is one of the most instantly likeable presences on screen, and she outshines everyone here, including mumble-mouthed Browning. In fact, Kebbel is better than her South Korean counterpart. Strathairn, meanwhile, is well-cast but poorly used, if you catch my drift. As for Banks, I’ll get to her later, as it ties into other quibbles I have with the film.
The nightmare scenes are stylish if not distinctly stylised, and in fact, overall the directors do an atmospheric if not frightening job. It has atmosphere, but few thrills or tension. Part of this is due to the approach to the adaptation/re-write of the material as more of a ‘Mother-in-law from Hell’ pic instead of a scary hybrid of family drama and ghost story like the original.
I also have to take issue with the cinematography by Daniel Landin, which looks lovely in the day shots, but the night-time scenes are way too dark. I like pitch darkness in horror films, and we get some of that, but some of this isn’t pitch darkness, it’s near-pitch darkness. Landin (or the directors) obviously wants us to see what’s going on in the scene, but he hasn’t lit it well-enough to do so, and so it becomes awfully frustrating.
The other main issue with this film is in regards to its ending and the Banks character, and I’ll try and be as careful as I can, but I’ll issue a ***SPOILER WARNING*** nonetheless. I had no problem with changing the ages of the two sisters in this film (in the original, the character Kebbel plays is much younger than her sister), but I do take issue with the film’s other change from the original. It’s almost as if the Brothers Guard, in re-writing the story (much the same as it actually is, for the most part), have deliberately muted Banks’ character with that ending in mind. For my money, that’s the wrong approach, because the original was so much more effective because of how it was written and how it progressed. It didn’t need much of a re-write, if you ask me. I give them kudos for having the ending still work logically, but the impact isn’t nearly the same, especially if you’ve already seen “A Tale of Two Sisters”. The re-writing of the stepmother role never quite comes off throughout the film. She was such an unforgettably repugnant presence, throughout the original film, but Banks, fine as she is in this re-interpretation, just doesn’t hold the same interest, thanks to how the character has been written. The role has been re-interpreted as more realistic, and thus tepid and ineffectual, like the film itself. *** END SPOILER***
OVERALL SUMMARY
Anyway, if you haven’t seen the original, I’d see it instead, but if you’re a moron who doesn’t like subtitles, well this remake isn’t a terrible repeat. It works relatively well in a serviceable manner, I was simply underwhelmed as a result of my familiarity with the superior original. This one lacks panache and has a dumb (and unoriginal) title to boot.
