DVD Reviews

Don’t Look Up – DVD Review

By Jeff Swindoll Jul 28, 2010, 15:49 GMT

$While filming in Transylvania, a crew unearths celluloid images of a woman\'s murder and unleashes the wrath of evil spirits. Based on the story by Hideo Nakata (the creator of$

While filming in Transylvania, a crew unearths celluloid images of a woman\'s murder and unleashes the wrath of evil spirits. Based on the story by Hideo Nakata (the creator of "The Ring") and directed by Fruit Chan. Starring Henry Thomas, Kevin Corrigan, Lothaire Bluteau and Eli Roth. ...more

Don’t Look Up is a remake of a 1996 film that covered the same horrific ground. This time the results don’t gel together though and seem a missed opportunity.

In the 1920s, Director Bella Olt (Eli Roth) went to Transylvania to shoot a film about a gypsy legend in the area in which the legend is supposed to have occurred. Olt vanished along with the footage he shot and was never heard from again. Only some production stills survived.

In the present day, director Marcus (Reshad Strik) drew inspiration from that lone still in a movie magazine. He’s also prone to having seizures that seem to make him clairvoyant. His friend and producer John (Henry Thomas) has secured the funds to make Marcus’ dream project – a horror movie based on the same story that Olt was developing and in the same Romanian location.

John and Marcus are met by gypsy Gregoire (Lothaire Bluteau) who takes them to the crumbling movie studio. A local named Romy (Elena Satine) has been cast in the main role, but odd things start happening on the set. It comes to a head when watching dailies Marcus starts to notice that Olt’s lost 1920s footage has been melded with the recently shot footage.

Don’t Look Up had some things that made me think that I was going to enjoy it. I like old movies so the missing feature and director from the 20s sounded appealing. I also like when past events form a mystery that our modern heroes have to figure out, so I put a second mental check on the list. Third, I enjoy horror movies.

I can’t really say the film is a complete dog, but it misses more than it hits. It’s a remake of a 1996 film and the idea and description of that film sounds good. Lead player Strik thinks that his vision of fear should be as close to Edvard Munch’s The Scream as possible. That and he’s prone to the fits that require him to sweat it up and roll his eyes back.

The visual effects are accomplished with CGI and the old film looks like a newly shot film that has been digitally aged. The CGI also betrays a visual that should’ve been a surprise or maybe delayed for some suspense, but since it’s digitally rendered you spot it right off. The plot is pretty old hat, no matter that it had elements that I could’ve liked.

The novelty of having horror picture director Eli Roth in the film is short lived as he only shows up in the pre-credits bit and never appears again. Director Fruit Chan appears to be highly regarded in his homeland, but his American debut really doesn’t make him appear to stand out from the other direct to video stuff that usually shows up.

Don’t Look Up is presented in widescreen (1.78:1) and is enhanced for 16x9 televisions. Special features include the 2 minute trailer, a 32 minute making of, and 20 minutes of behind-the-scene footage.

Should I look up? Well, that would be too easy wouldn’t it? The concept sounds appealing (I’d still like to see that 1996 original and see how they handled the plot) but the results do nothing to set it apart from the pack of other cheap horrors on the video store shelf.