The Crazies Review

Horror remakes tend to do better when they play it straight. Get down to business, deliver the shocks, don’t worry about those “the original was much better” rumblings from the peanut gallery, and try your darndest to stand on your own two feet. The Crazies succeeds more often than it fails on that front, mostly because of an outstanding bit of casting and the director’s willingness to find inspiration wherever he can.

The task becomes all the tougher when you choose to remake a George A. Romero film. The original movie featured plenty of fear and paranoia, as well as a go-for-broke feeling which spared no one in its efforts to shock us to the core. The new version lacks its raw nerve, but makes up for it with a more polished production. It entails a variation on Romero’s classic zombie formula: a virus created by the military is inadvertently released into a small town, turning the citizens into crazed lunatics and prompting a full-bore military lockdown. A few clear-headed survivors–including the town sheriff (Timothy Olyphant), his pregnant doctor wife (Radha Mitchell) and his true-blue deputy (Joe Anderson)–have to simultaneously dodge trigger-happy soldiers in HAZ-MAT suits and steer clear of their former neighbors transformed by the disease into blood-soaked freaks.

Director Breck Eisner (Michael’s kid) struck out with his first feature effort (the disastrous Sahara), but appears to have learned a great deal from the experience. He doesn’t try to stretch the scenario further than warranted, concentrating instead on finding interesting things to do with the little details. Individual sequences display verve and imagination, intended to cater to gorehounds but without using the violence to cover up a lack of ideas. The showstopper takes place in a car wash–reminding me why I’m always a little uneasy in those damn places–and an earlier gag involving a coroner’s bonesaw strikes the right balance between the ludicrous and the inspired.

Moments like that define most horror movies, and if they work, they allow you to forgive a number of sins. The Crazies has its share of shortcomings–including several small plot holes and a structure beset with periodic clunkiness–but Eisner readily exploits its flashes of spookhouse fun while keeping the accelerator set at an appropriately white-knuckle level. Even so, it might have succumbed to cliche were it not for the strength of the lead. The producers have compared Olyphant to Gary Cooper, and while that may be stretching things a bit, he brings a wonderfully quiet morality to compliment his character’s anticipated strengths. The actor’s comic timing helps lighten up the proceedings as well, and when backed by solid turns from Mitchell and Anderson, he gives us a foundation upon which our sympathies can rest.

The remainder of the film consists primarily of shoving the trio from one perilous scene to the next, mixing up the specifics to provide some variety and counting on the characters’ innate likability to generate suspense. It works surprisingly well, despite a comparative timidity (Romero goes places this one wouldn’t dare) and the inescapable fact that you probably won’t remember it long after the screening. Comparing it to the original isn’t quite fair in this case, since few people saw the first film and only hard-core horror buffs remember it with ease. As for its disposable nature, it seems unfair to harp on that unduly. The Crazies retains Romero’s fear of organized government, while investing its plot with enough plausibility to make you believe that an outbreak of this nature would look pretty much like the things we see onscreen. That lends the scares a certain substance… enough to give horror fans a reasonable good time without actively insulting their intelligence.

The Crazies (1973) Review:

The Crazies is a 1973 film written and directed by George A. Romero, but based on a screenplay by Paul McCollough.

The plot revolves around a dangerous biological weapon is accidentally placed in the air and reaches a citizen of the United States of America.

The plot can be divided into two stories parallel each other but united by a thin thread, the first treatment for people intent on surviving the madness unleashed the weapon biological and second the efforts of the government and the military to conceal the whole story to the public.

All this happens in the town of Evans City, Pa., started all over with strange arson caused by people who are quite normal and quiet, but that suddenly seem crazy.

This strange situation worries David, the fire chief, his girlfriend and nurse Judy, and Clank, a fireman secretly in love with Judy. During the film we learn that David was a Green Beret and Clank an infantryman veteran of the Vietnam War.

After these strange events, the city comes more Ryder leading the army with NBC suits and electronic equipment to measure radioactivity. From a discussion between the military finds out that the U.S. Army bomber crashed near a hill not far from the city, and that the incident broke out a biological weapon called Trixie “that ’s effect of making people go crazy, pushing them to commit murder and cause destruction, and has spread into the drain of Evans City, and has polluted the air and the environment.

Meanwhile in Washington DC, Colonel Peckam is showing some correspondence about how it will contain the virus, and the doctor and scientist, Watts began to study a cure or a vaccine for immunity from the weapon so as not to risk a pandemic elevated the entire country.

After the summit in Washington, it was decided that the situation will be worsened in the hours later, two fighter bombers will be equipped with nuclear weapons dropped in Evans City so as to eradicate the virus.

The scene in response to the town where the population has rebelled against the army and tries to escape before being infected, but this sets off a guerrilla war, as soldiers have orders to shoot anyone trying to escape the situation escapes control.

Many people are infected, the sheriff caught in a road rage kills himself with his pistol fitted, and an elderly lady asked by a soldier to take refuge in the institution than with the other healthy kills it with the tools for sewing.

Some people in the grip of madness destroy the gun shop in the town and are firing on all, leaving many dead on the ground. The priest of the church, take in petrol and sets fire to himself slain, and referring to the Buddhist .

Reappearance of the players are David, Judy and Clank, which together with two survivors, Kathie, and his father Artie, manage to escape the city with a military truck and take the main road to cross over from the United States of America. Seemingly comfortable and healthy, Artie suddenly goes berserk and attacks violently the daughter who is then rescued by Clank, then seems to commit suicide.

Kathie is visibly shaken, and leaves the truck to get some ‘air, but for this breathing the virus and mad, but do not have time to do harm to anyone, because a troop of soldiers in pursuit of the protagonists kill by several rounds of weapon fire. Clank also involved in the fighting, which in the grip of madness takes the weapons hidden in the van to kill some soldiers, after which he too was killed by a blow to the head.

There remain now only Judy and David, and when the first begins to manifest the first symptoms of “Trixie” is killed by soldiers with a flamethrower, while David claims to be immune to the virus and this explains why he settled in security ‘ entire story arc.

So the story ends with David, who surrendered to the military of his own free will, but keep the secret about his immunity to guinea pig Trixie not be used in future experiments.

Before the end credits shows the dr. Watts, who has actually discovered a vaccine virus and a cure in cases of infection, unfortunately some of the military think that he is infected and kill him, destroying the material also just discovered by the scientist who could have saved many people.

Finally, back on the scene that Colonel Peckam after giving orders to destroy Evans City receives a call informing him of new cities infected with Trixie.

The history of the production was explained by Romero himself in an interview contained in the extra edition DVD.

The Crazies is originally a project still in the hands of Paul McCollough writing called The Mad People, the story tells of a military incident that resulted in the release of a biological weapon in a small town and the processes of silting and containment of the population involving the armed forces.

Romero said that in the first draft of the script, the story was very focused on the actions of the military, but only in a later revision was focused on the reaction of citizens and what they would do to save himself.

By the will of Romero, the script was sent to producer Lee Hessel, who had previously worked with him in There’s Always Vanilla (1971). Hessel Approves Draft McCollough, but is willing to fund only on condition that Romero rewrite much of the script to add items that are characterizing according to the manufacturer for a successful outcome.

McCollough out so the film, Romero is granted the use of 270,000 $ to help in the scripting and other production processes.

The shooting took place at two locations in Pennsylvania (USA), Evans City and Zelienople, and Romero’s statement seems the locals were happy to participate in the film.