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The Hills Have Eyes
4/5
R E V I E W   B Y   R I C H   C L I N E dir Alexandre Aja
scr Alexandre Aja, Grégory Levasseur
with Aaron Stanford, Kathleen Quinlan, Ted Levine, Vinessa Shaw, Emilie de Ravin, Dan Byrd, Robert Joy, Laura Ortiz, Desmond Askew, Billy Drago, Michael Bailey Smith, Tom Bower
release US/UK 10.Mar.06
06/US Fox 1h47

Prey: Stanford (above), de Ravin and Byrd

stanford quinlan shaw

See also: THE HILLS HAVE EYES II (2007)

The Hills Have Eyes To remake his 1977 horror groundbreaker, Wes Craven wisely hired rising-star French director Aja, whose Haute Tension was one of the most unsettling thrillers in years. And with this revamp, Aja continues on that promise, delivering a bleak, gripping, refreshingly non-Hollywood shock-fest.

The Carter family are driving through New Mexico when Dad (Levine) takes a shortcut across the desert. We know this is a bad idea, because the jittery garage attendant (Bower) who points out the route is clearly in league with a fiendish group of locals, mutants as a result of the area's nuclear testing history. Of course, the car breaks down. And now religious Mom (Quinlan), bickering teen siblings (de Raven and Byrd), new-mum sister (Shaw) and her city-slicker husband (Stanford) are facing horrifying marauders in the middle of nowhere.

Aja's genius is to subvert expectations by continually undermining the genre. We know what's probably going to happen, but it never goes down the well-worn route of countless horror movies. Instead, the plot is full of both intriguing character depth and scenes so surprising that we soon realise we can't predict anything. He also unnerves us with evocative images that draw on our own fears, from the sweltering, empty landscape to Cold War scare tactics (including an eerie recreation of Goldwater's infamous kid-on-a-swing ad).

The cast is terrific; each character is a living, breathing person, and that also goes for the mutants. We actually begin to understand them, which makes it that much more gripping when all hell breaks loose. Aja constantly isolates people from each other, tormenting and stretching them, and the actors catch this mood perfectly with a combination of desperation and strength that we have no trouble identifying with.

The cinematography and editing are so sharp that they catch every morsel of fear and emotion. While there's the whiff of a preachy moral, Aja resists sentimentality even when the baby's in jeopardy or when a thoughtful young misshapen girl (Ortiz) is on screen. Meanwhile, the violence is extremely grisly and unexpected; unlike most horror movies, death is actually tragic and sad. And nobody's safe. Including us.

cert 18 themes, violence, language, grisliness 21.Feb.06

R E A D E R   R E V I E W S
send your review to Shadows... The Hills Have Eyes Jessica, Cincinnati, Ohio: 1/5 "This movie was terrible. The fact that the acting was actually decent made it all the worse. The rape scene was horrific. I walked out. Keep in mind, I'm a huge horror movie buff, but this was more like watching a snuff film over and over and over again. Bottom line: not horrifying, just horrific." (23.Jun.06)
© 2006 by Rich Cline, Shadows on the Wall
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