>>REVIEW
THE FOG
STARRING Tom Welling, Maggie Grace and Selma Blair
DIRECTED BY Rupert Wainwright
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Horror movie remakes are a touchy subject. Sometimes the results are impressive (Dawn of the Dead), while others are almost unwatchable (The Amityville Horror). Sadly, the remake of John Carpenter’s The Fog falls into the latter category.
This time out, a small island off the coast of Oregon is engulfed by an inexplicable fog that brings with it a boatload of ghosts and a nasty case of leprosy. You see, some bad shit went down a few generations back and now the dead are rising from the sea to exact their revenge.
In a story like this, when the ghosts don’t show themselves until the movie is almost over, it’s up to the corporeal cast to carry the film. Almost universally, they can’t manage it. Smallville’s Tom Welling stars as a two-timing fisherman who does little more than drive his truck around and look good in turtleneck sweaters. Maggie Grace is his girlfriend, who has been plagued by dreams of fog, fire and drowning, but can’t seem to put enough energy into her performance to make you care. Then there’s DeRay Davis, playing Gilligan to Welling’s Skipper, who spends most of the film looking panicked or aping Eddie Murphy. Worst of all, though, is Selma Blair as the island’s lighthouse operator-radio DJ. She tries way too hard to be sexy and sassy on the air, her character has shitty taste in music and worst of all, she survives the film.
All of this could be forgiven if there were oceans of bloody gore, the ghosts in the film didn’t look like leftovers from Lord of the Rings or the script made sense, but The Fog doesn’t offer any thrills – not even cheap ones. My friend summed it up best when she said, "The scariest thing about that movie was the preview for Rent." Yikes – a big-screen version of that Broadway musical? Now that’s terrifying. |
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