Eh, it's been a while. I've got to say, I'm not too great at getting through my list - most of these items were left unfinished for a reason. Perhaps I should seek professional help, but the only thing I got around to recently was watching "Eyes Without a Face" on Netflix. I guess I can say this takes me one step closer at watching every movie that's apart of the Criterion Collection; however, I foolishly said that before I realized there were already over 500 films inducted into that collection - "Audios Mios!" - and it's still growing. Whatever. Here comes another review flying at your eyeballs.
Hollywood, in its infinite talent and wisdom, does do one thing very, very well: remakes. Over the past few years we've all seen dozens of remakes whether it comes to a syndicated television series (A-Team) or to beloved classics (Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory), Hollywood loves to regenerate old material in the belief that it will sell again. But perhaps the genre best known for its regurgitated content are horror films. Just recently there has been "Friday the 13th" and now well look forward to "A Nightmare on Elm Street" and "The Birds" - seriously Michael Bay, you would remake Hitchcock? Anyways, what this rant comes down to is that I am constantly condemning Hollywood for their poor, unimaginative decisions when it comes to developing a new film. But I must say, if they must remake a movie they would be smart to choose "Eyes Without a Face."
Georges Franju made this French flick center around a renown physician, Doctor Génessier, who is in pain because we believe that he's just verified his daughter is dead after getting called into the city morgue to identify an unknown body. A little backstory: Génessier was involved in a car accident some time ago in which others believed his wife to have died in and his daughter's face was horrible disfigure. We quickly find out that both Génessier's wife and daughter are still alive. He gave his wife a face transplant to make her normal again and now she walks around with him as his personal secretary. Génessier's daughter on the other hand suffered far worse from the accident and has been a more difficult subject to heal. Luring young, attractive women from the city, then kidnapping them, Génessier has been trying to find a donor who's face he can transplant to his daughter and have the transplant keep without it decaying and falling apart. And yes, the girl Génessier was identifying at the beginning of the film was not his daughter, but his most recent patient who died on the operating table and was then thrown into the river by his wife. I won't spoil this ending for you - not because it's anything stunning or original - because I highly encourage anyone to watch this film and I want to leave you with something fresh to look forward to.
Even though this move carries its own charm in acting and directing style, this is a film that did not live up to its true potential. The film's energy resides within the family itself. Watching them try to live their lavish, aristocratic lives amidst all this blood and murder. Then we see the daughter herself - absolutely terrifying always wearing this plain mask - conflicted by what her family is doing and how she just wants to escape and be with her fiancé who believes her to be dead. Although a great story, I thought that stakes could have been raise so much higher. The love story between the daughter and her lover was never really built upon, the detectives involved in finding these missing girls weren't involved as much as they could have been, and on and on. Basically, the stakes could have been raised higher and the theme, desire of vanity, could have been exemplified much better.
I'm not demanding that Hollywood remake this film. On the contrary, I would love it if they stopped remaking films altogether (I mean, how many fucking "Alvin and the Chipmunks" movies to we need?)... but that doesn't look as though it will ever happen. So let me proposed this instead: remake the films who's message ended up being stifled the first time. Let us actually contribute something towards the cinema world instead of rehashing some shitty old TV show or something.
And please God, give Michael Bay a really nasty hemorrhoid for even thinking that Hitchcock needed to be retold. Arrogant jackass.
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