For those wondering, let's make this immediately clear: this is NOT a shot for shot remake of the original Austrian movie. It follows the same premise, but has the story unfold in its own way.
But that doesn't help anyway.
Right from the beginning they add something new, like the presence of the twins' father, and the fact that in this case it's them that go to the house, instead of the mother coming to them after the operation.
In this you can soon see how they tried to involve the mother even more than in the original.
What I mean is, while in the Austrian one she's of course a relevant presence for the whole picture, the focus is especially on the twins' reactions to the situation, with her relegated almost on the background, like a dark shadow that feeds their fears and doubts.
Here, she's definitely at the centre of it, and she also appears to be less cold and distant than the original, despite still acting in a strange and aggressive way, but this time with more motivations.
By doing this, though, all the sense of claustrophobic alienation we felt in the original is totally lost; and that goes also for other major elements, like the house: it almost was another character, its design and the way they shot the scenes, it all served so well to the atmosphere; here, the place isn't as important as it was, just a normal country home, even if they try to play the "haunted house" sensation, without real value, also with those embarassing nightmares and visions.
Naomi Watts is a great actress, and she could've easily given justice to the role; and yet, while not doing a bad job, she doesn't go bolder as she could, just like the whole picture.
And the kids ... they're not bad either, but surely they don't give us the unusual and almost frightening sensation they reflected in the original, where everything seemed to be so strange and surreal also because of them being the principal point of view.
Even the torture scene on the mother ... it's just so bland, no tension, no real sense of danger.
And we come to the twist ... I read how many viewers seemed to have caught the one in the original pretty soon; I admit they had revealed it to me before I watched the picture, but even if it was not the case, maybe it would've been easy to spot anyway. But since the rest of the atmosphere helped a lot, I didn't find it a possibile flaw, instead I assumed the directors didn't want to have a real mystery, but just to observe the reactions of the kids.
Here, the way it is explored ... well, if you complained about it in the original, here you'll find it even easier to understand ... and yeah, in this case I have to agree, it's just painfully clear.
And also, this eliminates totally the sense of darkness and craziness, giving us some kind of tenderness that totally makes no sense, and makes this another bland and poorly conceived Horror.
There you have it, let's not forget about the original, and let's go back to that, pronto.
But that doesn't help anyway.
Right from the beginning they add something new, like the presence of the twins' father, and the fact that in this case it's them that go to the house, instead of the mother coming to them after the operation.
In this you can soon see how they tried to involve the mother even more than in the original.
What I mean is, while in the Austrian one she's of course a relevant presence for the whole picture, the focus is especially on the twins' reactions to the situation, with her relegated almost on the background, like a dark shadow that feeds their fears and doubts.
Here, she's definitely at the centre of it, and she also appears to be less cold and distant than the original, despite still acting in a strange and aggressive way, but this time with more motivations.
By doing this, though, all the sense of claustrophobic alienation we felt in the original is totally lost; and that goes also for other major elements, like the house: it almost was another character, its design and the way they shot the scenes, it all served so well to the atmosphere; here, the place isn't as important as it was, just a normal country home, even if they try to play the "haunted house" sensation, without real value, also with those embarassing nightmares and visions.
Naomi Watts is a great actress, and she could've easily given justice to the role; and yet, while not doing a bad job, she doesn't go bolder as she could, just like the whole picture.
And the kids ... they're not bad either, but surely they don't give us the unusual and almost frightening sensation they reflected in the original, where everything seemed to be so strange and surreal also because of them being the principal point of view.
Even the torture scene on the mother ... it's just so bland, no tension, no real sense of danger.
And we come to the twist ... I read how many viewers seemed to have caught the one in the original pretty soon; I admit they had revealed it to me before I watched the picture, but even if it was not the case, maybe it would've been easy to spot anyway. But since the rest of the atmosphere helped a lot, I didn't find it a possibile flaw, instead I assumed the directors didn't want to have a real mystery, but just to observe the reactions of the kids.
Here, the way it is explored ... well, if you complained about it in the original, here you'll find it even easier to understand ... and yeah, in this case I have to agree, it's just painfully clear.
And also, this eliminates totally the sense of darkness and craziness, giving us some kind of tenderness that totally makes no sense, and makes this another bland and poorly conceived Horror.
There you have it, let's not forget about the original, and let's go back to that, pronto.
