The Uninvited (A Tale of Two Sisters remake)

[MrMidwest]

Posted: 1/30/09 at 7:54am

"Emily Browning's face helps "The Uninvited" work so well. She's a 20-year-old actress from Australia, has a lot of experience, but looks about 14. She makes an ideal heroine for a horror movie: innocent, troubled, haunted by nightmares, persecuted by wicked stepmother, convinced her real mother was deliberately burn to death. She makes you fear for her, and that's half the battle. Yet she's so fresh she's ready for a Jane Austen role."

http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090128/REVIEWS/901289983

I can't imagine that it's quite as haunting as the original, but I like most of the actors in the remake, so I might give it a shot.

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 1/30/09 at 12:52pm

I'm very curious to see it. The original is in my short list of favorite horror films.

[Borstalboy]

Posted: 1/30/09 at 1:06pm

I have come to the conclusion that if a horror film is made in America these days, chances are its going to suck. Vive Le France!
Coming soon: MARTYRS

[doodlenyc]

Posted: 1/30/09 at 1:15pm

I wasnt hopeful once I saw the trailer, but the reviews are encouraging. I doubt it'll be as good as the original, however.

[Borstalboy]

Posted: 1/30/09 at 1:22pm

Stephanie Zacharek in Salon.com:

Anna wakes in the middle of the night to find dark, slimy specters crawling around her bedroom floor. She keeps seeing a mysterious little redheaded girl with dead-looking eyes; garbage bags that are supposedly filled with garbage begin ... moving. Is she dreaming this stuff? Has the household been invaded by ghosties and beasties? Or could it be that she was sprung from the hospital a tad too early? Nothing in "The Uninvited" makes you care enough to want to find out. As is generally the case with Hollywood movies that use Asian horror films as their inspiration, the Guard brothers seem to have glanced at the original, borrowed a few images and then made the movie according to some preconceived template of what makes audiences jump -- instead of burrowing into the stuff that haunts our dreams. Banks, whose character is a nurse, gets a speech about having served her time wiping the bums of elderly patients. But that's about as close to scary as "The Uninvited" gets.

[doodlenyc]

Posted: 1/30/09 at 1:26pm

Ew...that's the kind of review I was expecting.

[MrMidwest]

Posted: 1/30/09 at 2:13pm

I don't know if I'd say that I found the original to be especially scary.

I enjoy reading Zacharek's reviews, but she's like Slant Magazine to me. They rarely give anything more than 2 stars. I wouldn't decide to not go see a movie based on her review of it.

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 1/30/09 at 3:26pm

Martyrs just looks like all the other torture flicks in the past few years.

I wouldn't call A Tale of Two Sisters "scary" exactly, but I was spellbound from its beautiful opening to the devastating finale. I thought it was brilliant and gorgeous. I just loved everything about it.

[CyCoSpAz2]

Posted: 1/30/09 at 3:29pm

I love Elizabeth Banks, but no interest in this movie.

[tazber]

Posted: 1/30/09 at 3:37pm

A review from one of my horror websites Arrow-In-The-Head.

John Fallon isn't the most articulate reviewer to be sure, but he evaluates horror films strictly from a "genre" point of view.
The Uninvited

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 1/30/09 at 3:53pm

That Arrow review is pretty much what I suspected. DAMMIT! But hey, that "Convict of the Day" in the upper-right corner was a nice distraction.

[MrMidwest]

Posted: 1/30/09 at 5:31pm

'The Uninvited' stars Elizabeth Banks, Emily Browning, Arielle Kebbel
Rating: 2 1/2 stars (fair-good)
By Michael Phillips | Tribune critic
January 30, 2009

There's a substantial twist in "The Uninvited," a pretty fair and reasonably scary remake of South Korean director Kim Jee-Woon's thriller "A Tale of Two Sisters." The twist was there in the stylish original, which I watched after the English-language re-do. If one of my film critic colleagues hadn't guessed the twist out loud, and correctly, I might very well have been taken in by it. But you know? I'll never know.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/movies/chi-0130-uninvited-reviewjan30,0,917877.story


Uninvited, The

A movie review by James Berardinelli

The Uninvited is a flawed production, but gratifying in the way it delivers. The interesting and unique elements of the movie effectively compensate for the formulaic way in which the plot develops. The film looks better in hindsight than it does while it's unfolding, although one could argue that there's a whiff of contrivance about its hook. Some people won't buy what The Guard Brothers are selling. Others will feel cheated. Others (like me) will smile in recognition of what they accomplish and the skill with which the deception is delivered. In the subgenre of PG-13 Asian horror remakes, this stands near the pinnacle.

http://www.reelviews.net/php_review_template.php?identifier=1467

[tazber]

Posted: 2/13/09 at 11:49am

***************update******************

This is the movie all genre fans have been drooling over for a year now. We have a release date now!




Coming to DVD 4/28/09

Updated On: 2/13/09 at 11:49 AM

[EVIE]

Posted: 2/13/09 at 5:58pm

I saw The Uninvited and the only thing I enjoyed was how close the sisters were. Their relationship was beautiful.

[Kasie]

Posted: 2/14/09 at 6:00pm

Can't wait for Martyrs!
As for the Uninvited, meh. I'll probably wait for the DVD.