Sunday 13 February 2011

Film Review: THE CRAZIES (2010)

Director: Breck Eisner
Running time: 98 mins (approx)
Certification (UK): 15

Genre: Horror/Sci-Fi/Thriller
UK release date 26th February 2010

Watched on Sky+ Sunday 13th February 2011.

PLEASE NOTE: THERE MAY BE SPOILERS IN THIS REVIEW.

This is based on a 1973 film of the same name, now, for the record, I haven’t seen the original so you’ll get no comparisons here. Although rather formulaic, it’s still a pretty enjoyable, if scary and at times gory film. There’s more from me later, but here’s a brief summary first (summary haters please stop acting crazy while I write the next paragraph).

It’s a typical day in a small town in Iowa, there is a baseball game going on and the town sheriff, David Dutten, is there with his deputy, Russell Clank. When a local man wanders onto the pitch carrying a shotgun, Dutten is left with no option but to shoot him. Thinking he was drunk, he goes about his day but feels there’s something odd about it. The next day he discovers the man was sober. More and more incidents begin to happen around the town and Dutten decides to take his wife, Judy, the town doctor, and leave. There’s a problem though, the army have now arrived in biohazard suits and are rounding the townspeople up… I’ll leave it here, that should be intrigue enough.

This is a very well made film; you can tell it had a decent budget. The effects and the stunts are all very well done and the cinematography is pretty decent too. I thought Timothy Olyphant played the part of the Sheriff very well, but it’s a part that seems to fit him pretty well. Radha Mitchell has a good scream (in places) as his wife Judy and I thought Joe Anderson was also pretty good as Russell Clank (although it’s a very comedy name).

I said at the beginning that I found this one pretty formulaic, what I mean is that it follows a similar pattern to several other films I’ve seen in the past. I’d like to name a couple but I’m getting accused of giving out spoilers… At the end of the day, it’s a pretty solid film with a few scares and some gory moments. A little predictable but perfectly watchable… Recommended.

My score: 6.5/10

LINKS:
(RT = Rotten Tomatoes)
IMDb Page: http://uk.imdb.com/title/tt0455407/
RT Page: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1205380-crazies/
Official Site: http://www.thecrazies-movie.com/#/home
Trailer: http://uk.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi3255239705/

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

The scares are cheap, but I at least liked a lot of the action that kept me on the edge of my seat. Also, Olyphant is perfect, as always. Good review, check out mine when you can!