Cape Fear, on Apple TV+

This time around, Max Cady wisely ditches the “love” and “hate” knuckle tattoos, in favor of the more New Age-sounding “Lost” and “Past.” Admittedly, it makes it easier to fool the media, the cops, and the public interest lawyers. Cady’s 1991 tattoos originally came from Night of the Hunter, not the original 1962 film adaptation of John D. MacDonald’s The Executioners, but it seems like the one element Scorsese and De Niro fans would most likely miss. On the other hand, they won’t miss Bernard Herrmann’s thunderous score. Just like Elmer Bernstein reworked it for the 1991 remake, Jeff Russo reorchestrates the reorchestrations for creator Nick Antosca’s ten-episode—yes, count them, 10—re-remake of Cape Fear, which starts streaming today on Apple TV+.

This time around, the focus shifts to Anna Bowden, who was the defense attorney who advised Cady to take a plea bargain for the murder of his wife. Since then, she has risen to prominence as the chief counsel for a death row exoneration non-profit. She also married Tom Bowden, the well-heeled assistant district attorney who prosecuted Cady. Even they admit it looked super awkward, but it was never an issue until Cady’s ex-girlfriend committed suicide, leaving behind a confession and evidence that cleared Cady.

Bowden knows that Cady is toying with her and her family, but she can’t prove anything. Unfortunately, she must put on a show of solidarity when her boss agrees to handle Cady’s suit against the prison. That shows what public interest groups really care about: financial interest. However, viewers know full well all the trouble that befalls the Bowden’s emotionally disturbed son Zack and his half-in-the closet half-sister Natalie are not coincidences. Yes, Natalie’s true father will be a source of speculation and rumor. Could it be Tom, which would be scandalous, given the timing of the trial and her birth, or could it be someone even more scandalous?

Scorsese’s remake was just a few minutes over two hours, while J. Lee Thompson’s original was considerably shorter. In contrast, Antosca needed ten full-hour episodes for his retelling (out of which eight were provided for review). Not surprisingly, there is a lot of padding. Episodes two and three could (and should) have been condensed down to 15 minutes each. He and the writers also introduce wild new complications. This time around, not only does the stalker have his own stalker, perhaps his stalker does as well. Frankly, it all gets very silly.

Amy Adams tries to sell all this madness with her relatively grounded performance as Bowden, but her spotty southern accent is not much help. Javier Bardem recycles all his snarling No Country for Old Men Bond villain greatest hits as Cady, but frankly, his on-screen personas are not as sinister as his off-screen extremism.

A Blind Bargain, Sort of Remaking Lon Chaney, Sr.

For movie lovers, the 1965 MGM Vault Fire represents a profound tragedy. Amongst the films destroyed therein were the last surviving (as far as we know) prints of Lon Chaney’s London After Midnight and A Blind Bargain. Years later, fans and scholars still try to piece together an approximate idea of both films, from historical clues. This film was not the result of such efforts. It is more of a conceptual tribute. However, it has the advantage of still existing. In fact, Paul Bunnell’s A Blind Bargain opens tomorrow in New York.

In the much-desired original, Chaney portrayed mad scientist, Dr. Arthur Lamb, as well as one of his victims, the Ape-Man. Lamb had a similar experiment in mind for Robert Sandell. To compel his agreement, Dr. Lamb offers to perform the life-saving Sandell’s mother needs, but at the cost of Sandell’s humanity.

The Mephistophelean Dr. Gruder offers Dominic Fontaine a slightly different Faustian bargain (but it will still be a blind one). Fontaine, who got hooked on heroin while serving in Vietnam (that anti-veteran stereotype just won’t die, will it?), now owes serious money to his leg-breaking dealer. With the best of intentions, his mother, former silent movie star Joy Fontaine, encourages him to seek treatment at the clinic Gruder operates as a front.

Having tested Fontaine, the still-mad doctor realizes his mother’s blood must have the rare elements his experiments require. Sensing their patient’s desperation, Gruder, his hulking enforcer Logos, and his seductive nurse Ellie Bannister convince Fontaine to lure his mother to the clinic under false pretenses and then sign her into the Doctor’s dubious care. At first, the nightmare treatment horrifies the former movie star, but she changes her tune when it successfully returns her to the youth of her stardom days. Of course, it cannot really be that easy, can it?

Wisely, Bunnell and the design team never go for a faux silent era aesthetic. Instead, they aspire to a vintage 1970s exploitation look and texture, starting with the Super 16mm film stock. There are hat tips to Chaney, like the use of his photo and the evocative titles of Fontaine’s movies, like Egypt After Midnight. However, the deliberately rough edges will put off some viewers. Frankly, if viewers didn’t know the title, they might assume it is related to the 2016 remake of Herschell Gordon Lewis’s Blood Feast.

Handsome Guys, on Delta

They might not look like it, but Kang Jae-pil and Park Sang-goo have cousins in West Virginia. Their names are Tucker and Dale, who once fought evil. Kang and Park are in for a similar bout of misunderstandings, but they must also battle a genuine demonic force in Nam Dong-hyup’s Handsome Guys, a Korean remake of Eli Craig’s Tucker & Dale vs. Evil, which is currently available on Delta’s in-flight entertainment system.

Kang and Park are shy, luckless losers, who have bought a remote cabin to enjoy the “rustic life.” Unfortunately, their new home was the scene of a half-successful exorcism sixty-six years and six months ago—so, obviously it is getting to be about that time again.

Unbeknownst to hard-working Kim Mi-na, her not-really-friend Bo-ra invited her on a weekend getaway just so her pro-golfer pal Lee Jung-bin could take advantage of her. Naturally, Lee and his entitled friends look upon Kang and Park like the backwoods boys in Deliverance. Consequently, when the “Handsome Guys” save Kim from drowning, they assume she was kidnapped. Ordinarily, Lee wouldn’t care, but Kim accidentally walked off with his phone, which is loaded with highly incriminating photos and video.

As Bo-ra and the cads try to “rescue” Kim, they meet a series of unlikely but fatal Final Destination-style mishaps. However, in Nam’s remake, death isn’t the end for them. As sacrifices to Baphomet, they become his demonic vessels.

The supernatural elements are entirely new to Handsome Guys. Even though they add a dumpster truckload of additional lunacy, the new material really makes the concept work better. Having a hidden hand behind all the fatal misadventures gives a greater degree of “logic,” to use that word extremely loosely. Arguably, there it also invests the film with a greater sense of morality.

Deathstalker, Starring Daniel Bernhardt

Casual viewers might think of fantasy heroes as virtuous Tolkienesque dragonslayers, but for real fans, the irresponsible antiheroes are even more important. Conan was that kind of freebooter and so was Red Sonja (in the books and comics). The title character of Roger Corman’s 1983 rip-off has always been a cult-favorite, because he was so grungy and roguish. The reboot might not share much with the original, but at least the wandering swordsman still refuses to reform himself in Steven Kostanski’s Deathstalker, executive produced by Guns ‘n Roses’ Slash, which opens this Friday in theaters.

As the film opens, the universally despised Deathstalker makes his coin scavenging from dead bodies fallen in battle. That is pretty scummy behavior, but nobody challenges him, because he is too lethal. However, this time around, he “liberated” an amulet from a “mostly dead” knight that apparently carries a curse.

From now on, no matter what he does with it, it always turns up back in his pocket. Making everything worse, a demonic army led by his old nemesis, Jotak, seems hellbent on recovering the amulet, even if it does him serious harm in the process. To lift the curse, he must find Doodad, a little person wizard. However, Deathstalker must first save the sorcerer from his own magical entrapment. Heck, at this rate, Deathstalker is practically becoming heroic.

The ruckus but comfortable combination of bloody carnage and outrageous over-the-top humor will compute for fans of Kostanski’s previous films, such as PG: Psycho Goreman. Deathstalker also reflects the former makeup artist’s passion for practical effects. It doesn’t exactly transport the audience to an immersive fantasy world, but it certainly dives right in, embracing the hacking and slashing, as well as the creature-creation.

The Hidden Face: The Korean Remake

Andres Baiz’s Spanish film, The Hidden Face, is starting to generate as many international remakes as Oirol Paulo’s The Invisible Guest. At least many of the subsequent Hidden Faces have tried to put their own spin on the dark psychological themes. That is particularly true of the new Korean remake. The love triangle relationship-dynamics get especially torturous in Kim Dae-woo’s The Hidden Face, which releases this Tuesday on digital.

Seong-jin might direct the orchestra, but his fiancée, cellist Soo-yeon, calls the shots, along with her mother, the executive director, Hye-yeon. Everyday brings new emasculations, until Soo-yeon impulsively flies off to Europe. At least that is what she told him in the video she left behind.

Weirdly, there has been no sign of her since then—no calls, no credit card usage. Despite her imperiousness, Hye-yeon starts to worry. Nevertheless, she agrees Seong-jin should find a temp replacement for her. Conveniently, Soo-yeon also left behind a recommendation for Mi-joo. Years ago, they both studied cello together in the very same house Soo-yeon just bought, to live with Seong-jin. At the time, Mi-joo and her were quite close.

It turns out she and Seong-jin are also quite compatible. They both share a fondness for the melancholy of Schubert (much like Martin Landau in Crimes and Misdemeanors). Pretty soon, Seong-jin commences something like an affair with Mi-joo, even though he still presumes Soo-yeon abandoned him. Instead, Mi-joo locked her in the secret bunker behind the walls, where she can see everything through the one-way mirrors, but she cannot be heard through the thick glass and steel.

The game-playing in this Hidden Face is even more morally bent than it sounds. Frankly, it is a sign of progress that the film has not provoked boycott-fury from the various professionally outraged alphabet groups for the way it depicts certain sexual identities. Happily, we can all just relax and enjoy its perverse, twisted soul. This is indeed a twisty and twisted film, but it will definitely surprise viewers, perhaps even those who have seen the previous Hidden Faces.

The Toxic Avenger, Starring Peter Dinklage

He was born in a notoriously violent and grotesque Troma movie. Less than seven years later, he was starring in a children’s cartoon. It didn’t last long, because what’s haye point of watching Toxie if he can’t stuff a bullying bad guy’s hands into a deep fryer? In the original films, his name varied from Melvin Ferd to Melvin Junko, so giving him a fresh name change to Winston Gooze is really no big deal. Regardless, he will experience plenty of body horror while in engaging in gruesome acts of payback throughout director-screenwriter Macon Blair’s rebooted The Toxic Avenger, which opens tomorrow in theaters.

Poor Gooze is still a put-upon janitor (wielding a trusty mop), who is done wrong by life in general and his boss, mobbed-up nutritional supplement tycoon Bob Garbinger in particular. First, Garbinger’s company rejects his insurance claim for life-saving treatment. Then his thugs beat Gooze and leave him for dead in a vat of toxic goo. Frankly, that last part was an honest misunderstanding. They were supposed to kill J.J. Doherty, a whistle-blower collecting evidence of Garbinger’s dangerously foul environmental practices. Gooze just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Although Gooze looks like a giant oozing disfigured freak, he now has superhuman strength and healings powers, which are obviously handy traits for a vigilante. Yet, Gooze fears his new twisted form will further traumatize his stepson Wade, who is still reeling from his mother’s death (prior to the start of the picture).

Troma still co-produced Blair’s reboot and studio chief Lloyd Kaufman even makes a Stan Lee-style cameo, but civilians who are not fanatically devoted to the indie studio will be happy to have more cooks in the kitchen. As a result, the new film is not quite as cartoonishly vicious as Troma’s vintage 1980’s releases, including the original 1984 film. Admittedly, “watered-down” is not a term many critics will apply to Macon’s reboot, but it does not quite have the same ferocity, which is a good thing.

In fact, there are flashes of pleasantly dry wit, delivered with appropriate cynical world-weariness by Peter Dinklage. He has a great voice for voice-overs. Frankly, based on his intro, he would probably make a terrific Batman for the DC Animated Universe. He also helps humanize Gooze, even when Luisa Guerrero takes over as the body of the Toxic Avenger.

Witchboard, Chuck Russell’s Reboot

It used to be a garden variety Ouija board that picked up a bad passenger, but for the reboot, it has been upgraded to a very rare and very evil antique. That will not be a trade-up for those who handle it. At least the food is better this time around, because the setting moved from California to New Orleans. However, a young woman still falls under the sway of a creepy forerunner to the magic 8-ball in Chuck Russell’s Witchboard, which opens today in theaters.

Emily, her fiancé Christian, and their friends were out foraging for mushrooms when she stumbled across the evil board. They weren’t for recreational purposes. They are for the opening of Christian’s hipster restaurant. Apparently, everyone was so busy planning for the premiere, they missed the news of the museum heist that made off with a notorious witchcraft relic.

The board still basically works the same way. It just has more bells and whistles. Ominously, Emily grows increasingly obsessed with the board’s divining powers, after it leads her to her misplaced engagement ring. Indeed, the recovering Emily has an addictive personality that makes her acutely susceptible to the board’s malevolent influence.

Nobody really thinks about why the board was there in the first place. Anne Ricey-looking Alexander Babtiste, a wealthy expert in the dark arts, commissioned the theft, but was double-crossed by the hoodlum now decomposing in the forest. Ill-advisedly, Christian’s torch-carrying but well-meaning ex, Brooke, refers Christian to Babtiste for occult guidance. Clearly, he does not have Emily’s best interests at heart.

Russell and co-screenwriter Greg McKay’s screenplay wildly departs from the 1986 original, but Babtiste’s shadowy conspiracy to resurrect a notorious 17^th Century witch is the best thing going for the film, admittedly in a wacky and outlandish kind of way. There are times when the film ventures quite deeply into the tall weeds of left field (to compound metaphors).

Japan Cuts ’25: Serpent’s Path

With this film, Kiyoshi Kurosawa joined the company of Michael Haneke (Funny Games), Takashi Shimizu (The Grudge), George Sluizer (The Vanishing), and Ole Bornedal (Nightwatch). All have helmed remakes of their films in different languages. Admittedly, Japanese can still be heard in Kiyoshi’s new take on his 1998 dark thriller, but French is the primary language—logically so, since it is set in and around Paris. Weirdly, one of the major themes was lost in translation, but human nature remains just as dark and brutish as ever in Kurosawa’s Serpent’s Path (2024), which has its East coast premiere tomorrow, as part of the 2025 Japan Cuts.

Schlubby, grieving Albert Bacheret and straight-arrow psychiatrist Dr. Sayoko Mijima are a mismatched odd couple, but they are about to pull off the daring daylight abduction of Laval, a prominent attorney. He should have been more discerning in his choice of clients.

Viewers deduce relatively quickly that Laval represented “The Circle,” an organ-trafficking cult that murdered Bacheret’s young daughter. Tormented by grief and guilt, Bacheret now only lives for revenge. However, as the trail leads the duo to high-ranking members of the Circle, Bacheret grows wary and apprehensive. He understands just how dangerous they are, because he once worked for them. Right, that’s awkward.

Aurelien Ferenczi’s adapted screenplay remains largely faithful to Hiroshi Takahashi’s original, but it transforms the distraught father’s accomplice from a math teacher into a doctor. As a result, the mathematical motifs all go out the window.

While that character change might trouble admirers of the 1998 film, Ko Shibasaki’s powerhouse portrayal of Mijima is definitely the remake’s greatest asset. She is quiet, but her presence is electric. Frankly, Damien Bonnard is completely outclassed as the basket case, Bacheret.

Bad Genius, an Unnecessary Remake

In the movies, the have’s are always stupid and lazy, whereas the have-not’s are always smart and virtuous. In real life, there are plenty of intelligent wealthy people and creepy working-class morons, but they make poor fodder for class warfare propaganda.  You will not find any such inconvenient characters in this unnecessary remake of a vastly superior Thai film. Two scholarship kids still have one advantage—a knack for taking standardized tests—that they do their best to fraudulently monetize in Bad Genius, directed by J.C. Lee, which is now in theaters and on digital.

Lynn Kang has a real shot at getting into either MIT or Julliard, but she and her father Meng disagree regarding which she should apply to. Regardless, her upper-crust classmate Grace Simon quickly realizes Kang’s brain could help her too. Despite some reservations, Kang develops a method of signaling test answers to Simon’s clique, for a fee, of course. She makes good money until the dumb old adults notice suspicious patterns.

Unfortunately, Kang loses her scholarship, but not her ambition. Needing money for Julliard auditions, Kang agrees to a grand scheme in which she takes the SAT in a crummy, poorly maintained Philly high school, where she will secretly text her memorized answers back to her exploitive “friends” in suburban Seattle—but she can’t do it alone. Of course, the only classmate smart enough to help her is the painfully sensitive Bank Adedamola, the son of African immigrants (so much for all those bogus complaints about standardized tests being culturally biased).

The emphasis on Adedamola’s immigrant identity is an example of how Lee’s adaptation of Nattawut Poonpiriya’s like-titled Bad Genius, a briskly-paced teen caper, evolved into such a downbeat, politicized buzzkill. The original Thai film has a smart and entertainingly conspiratorial vibe. In contrast, Lee and co-screenwriter Julius Onah constantly lecture viewers on inequality, which is a lot less fun.

Speak No Evil, Remade by Blumhouse

Remember, your new vacations friends probably are not that funny. Most likely, it is really just the wine. Most people realize it would be a bad idea to reunite later, especially at their isolated country home, but the Daltons do it anyway in James Watkins’ Speak No Evil, a Blumhouse-produced remake of Christian Tafdrup’s Danish film of the same name, which releases tomorrow nationwide.

Ben Dalton brought his wife Louise and daughter Agnes to London for a job opportunity that evaporated at the last minute. They are still there, but it is awkward, for additional reasons that will be revealed during their stressful upcoming country getaway. To lift their spirits, they have a miserable time vacationing in Tuscany, until they start hanging with the super-fun Paddy and Ciara, who rescue them from the other boring tourists. However, their mute son Ant is not such a good time. Maybe they should pay more attention to him.

When things get bad again back home, they decide to take up Paddy’s offer to visit their farmhouse. However, as soon as they arrive, they regret it, because their hosts are much weirder than they remember. The Daltons also realize poor Ant endures constant emotional (and perhaps physical) abuse. Yet, they stay, to avoid offending Paddy and Ciara. Ant tries to warn them, but only Agnes picks up on his desperate attempts to communicate.

Watkins’ adaptation of Tafdrup’s original film is taking flak for not being as hopelessly give-you-nothing-nihilistic as its predecessor, but that’s not such a bad thing. Frankly, we already have plenty of horror films in which cruelty is rewarded. Arguably, it starts out as a remake of Speak No Evil but turns into a much better remake of Straw Dogs than Rod Lurie managed to cobble together. It even takes place back in rural England again.

There is a good deal of sexual politics reflected in the Daltons’ cratering relationship. As a further source of shame, she turns out to be a better, fiercer protector, but mostly due to reasons of coordination rather than Force Majeure-esque cowardice on his part. Instead, Ben Dalton endures tremendous pain for family, in a climax that would make a Spanish Inquisitor wince. Yet, boy, does that tension build.

Mackenzie Davis is terrific as Louise Dalton, both on a physical and viscerally emotional level. Scoot McNairy is more restrained, but he elevates Ben Dalton above and beyond his “wounded masculinity.” However, young Dan Hough so devastatingly expresses such extreme inner turmoil as poor Ant, it should make some viewers questions the ethics of children appearing in a film like this.

Longing, Starring Richard Gere

Presumably, it is profoundly too late for Daniel Bloch to be a father to his son, but at least the kid will not judge him too harshly. Allen Hilu is beyond Gen Z griping, having perished in a car crash. Bloch’s ex only now informed him of the truth. Despite the tragic circumstances, Bloch tries to find fatherly ways to help his late son—and maybe there is something he can do in director-screenwriter Savi Gabizon’s English-language remake of his Award-winning Israeli film Longing, which releases this Friday in theaters.

Rachel understood Bloch had his reasons for not wanting children, so she never told him when she left town, pregnant with his son. After Hilu’s death, she figures he ought to know the truth, which leaves him speechless. Bloch not only travels to Canada for the funeral, he then takes it upon himself to learn about the son he never knew. He meets the girlfriend Hilu maybe took for granted and Ms. Alice, the pretty French teacher for whom the teen apparently developed an unhealthy romantic obsession.

Steadily, Bloch uncovers the good and the bad, but he usually takes his son’s side, especially with regards to Ms. Alice. He finds some small but meaningful ways to keep his son’s memory alive, which Rachel and her husband appreciate. However, they are skeptical of his suggestion to arrange a posthumous marriage (in accordance with traditional Chinese customs) with Elizabeth Harris, a beautiful teen suicide, whose bereaved father Bloch regularly encounters in the cemetery.

There are a lot of awkward implications to this scheme, but to his credit, Gabizon’s screenplay never shies away from addressing them. It is perhaps a dubious idea, especially for parents who do not subscribe to such beliefs, but if it gives consolation, who’s to judge?

There is indeed a deeply honest and humanistic stream running through Longing. Gabizon never makes it easy for any of his characters, least of all Bloch, whom Gere portrays with extraordinary sensitivity. Gere has a scene relatively early in the film, explaining why he resolved never to have children, because of the abuse he suffered from his father, which is truly devastating. Gere is still a huge movie star, at the peak of his powers, so it is a crime he does not appear in more high-profile releases.

Indeed, Longing could very well be the victim of review-bombing and trolling two times over. In addition to Gere’s well-documented support for the Dalai Lama and Tibetan culture (making him persona non grata with the CCP and their netizens stooges), Longing was adapted from an Israeli film by the original Israeli filmmaker. It would be a shame if the forces of darkness attacked a heartfelt film like Longing, but it is probably inevitable.

The Mole, on Eurochannel

Compared to Lino Ventura’s network in Army of Shadows, it looks like Marie-Helene Dumoulin’s “Vaillance” Resistance group had an above-average survival rate. Yet, they are understandably haunted by the memories of their fallen comrades, particularly their charismatic leader Castille. When Dumoulin discovers they were betrayed by an informer, she confronts her fellow survivors, hoping to uncover the truth in Josee Dayan’s The Mole (a.k.a. Marie-Octubre), which premieres this Friday on Eurochannel.

Thirteen years after the war, Dumoulin has built a successful fashion house, named after her Resistance code-name, Marie-Octubre, with the support of her old comrade and current lover, Jerome Massenet. The Vaillance group now spans the social gamut, including a prominent politician, lawyer, and surgeon, as well as a leftist professor, and a failed businessman who is considered little better than a con artist.

Yet, they duly come together to honor Castille. When the eleven are finally assembled (twelve including Massenet’s longtime family servant Clemence), Dumoulin drops her bombshell. During one of her fashion shows, a German buyer rather casually revealed to her his role as a former SS intelligence officer, who received information from a Vaillance turncoat that led to Castille’s death.

Dayan’s remake of the 1959 Julien Duvivier film has the form and tone of an Agatha Christie movie. All the suspects are assembled in one place, where each one’s motives for betrayal are examined one by one. That is also why it is so much fun. Even though it was made for French TV, The Mole is a terrific French thriller. It is particularly intriguing to see how Vaillance group encompassed leftwing and rightwing extremes, who inevitably point fingers at each other, in the wake of Dumoulin’s accusation.

Final Cut: Michel Hazanavicius Remakes One Cut of the Dead

Ironically, a zombie apocalypse breaks out while a film crew is shooting a zombie movie. But wait, there’s more—as those who have seen Shinichiro Ueda’s One Cut of the Dead already know. However, this is sort of a remake and also sort of a sequel. Apparently, it all transpires in a universe where One Cut exists, but the production is plagued (so to speak) by similar problems. It isn’t easy directing zombies in Michel Hazanavicius’s Final Cut, which opens today in New York.

This time around Higurashi doesn’t look like a Higurashi, but he is just as deranged. Quite irresponsibly, he has invoked a WWII-era zombie curse to illicit more convincing performances from his beleaguered cast. They too have distinctly Japanese names, despite speaking French. All will be explained eventually.

It is interesting to watch Final Cut, for the “first time,” while knowing the big twists. It allows fans of One Cut to appreciate the ways Hazanavicius tweaked the material and how he stayed faithful to the spirit of the original film. Reviewing three similar takes on Invisible Guest was probably one too many, but Hazanavicius’s clever in-film references to One Cut help differentiate Final Cut. In some ways, they also make the French remake/sequel/side-film even nuttier.

Romain Duris and Berenice Bejo are terrific as the Higurashi the director and Natsumi the make-up artist. They sort of play against type—and then they don’t—but they both use their winning screen charismas to full effect. Lyes Salem and Jean-Pascal Zadi are also very funny as the producer and composer-sound designer.

The Rising, on CW

When it comes to amateur sleuths, Neve Kelly is unusually highly motivated, especially for a Gen Z’er. The murder she is trying to solve is her own. Obviously, she is at a bit of a disadvantage as a ghost, but there are a few people who can see her. Regardless, there is a murderer out there, who does not want to be caught in The Rising, Peter McTighe’s eight-episode British remake of the Belgian series Hotel Beau Sejour, which premieres tonight on the CW.

It is not initially shocking the Kelly did not make home the morning after her final motor-cross race of season. When she wakes up in the lake, she is still not aware of her death. Unfortunately, due to the booze at the party and the trauma of the murder, she has no memory of what was done to her, or by whom. At first, nobody seems to be able to see her, but soon she realizes her hard boozing father can. Of course, he cannot believe his eyes, but with a little effort, she convinces him of her presence. Then she also realizes Alex Wyatt, her boyfriend’s cousin can see her too. Eventually, it will get to the point where it would be easier to just list who can’t see Kelly, but frustratingly for her, her grieving mother Maria Kelly never can.

Weirdly, the issue of who can see Kelly and why gets worked out to an acceptable extent. However, there are a lot of other questions about the mechanics of “death” that are never satisfactorily explained. Kelly still needs to take her motorbike to get across town, but nobody can see her driving it, except her well-lubricated dad. When she smashes up a vase, but it appears just as it was, once the living turn their gaze towards it. Frankly, the way dead Kelly interacts with the physical world makes almost no sense. Instead, it seems deliberately fluid, simply to help advance the storyline. Yet, the persistence of those nagging issues of logic constantly distracts from the drama.

There is a lot in The Rising that comes perilously close to genuine silliness. Still, the series has its creepy moments, especially when Kelly links her murder to the previous disappearance of woman, whose body was never recovered. Matthew McNulty and Emily Taaffe are also both excellent as Kelly’s divorced parents, who deal with their grief in very different ways. Alex Lanipekun is also a standout (in a good way) as Kelly’s distraught stepfather, Daniel Sands, whose own grief is unfairly ignored and belittled by his overwrought wife.

Dead Ringers, on Prime

Yes, it is another reboot gender-switcheroo, but in this case, Stewart and Cyril Marcus probably would not object, even if they could. They were the late identical twin gynecologists, whose mysterious deaths inspired the novel that was later adapted by David Cronenberg as Dead Ringers. Weirdly, this series remake-reboot-re-conception is more disturbingly graphic than Cronenberg’s film—way more. A lot is different, but at least they still have the crimson red surgical smocks in showrunner-writer Alice Birch’s six-part Dead Ringers, which premieres today on Prime.

Beverly and Elliot are still sort of strangely unisex names, since the latter has reportedly become more popular for girls in recent years. Regardless, the Mantle twins remain physically identical, but psychologically weird in very different ways. Beverly thinks she is the shy one, but her passive aggression is also quite manipulative. In contrast, Elliot’s foul-mouthed aggression comes right at people. She sees herself as Beverly’s protector and sometimes procurer, helping her shy sister lure lovers, with the understanding they will be quickly disposed of.

Much to Elliot’s surprise, Genevieve (presumably named as a hat-tip to Genevieve Bujold, who co-starred in Cronenberg’s film) is different. Once Elliot handles their first “date,” Beverly starts swooning for her new lover, even considering a long-term commitment with her. The resulting strain on their sibling relationship is exacerbated by the stress of opening their state-of-the-art birthing center, with capital supplied by Rebecca Parker, a truly toxic pharma heiress, who plays the part of philanthropist, but it really just working her own angles.

As issues arise at the new center, the shoot-from-the-hip Elliot grows increasingly unstable. Heck, maybe she even kills a homeless woman, but to be fair, she was even more obnoxious than Elliot. Regardless, Birch and the writers and directors play a lot of games with the twins’ perceptions of reality that undermine the main narrative rather than enhance it.

However, there is a good chance most viewers will not get that far. Frankly, the first episode almost entirely consists of harrowing birth complications and crude sexual conversations that make it an uncomfortably repetitive viewing experience to endure.

This should go without saying, but doctors should not sleep with their patients. Even if you gloss over the Beverly-Genevieve relationship, there is a lot of virtue signaling on behalf women’s health in Birch’s Dead Ringers that basically deconstructs on closer viewing. The Mantles are constantly talking about making their birth center feel safe and welcoming to pregnant women, but every examination room and operating theater seems to have observation windows any passer-by can open. Seriously, what is that all about?

Yet, there are flashes of inspired writing in the series, particularly two scenes, in which a mystery woman and a disgraced journalist both strip off Elliot’s façade and utterly expose her tortured psyche. Unfortunately, that quality is fleeting. Soon, the series repeats the same melodrama, driven by Elliot’s potty mouth, Beverly’s neurotic twitching, and their test tube horror shows. This story would be better executed in feature length, as indeed it was, by Cronenberg.

Yes, Rachel Weisz is frighteningly committed in the dual role of the Mantles, creating two very distinct, deeply troubled personas. However, they are both so much, it is hard to believe either could function or be accepted professionally in the real world. (In contrast, Jeremy Irons’ before-Mantles at least projected the appearance of learned competence.) Jennifer Ehle’s ice-cold snark as Parker is highly amusing, but way too abrasive to be credible in a serious dramatic context.

Cube (the Japanese Remake), on Screambox

Vicenzo Natali's 1997 film gave fans some life-and-death math well before Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code—with an emphasis on the death part. Instead of Fibonacci sequences, it was all about Cartesian Coordinates and primes, as well as brutal death traps. The rumored reboot has yet to happen, but it was remade in Japan, with Natali on-board as an executive producer. You still want to avoid prime numbers in Yasuhiko Shimizu’s Cube, which premieres Tuesday on Screambox.

Like in Natali’s original, six people wake up in a mysterious structure of interlocking cubes with no memory of how they got there. When they eventually find each other, it is clear the blue-collar Ide is the one who has had the most time to figure out the cube’s deadly ways. However, it is the emotionally-damaged teen Uno who figures out the significance of the serial number-like digits attached to each of the cube like rooms. If any of the three sets of three numbers constitutes a prime, there is sure to be a trap waiting for them in the corresponding chamber. However, even if there is no prime, there still could be a trap.

Much like the source film, most of the Cube’s prisoners have serious personal issues, like Ando, the obnoxious business man or Ochi, the psychopath. The one who doesn’t seem to have anything going on, actually holds the biggest secret, which represents the greatest departure from the 1997 film.

Frankly, Shimizu’s remake, adapted by Koji Tokuo is even weaker when it comes to characterization than the original. Whereas the first film might have been slightly more tethered to the real world, Tokuo’s version has more science fiction implications, but there is no time to explore them to any substantial extent.

Children of the Corn (2023)

This is one Stephen King property that can probably be remade without a lot of pressure. The first film from 1984 remains popular, despite departing significantly from the original short story, which really isn’t considered King’s best work anyway. Then there were a raft of questionable straight-to-DVD sequels and SyFy Channel remakes. The last film in the franchise was truly awful, so most fans should be willing to give director-screenwriter Kurt Wimmer a little leeway for his take on Children of the Corn, which releases Friday in theaters.

No strangers come to town this time around, because why would they? Boleyn Williams’ corn-farming community is dying, thanks to pestilence and faulty GMO seeds. It is so bad, her father wants to pull the plug and accept Federal subsidies for not growing corn. However, Williams wants to stay and fight. So does creepy little Eden Edwards and the corn cult that has sprung up around her. She used to live at the local group foster home, but when her brother went crazy-from-the-fields, the sheriff tried to gas him out of the house, killing two dozen other children in the process. Subsequently, Edwards has claimed to have a weird, pagan connection to the corn fields.

Ill-advisedly, Williams recruits Edwards’ help in staging a public inquiry into the state of local agriculture. She thought it would be a public forum, but Edwards and her cult quickly turn it into the corn-country equivalent of Robespierre feeding the guillotines.

Wimmer’s Corn isn’t exactly fantastic, but it is certainly a healthy improvement over the dismal Children of the Corn: Runaway. It also shows some signs a bit of thought went into it, at least at some early stage. Although Wimmer starts out suggesting this will be an environmental horror, he quickly steers away from that dead end.

Despite the supernatural elements, this Children of the Corn seems to more depict the insanity of mob behavior and cults. In some ways, it very definitely critiques the revolutionary impulse, which once again leads to violent horrors Williams never imagined, but Edwards is eager to unleash. It turns out show trials can go in a very, very ugly direction.

Elena Kampouris and Callan Mulvey are both surprisingly strong as Williams and her decent father Robert. In fact, Mulvey might earn Wimmer’s film the distinction of having the nicest dad of any Stephen King film yet. Unfortunately, Bruce Spence plays Pastor Penny as a sweaty, leering stereotype, but that certainly follows in the King tradition. However, young Kate Moyer is certainly creepy, in an appropriately Village of the Damned-kind of way.

Terror Train (2022), on Tubi

More people were killed in Roger Spottiswoode’s 1980 train-bound slasher movie than during Runaway Train, Silver Streak, or Murder on the Orient Express (but probably not Train to Busan). It was supposed to be a party train, but a mystery man in a Halloween mask crashed it hard. There will be another killer party in Philippe Gagnon’s remake of Terror Train, which premieres tomorrow on Tubi (following its screening at this year’s Brooklyn Horror Film Festival).

Alana reluctantly agreed to participate in a really mean hazing prank, but she had no idea “Doc,” the fraternity president, would use a real cadaver. The shock sent the poor-pledge victim to the mental ward. She was appalled, but he blackmailed her to keep silent. Awkwardly, her boyfriend Mo remained in the frat, so there she is, rubbing shoulders with Doc at the first party hosted by more sensitive successor.

You can kind of understand why she accepted the invitation, since it will be a costume party, with a hip, “edgy” magician performing. Unfortunately, there will be an uninvited guest, wielding a sharp knife. This time, our killer passes unnoticed wearing an evil clown disguise, instead of the original’s Groucho Marx mask (which a lot of Millennials presumably wouldn’t recognize). Soon, the psychopath is carving up partiers, but everyone is too busy drinking or watching the entertainment to notice.

Screenwriters Ian Carpenter and Aaron Martin ditched the original’s shocking twist, which comes as no surprise, if you remember what happened. Arguably, the remake might also be somewhat gorier. However, in many other respects, it remains surprisingly faithful to the 1980 film. Most importantly, the enigmatic magician still plays an important role keeping viewers off balance. To this day, it remains David Copperfield’s only true dramatic role, but he was amazingly weird and he had real deal magic chops.

Tim Rozon is shockingly great assuming his role and his cape. Once again, his unnamed magician character really elevates the remake above standard slasher fare. Of course, he is flamboyantly over-the-top when chewing the scenery and performing his illusions. That is the whole point.

Let the Right One In, on Showtime

Traditionally, vampires were tall, dark, and handsome, lustily populating hot-blooded, sexually-charged gothic horror stories. Then Tomas Alfredson’s 2008 film adaptation of John Ajvide Lindqvist’s novel introduced viewers to a tiny, pale vampire leading a lonely existence in a bleak, frigid Scandinavian suburb. Now, Showtime’s series adaptation relocates its story to New York City. So much for that distinctive vibe. At least there is still a twelve-year-old (looking) vampire in creator Andrew Hinderaker’s Let the Right One In, which premieres tomorrow on Showtime.

Eleanor Kane and her father Mark move around a lot, because she is a vampire. They have finally returned to New York (which always reminds people of Blackeberg, Sweden), because her dad hopes finding the vampire who attacked and turned Eleanor a decade ago will hopefully lead to a possible cure.

Of course, “young” Kane will be home-schooled and kept safely locked inside the apartment. He will do all her hunting, just like Eli’s old familiar in the film. Despite his caution, she still manages to befriend Isaiah Cole, the bullied little boy living next door. That inevitably alarms her protective father, especially when he learns Cole’s mother is a NYPD detective. Yet, he is also happy to see her finally making friends and enjoying herself.

Big Daddy Kane believes he might have stumbled across a lead during his blood-hunting, after he kills a junkie exhibiting vampire-like symptoms. For background on the new designer drug, the desperate father targets a low-level pusher, who just happens to be Isaiah’s dead-beat dad. Small world, right? This is all somehow connected to Claire Logan, a brilliant medical researcher, who just learned a few months prior she had a shocking connection to the undead.

Right, there is a lot here fans of the Swedish Right One (or the American Los Alamos-set remake) will not recognize. Look, I do not want to always be the “Remake Cop,” but what made Alfredson’s film and the St. Ann Warehouse theatrical production so special was the chilly, austere vibe (it snowed on stage and it was magical). That is not here. Yes, it incorporates the outsider friendship that blooms between Eleanor and Isaiah, but her relationship with her father takes precedence in the series. By calling it Let the Right One In, Hinderaker is inviting these comparisons, so why not create something entirely new, or at least call it From the World of Let the Right One In or Let Another Right One In or whatever.

That would have better served the series, because once fans get past their disappointment over how the urban chaos that squeezed out all the original’s Spartan intimacy, they might appreciate the things that works. Demian Bichir is terrific as Kane, especially the way he portrays how the desperate father holds on to his Catholic faith. Based on the first five episodes, Right One is surprisingly faith-friendly, without ever getting preachy.

Young thesps Madison Taylor Baez and Ian Forman are quite professional and appealingly sympathetic playing Eleanor and Isaiah. Anika Noni Rose and Jimmie Saito (as Cole and her partner Ben Jones) also have good cop chemistry together doing all the police procedural business.

The Munsters: Revived by Rob Zombie

This beloved TV family was more apple pie-American than the Waltons, the Cleavers, or the Simpsons, but they originally hailed from Transylvania. Sure, some most fans might be somewhat fonder of the Adamses or the Collinses of Collinsport, but we all have a soft spot for Herman Munster and family. That’s why everyone had the same thought when Rob Zombie’s remake was announced: “he better not screw it up.” At least he gets the tone right in The Munsters, which releases today on DVD and Netflix.

Lily is a ghoul (with the moistest) living with her father the Count, who wants her to settle down with a wealthy Nosferatu. Instead, she falls for Herman Munster, the days-old creation of Dr. Henry Augustus Wolfgang. He was stitched together soon after the death of two brothers. One was a brilliant quantum physicist. The other was a moronic nightclub comic. Guess which one’s brain Wolfgang’s assistant Floop was supposed to steal and which he plundered instead.

The Count thinks Herman is an idiot, but it is love at first sight for Lily. Unfortunately, the Count is not wrong about Munster, which makes him easy prey for Lily’s scammer brother Lester, a compulsive gambling werewolf deeply indebted to fortune-teller-real estate developer Zoya Krupp (yes, we still love Maria Ouspenskaya as Maleva in The Wolf Man, but the Roma stereotypes are getting a bit outdated).

Unlike every other film Rob Zombie ever made, The Munsters is sweet and gentle. You won’t hear anyone leveling charges of toxic fandom to defend the film, because it respects what made the original so enduring—a loving nuclear family, who just happen to look like vintage Universal monsters. To that end, there are a number of warmly pleasing sequences, like Herman and Lily’s duet on “I’ve Got You Babe” and Herman’s introduction to Lily’s uncle, the Creature from the Black Lagoon.

The problem with Zombie’s script is that it is a totally unnecessary origin story. We completely get who the Munsters are. There is no need wasting time explaining. Just cut to the riffing on classic monster tropes. Frankly, there is not a lot of genuine conflict to drive the narrative, such as it is. We do not even get to meet Eddie or Marilyn Munster yet, but the original cast-members Butch Patrick and Pat Priest who portrayed them have voice-over cameos (as Tin Can Man and an airline announcer) that viewers should be forewarned of, because otherwise they aren’t likely to register.