The Stepfather Review

First and foremost, I'm going to have to take this opportunity to apologize to the producers of Manhater. I unfortunately got backed up, and had to postpone the review of that film until June 2nd. The schedule got messed up and I've had to deal with personal issues. Next Wednesday, I'll have a full review of that film.



For today though, I'm going to be trying to review one remake that I never thought would be necessary. The Stepfather had a creepy trailer, cute teenagers that would most likely have sex, and one half of what made Nip/Tuck such an amazing show (except for the bs last season). I thought for sure, just maybe, this one would be worth while, but it's not it's just a big failure on a lot of levels.

The imagery is not robust. In fact, from the very beginning this film doesn't make a lot of sense, nor does it feature any gore or harsh tones that the original film did. For those of you that don't know, the Stepfather series was made in the 80's and featured a slasher plot line, mad villain, that was way creepier and at times more sex filled and horrific than this pg-13 piece of garbage.

The plot is simple. A random man is seducing single mothers and then killing them when they don't fit into his psychotic vision of what a perfect family is. By the time the women figure it out, he kills them, and moves to another city.

With today's modernity, and people not being as trusting(especially in the Portland area, where I think this film was based in or I heard Oregon, I think), the premise is lost on me. What made this series work in the 1980's was the lack of a modern police system with serial killers falling through the cracks due to enigmatic riddles, lack of dna evidence, digital cameras, surveillance footage and much more. This film does NOT work in the 21st century, where everyone has a camera, or a video phone.

On a separate, non related note, isn't it funny that although we have more modern recording equipment, the amount of documented UFO sightings has dropped? I'm just saying.

The Stepfather is NOT scary, nor is it worth thinking too much about. I actually had an abusive stepfather so while the original films creeped me out, this film doesn't creep me out, it's just stupid.

The only saving grace to the whole pile of drivel is the fact that the ending is kind of cool. Dylan Walsh looks kind of creepy as a hardware store worker, not bad.

As for the scary moments, there are very few. The film relies on jump scares and the old "killer comes back one last time" before escaping without a trace in a modern suburb card.

I wouldn't recommend The remake of The Stepfather, but that's just me.



*BONUS*

Here's the original poster artwork from the original trilogy, which is by far more creepy and more gore filled than this half-assed remake.







I recommend the original series far more than I would ever recommend even the Unrated Director's Cut of the remake. Man, I'm sick of bad horror movie remakes.