The Hitcher (2007)
I was looking forward to seeing what Sean Bean would make of the role in this remake of one of my favourite 80s movies. Not a lot, it turns out :-(
A watchable film sure, no problem there. Quite nicely done even.
As a remake though, blehhhh. The creepy atmosphere of the original seemed to have hitched a lift elsewhere and the dark humour had wandered off too. The few plot changes seemed pointless and added nothing.
Bean, meh. Neither menacing nor frightening imo.
A Fucking Cruel Nightmare (2010)
Slice of German "extreme" horror which really failed to impress. The gore fx were like something from Monty Python and the whole thing was just flat and a bit tedious. I wouldn't recommend this to fans of extreme unless like me you just want to have a complete list.
Shame really, there were some good ideas in there. I think it would have worked better as a full-on trippy dream style thing rather than whatever it was they were aiming for.
Mirrors (2008)
Seemed like
24 with ghosts in places. Can't really put my finger on why this movie failed to impress - interesting story, polished production and all that, but it was as if it all stopped at the back of my eyes and failed to penetrate any deeper. Characters seemed cliched to the point of paint-by-numbers and it had an annoying lack of attention to plot holes as well.
Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009)
Animated adaptation of one of my favourite childhood books. It was very nicely done, charming and entertaining on it's own terms, definitely.
As an adaptation of Dahl's story though it was disappointing. As with most Dahl screen-adaptations the darkness was gone and the story padded out with American and modern culture and "added excitement". Also, Boggis, Bunce and Bean were nowhere near unpleasant and detestable enough.