Newest film subpar compared to classic
Brian De Palma (“Carrie,” “Dressed to Kill,” “Scarface”) directed this English-language remake of Alain Corneau’s 2010 French film “Love Crime.” The vastly inferior remake stars Noomi Rapace (the original “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”) as Isabelle James, a shy, diligent worker in a large advertising firm, and Rachel McAdams (“Midnight in Paris”) as Christine Stanford, a cutthroat businesswoman who toys with her employees in unethical ways to benefit herself. She is a domineering and manipulative woman who has cheated and lied to people for so long that she is revered but feared. When she falls in “love” with Isabelle, who does not return her affection, Christine uses her power to squash Isabelle. Then a murder takes place. The plot continues to twist and turn but winds up being more and more ludicrous and unsatisfying with each moment.
Since I had seen the original, the surprise factor was gone. The key difference between the original and the remake is that the killer is not revealed in the remake until the end. In the original, part of the fun is seeing the killer get away with murder by elaborately planning and executing his or her crime. Not only does the alteration make the film confusing even for a viewer that has seen the original, it changes the dynamic of it. The film is a whodunit when it should be a howdunit. The final twist in the remake is so unbelievable and idiotic that it dilutes the already silly film.
The original shows that revenge is a dish best served cold. The film has an icy quality that makes watching the clinical proceedings play out a joy. The remake is heated and more overtly erotic, bathed in colored lights and awash in the stylized film techniques that De Palma is famous (or as his detractors would say, infamous) for. In the murder scene in the middle of the film, split screen is used to show a ballet on the left side of the screen and the murderer or murderess stalking his or her victim on the right side, paralleling the apparent innocence of the characters in the ballet. What in theory sounds like a striking set piece is actually a missed opportunity, because it lacks an intriguing correlation between the scenes. The juxtaposition of images is disjointed and removes tension from the murder. The whole scene falls completely apart in the end because its use of CGI blood. It makes the already unexciting scene ridiculous and cheap. De Palma has gone from splashing onto the screen in 1976 when a bucket of pig’s blood was dropped on his title character in “Carrie” to having a cartoonish splatter of digital blood in his new film, which has barely been released in theaters. My, how the mighty have fallen.