2001 Maniacs (2005)

Dir: Tim Sullivan

Pastiche/remake of H.G. Lewis' "Two Thousand Maniacs!" (1964) that somehow manages to lose both the menacing atmosphere and the ghoulish sense of fun from the original. The plot remains virtually identical - group of hip young things on a road trip take a detour and get gleefully slaughtered by jovial redneck sadists - but the new screenplay is abysmal. For one thing, it's dull dull dull - the pacing and structure are non-existent, replaced instead by dreary, predictable jokes, limp excuses to show off rubbish splatter FX (strangely even less convincing than the original) and brain-numbing fratboy dialogue. With its mix of goofball toilet humour and gory death scenes, you get the feeling this film was aiming for a tone similar to "Cabin Fever" (indeed Eli Roth reprises his role from that film for a brief cameo - the only laugh-out-loud moment in the entire thing) but there's no wit, verve or originality to pull it off successfully. Some star turns from the genre royalty involved (Robert Englund, Johnny Legend) and a few weird cameos (Travis Tritt, Giuseppe Andrews) fail to enliven proceedings and it even makes gratuitous nudity seem unappealing by the end. Although the budget's probably about equivalent to what Lewis worked with on the original, "2001 Maniacs" feels as joyless, cynical and vapid as any Hollywood remake from recent years and is best avoided. The nu-metal cover version of "The South's Gonna Rise Again" at the end tells you all you need to know about how much effort and imagination went into this. *