Straw Dogs
More stories
-
Move over, ‘Total Recall’: 10 more remakes you’ll want to avoid
Whether you measure your movies by box office, reviews, or popular appeal, Sony’s $125 million remake of the 1990 Ah-nuld Schwarzenegger interplanetary action fest Total Recall looks like a strike-out. The movie opened with a lethal softness; a $25.7 million first weekend meaning Recall won’t even come close to making back its budget during its […] More
-
2011: A Year of Uprooting and Rebooting Eras
Remakes, “re-adaptations”, and “re-imaginings” have been a frequent occurrence in cinema throughout much of its history, alongside the franchise “reboot” concept that has become particularly commonplace in the last decade. 2011, however, saw a rather curious trend of remakes of films and TV shows, either formerly original concepts or previous adaptations themselves, where the original’s […] More
-
Summer, Bloody Summer
As our last thrilling episode ended in June, we had left poor, helpless, hapless Hollywood tied to railroad tracks with the July/August Express out of Union Station barreling down, dastardly Audience Disinterest at the throttle, henchman Audience Apathy throwing on more coal. But wait! Are those cavalry bugles heard from just over the hill? […] More
-
Be-Seiged: The Gordon Williams Novel V. Sam Peckinpah’s Straw Dogs V. Rod Lurie’s Remake
Heaven and earth are ruthless And treat the myriad creatures as straw dogs; The sage is ruthless And treats the people as straw dogs The Cahiers du Cinema called it “the furious springtime of world cinema,” and nowhere was it more furious than in the United States. From the 1960s through the 1970s, a confluence […] More
-
First Trailer for Rod Lurie’s ‘Straw Dogs’ Remake
Sony Pictures has released the first trailer for their upcoming remake of Sam Peckinpah’s landmark Straw Dogs. I have a love and hate relationship with remakes and reboots, but I must question why Hollywood seems to think this movie needs to be remade. It will be interesting to see if they can match the intensity […] More
-
Sound On Sight Radio Rewind: Episode #206 – Vigilante Justice
If you believe the movies, in every city lies a pissed-off ex-military man with a tragic past, an antiquated firearm and a self-administered license to kill. That describes any number of mostly exploitative action flicks, but the grandaddy of them all might well be Michael Winner’s Death Wish, from 1974, which starred the neighbourly Charles […] More
-
Top Ten Mexican Standoffs
Summer blockbuster season is a perfect time for the movie fans to show their true colors. For some, the appeal strikes with a comic book inspired action movie, as in Iron Man 2. For others, it might be a laugh-out-loud high concept comedy, as in Get Him to the Greek. But for cult geeks like […] More
-
Sound On Sight Radio #206: Vigilante Justice
If you believe the movies, in every city lies a pissed-off ex-military man with a tragic past, an antiquated firearm and a self-administered license to kill. That describes any number of mostly exploitative action flicks, but the grandaddy of them all might well be Michael Winner’s Death Wish, from 1974, which starred the neighbourly Charles […] More