Movie Review: Footloose (2011)
Why remake a movie if you're just going to copy the original?
Photo: Paramount Pictures
Watching Craig Brewer's remake of Footloose was a bit of a strange experience for me. With just a few slight changes here and there, this supposedly "new" Footloose is more a re-enactment than a remake, resulting in some sort of "bizarro world" re-telling of the 1984 original.
The cast includes Kenny Wormald, Julianne Hough, Dennis Quaid, Miles Teller and Andie MacDowell. For more information on this film including pictures, trailers and a detailed synopsis choose from the following menu.
Review
"Footloose" is a Paramount Pictures release, directed by Craig Brewer and is rated PG-13 for some teen drug and alcohol use, sexual content, violence and language. The running time is 1 hour 53 minutes.
Flash forward three years and into town struts Boston native Ren MacCormack (Kenny Wormald), a teenager who watched his mother die of leukemia and has come to this small town to live with his aunt and uncle. Little does this music lovin', dancing gymnast know, loud music and dancing have been banned. It's a lesson he's quick to learn after he's pulled over in his VW bug for playing his music too loud, and he learns the rest of the story soon enough from his new friend Willard (Miles Teller), the film's comedy relief and one true saving grace.
Just as in the original, Ren still falls in love with the local preacher's daughter, Ariel (Julianne Hough), and her father (Dennis Quaid) still doesn't approve. She still likes to dance just as much as Ren, likes to play chicken with oncoming trains and can definitely take a punch.
Additionally, Ren and Willard still like to talk about wet t-shirt contests at the car wash, Willard still needs to learn how to dance and games of chicken with tractors are replaced by figure eight school bus races. I could go on, but I think you get the point.
Director Craig Brewer has said this film is more of an homage to the original than anything else and I guess for a modern audience that's unaware of the first film that will work just fine. However, when the film is remade all the way down to the songs, such as "Holding Out for a Hero" turned into some kind of slow ballad, I begin to wonder why even make the effort?
This, of course, is a personal hang up, from the viewpoint of someone that has seen and enjoys the original movie and would prefer to see a new movie rather than an old one virtually copied shot-for-shot and song-for-song. Yet, to avoid being entirely dismissive, Miles Teller as Willard and Ray McKinnon as Ren's Uncle Wes are both quite entertaining. Teller creates a far more comedic sidekick than Chris Penn did in the original and McKinnon has a solid bit of small town sarcasm and an addictive "aw-shucks" attitude that goes a long way.
Additionally, Craig Brewer knows how to have fun with a movie and there's no doubt in his filmmaking talent. I won't discount the film's energy and the fun it's attempting to have, but the fact it's essentially the exact same movie as the original just left me cold.
I'm sure Brewer has something more inventive up his sleeve, especially considering we're talking about the writer/director of Hustle and Flow and Black Snake Moan, and while bits of the Brewer that made those films can be found here, especially in the diverse cast and any time the sexual energy of dancing takes center stage, the film has no edge and no voice, which is due in large part to the fact the voice it’s using is the same voice we heard 27 years ago.
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