13

Horrorphile

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13

August 24th 2011 07:53

It’s bad enough (as a rule of thumb) when Hollywood remakes a great movie, even a solid one. But it’s insult to injury when a fat cheque to remake his or her own movie lures the original director. It happened with Dutch director Goerge Sluizer and The Vanishing (1988), an awesomely chilling psychological nightmare thriller that Sluizer then remade in English primarily for American audiences, and worse still was that he compromised the take-no-prisoners ending that made his original movie so powerful and effective. Well, it’s happened again, this time with Georgian-French director Gela Babluani and his lean, mean killing machine 13 (Tzameti), originally released in 2005, now remade in colour and in English and aimed squarely at Hollywood agents.

Sam Riley as Vince

The movie remains the same (unlike The Vanishing remake), which might sound like a plus factor, but actually works against it. The frayed and downbeat ending which punctuated the original 13 with a rounded calibre of nihilism doesn’t fit with this Hollywood-style version. Instead it feels like we’re missing a further ten minutes or so. It’s like the movie’s been shorn of a fittingly intense climax. But enough about the lame ending, which wouldn’t have seemed so lame if the screenplay had been up to scratch.

Jason Statham as Jasper, Ray Winstone as Ronald and Alan Davidson as Drizer

Gela Babluani has co-scripted with Gregory Pruss, and it sticks very closely to the original in terms of action, but additionally it contrives to tell the back-stories to several other characters that are superfluous. There isn’t enough characterisation. Period. The direction of the actors is adrift like a raft lost at sea, and there are some seriously good actors in this movie, which says a lot about Babluani dropping the actor’s ball big time. 13 boasts an impressive array of he-men, character actors, and all-round edgy and charismatic thespians. We’ve got Sam Riley in the role of naïve Vince, the electrician desperate for money to pay for the surgery and hospital bills in order to save his badly injured father. Riley dons a soft-spoken non-descript American accent, which doesn’t suit him one iota.

Alex Skarsgard as Jack

Vince foolishly decides to fill the shoes of the man whose home he was wiring. The man has overdosed, and Vince has purloined the details of an arrangement that may fetch him big money. This arrangement sees him leaving town, meeting a middleman (Alex Skarsgard), and eventually thrust into the middle of an elaborate game of death with very high stakes for those nefarious enough to gamble. It’s Russian Roulette essentially, and Vince is up against some heavyweights; Ronald (Ray Winstone) and his gambler brother Jasper (Jason Statham), Jefferson (Mickey Rourke) and his gambler Jimmy (Curtis Jackson a.k.a. 50 Cent), whilst an aging gambler, Schlondorff (Ben Gazzara), becomes very interested in Vince’s lucky streak. And rounding off the cast of A-listers is Michael Shannon as the Henry, the highly-strung game caller.

As I said, this is a killer cast. But the director has no idea how to rein them in and hone their skills. Instead each actor plays himself, or plays a caricature of a previous performance. Alex Skarsgard plays Eric North (True Blood), Ray Winstone plays Ray the thug (rage, foul mouth and all), Mickey Rourke plays Mickey the tragic broken lost soul (The Wrestler), 50 Cent plays, um, 50 Cent, poor old Ben Gazzara looks close to keeling over, Michael Shannon has probably the most thankless role of all and simply shouts and gesticulates. I wish Emmanuelle Chriqui had had a bigger role!

Michael Shannon as Henry

13 is shot well, with a strong mise-en-scene, and some excellent location shooting, but it’s utterly hollow. The soundtrack feels either forced, off-kilter, or plain ordinary. The title credit looks like it’s been lifted from a DVD menu (!), very odd. There’s no dramatic tension, and this is the kind of movie that should be so taut you could pluck notes off its narrative threads! I said in my review of the original movie that a remake was in pre-production, and although I didn’t agree with the idea at all, I thought they’d probably shoot in colour and up the graphic violence. Well, Babluani has opted for the colour option, but there’s no graphic violence, and that was my point of contention with the original, the poetic licence not to have much bloodshed or gore. Involve multiple players in Russian Roulette and you are going to have much blood, brain and bone all over the place. 13 remains entirely underwhelming in that crucial area.

Disregarding the excellent low-budget noir-ish original for one moment; Gela Babluani’s second 13 could have been a nightmare tour-de-force of colourful character and extreme violence; an instant cult classic. But no. Despite his formidable cast, and his skills as a visual director, Babluani fumbles with the gun and shoots himself in the foot. What a waste of talent.

Here’s the trailer:

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Posted By: Bryn - Category: movie reviews

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Comments

8 Comments. [ Add A Comment ]

Comment by David O'Connell

August 25th 2011 06:04

20/20 Filmsight
Screen Fanatic

Shannon again!

Like you say mate, a crying shame to assemble that cast and then waste them. The whole idea of a director being lured to America to remake their film again stinks to high heaven. Didn't the guy who made Nightwatch do it as well?

Comment by Bryn

August 25th 2011 22:22

Horrorphile

The Night Watch/Day Watch director was lured to Hollywood, but not to remake his movies, instead he directed the Angelina Jolie vehicle Hunted.

Comment by David O'Connell

August 26th 2011 05:45

20/20 Filmsight
Screen Fanatic

No, not that one mate - I meant the 1997 film with Ewan McGregor as a nightwatchman in a morgue. Not too bad from what I recall. Did you ever see it? Directed by Ole Bornedal who made the original 3 years earlier in Denmark.