DVD Reviews

The Stepfather - Blu-ray Review

By Jeff Swindoll Feb 12, 2010, 14:44 GMT

When Michael Harding (Penn Badgley, TV’s Gossip Girl) returns home from military school, he finds his mom is madly in love with her charming live-in boyfriend David (Dylan Walsh, TV’s Nip/Tuck). At first, David appears to be the ultimate nice guy and an ideal future husband and stepfather. But when Michael and his girlfriend (Amber Heard, Zombieland) start delving into David’s past, they begin to discover a dark and dangerous ...more

“Family is the most important thing. Without it, we have nothing.” Now me – without suspense you ain’t got a picture.

That doctor from Nip and Tuck takes over for that bald dude from Lost and the results are less than stellar. Casting is king and the original featured a much better choice in the role of the mad family man.

Susan Harding (Sela Ward) is in the grocery store with her two younger children when she runs into David Harris (Dylan Walsh). He says that he’s new to town and when he bumps into her in the parking lot she asks him to go with the family for a pizza. Six months later, they’re living together and engaged to be married.

Her older son Michael (Penn Badgley) is returning home from military school and to his family, girlfriend Kelly (Amber Heard), and to get to know his soon-to-be stepfather. Things seem to be going swimmingly until the seams start to show.

We, the audience, already know that “David” is a serial killer that insinuates himself into a family setting, pretends to be the perfect poppa, and then slaughters the family when his story starts to fall apart. It takes a bit longer for the Harding’s to catch on.

The Stepfather is a bland redo of a scarier picture. The producer of the remake saw a list of scary pictures and noticed that the original film fell in at #70. He had never seen it before or heard of it. Took a look and decided to remake it. The problem is that he chose to remake it in the most un-scary way imaginable.

The reason for those that remember the original film is known in two words – Terry O’Quinn (otherwise known as John Locke – the bald guy on Lost). Dylan Walsh is a good looking guy and did well on Nip/Tuck, but he’s a piker when compared to the memorable performance of O’Quinn.

He’s pretty bland and the wicked stepfather’s motivations are more realized in the first film. If memory serves, he moves in looking for the perfect family and when the family doesn’t meet his expectations he slaughters them and moves on to the next candidates. I guess that’s what Walsh does, but the film just doesn’t do it well.

The problem is that it’s unremarkable, old hat, and lacks suspense. If you’re looking for a drinking game, take a slug every time there’s scary music. Every bit of business is accompanied by a booga-boo musical sting. I had to cringe when it accompanied Stepdaddy un-scare-ily paying the bill at the diner. Snore.

I will say that the film looks good and Badgley and Heard provide some PG-13 high-def eye candy (the Blu-ray is unrated, but I really don’t see anything that is very controversial). The whole marriage lacks a bloodcurdling soul and I was looking for a divorce very soon into it. Although the opening is still chilling and copied from the first film if memory serves, but it’s downhill from there.

The Stepfather is presented in a 1080p high definition transfer (2.40:1). Special features are presented in high definition, unless noted. They include a commentary from director Nelson McCormick, Penn Badgley, and Dylan Walsh.

The 20 minute “Open House” is a making of, the 11 minute “Visualizing the Stunts” covers just that, the 5 minute (standard def) gag reel, the 2 minute trailer, and 3 minutes of TV spots. The disc is also BD-Live enhanced and you can play the feature with Sony’s MovieIQ trivia track.

The Stepfather remake is treated like the proverbial red-headed stepchild (not to imply anything against gingers or step-kids). It was done better in the film they’re remaking, so I’d recommend that you’d go and check that one out instead of this remake.