The Crazies

 Ryan: 1/4 banana peels
Matt: .5/4 banana peels

by Ryan


The Crazies is a remake of George A. Romero's 1973 grindhouse classic of the same name. The movie follows a small town in Iowa as it descends into madness after a toxin is introduced into the water supply. The town Sheriff, played by Timothy Olyphant, and his wife and town doctor, played by Radha Mitchell, are the lone survivors trying to make it out alive amidst the zombie madness and government cover up.

Given that this film is of the zombie genre, one should take a slightly lower standard going into the theater. However, this movie joins the likes of The Happening at the bottom of a barrel of rotten human zombie flesh. I'm not sure I should even go any further with this review, I feel I should just leave you with knowing how terrible it is. If you would like to read on go ahead, otherwise, know this film is bad and leave it at that.

I'll try to keep this short. The dialogue was beyond campy and cheesy, it was crap. The story was worn and used, lacking any innovation or thrills. The characters walked epically down the highway with awkward spacing. The acting was, in the immortal words of Charles Barkley, turuble. The pacing was unbelievably disjoint and hard to keep with. The whole film wreaked of a bad M. Night Shyamalan flick. Honestly, it seemed as though first time director Breck Eisner watched a marathon of Shyamalan (not including the Sixth Sense) before he set out to make this film. Should I go any further?

The only positive I could really offer here is that one day, 30 years from now, movie connoisseurs will seek out films like this, much like the ones who now seek out the Grindhouse movies of the 70's. Although, there is something oddly charming about those films and they get better with age. The Crazies is just bad and I'm not sure there's any amount of time that could cure this film.

I'll leave you with the final words of the film:
Sheriff:  "Ouch"
Wife:  "Sorry honey"

Looking for a good film to see this weekend? Don't go see The Crazies, hopefully we wasted $10 so you don't have to. If you're one of the unfortunate souls who lost 10 of their hard earned dollars, drop us a comment and let us know what you thought.