philosoraptor42

Maniac (2012)

Before we begin with the review, I absolutely have to share this awesome song from the soundtrack. It's another Drive-esque synthy song and I absolutely love it.

(video link)

When I first saw the original 1980s movie "Maniac" I decided that it could not possibly be remade because to do so the original movie would need to have some kind of unique plot that set it apart. That's not to say that the original had nothing to set it apart at all. It was essentially a showcase of Tom Savini's gore effects and that makes it special in its own way. However, a remake clearly would not be a showcase of Tom Savini's gore effects (or at least, if it was, Tom Savini had better have some pretty amazing new tricks up his sleeve to make it worthwhile).

Incredibly the remake has somehow managed to make some distinctive story points which fit the original and part of how it managed to achieve this is by making the story clearer and stronger. In the original movie the insane murderous protagonist possessed a whole load of shopfront mannequins without any real explanation. This time around it turns out that he makes his money by restoring classic mannequins and selling them to collectors. His hideout is actually at the back of a store devoted to this craft.

In the original movie there's a point towards the end where the protagonist briefly ceases to be a gibbering sweating wide-eyed weirdo going on and on about how guilty he is and how much he wishes his mother loved him. Out of nowhere he suddenly has this relationship with a woman, acting like a completely normal individual. In this remake the relationship takes longer to build up and the personality of the protagonist is rather more consistent.

Joe Spinell in the original 1980s "Maniac" movie

The pacing is greatly improved this time and I'm thankful that the protagonist no longer spends half the time ranting and raving. A really interesting choice when filming this remake was to film almost the entire thing from the perspective of the killer. Elijah Wood can be seen, but only in reflections. Wood is able to give a wonderful balance between vulnerable and manic to his murderous protagonist and the way kills are set up means that there's a real tension and atmosphere involved. In the original movie I just felt bored waiting for YET ANOTHER person to be killed by the protagonist, but Wood makes me want to plead with him not to kill again or even to turn himself in. The film is much more successful in making us feel a connection within the protagonist and one element is that, at times, we share in his deluded visions of the world surrounding him.

There's a very arty feel to this remake of "Maniac". I'm not surprised that the film has been compared with "Drive" though I wouldn't say that it was a strong comparison. There's some synthy music in the soundtrack, though that's clearly an attempt to callback to original 80s movie rather than any kind of inspiration from "Drive". On the one hand there's the wonderful song from the composer (who seems to just be named Rob) called "Juno" (embedded above), but the film also uses a song many will recognise from the movie "Silence of the Lambs" called "Goodbye Horses".

Meanwhile the visuals are very distinctive with surfaces looking clean and pristine consistently through most of the film's runtime. Admittedly the original also featured large well-decorated apartments on occasion, there were also more gritty ugly scenes too. One criticism might be that the scalpings performed by the killer (yet another element kept in from the original film) don't involve as much effort as you'd expect and also the colouring used for the effect looks a little too bright and shiny and overly purple rather than your typical muddy-red blood colour. But you have to realise that this film is a piece of art with a distinctive style which is more important than realism. There are plenty of other points where the effects are very realistic indeed, not to mention nail-bitingly shocking.

"Maniac" is not just a slasher film with effective gore and tension. It also has a heart to it from its effective use of Elijah Wood in the central role as well as a distinctive visual style, not least the first person perspective which pulls in the audience more than ever. What with this, Piranha and The Hills Have Eyes, Alexandre Aja (who wrote not directed in this case) seems to be making a name for himself through developing a better class of horror remake.

A+