If there's anything good to say about the 2024 remake of Road House, is that it will get people reaching for the classic 1989 movie to cleanse the palette and the more people who watch the original the better, as it is simply a brilliant film.
Sadly, I can't say the same about this steaming pile of double deuce I have just witnessed. Is it even a remake? The similarities between the two are sparse. The main character is a bouncer named Dalton and he's hired by a bar owner to 'bounce'..... that's it, the only thing that would even make you think this was a remake.
Missouri is replaced with Florida, mullets are replaced with bullet heads and actors are replaced with Conor McGregor and Billy Magnussen.
With the occasional exception, (and I mean VERY occasional), remakes always fail. A lot of the time it's because they are being judged, at times unfairly, against the original. Others are simply bad movies trying to cash in on an illustrious name. 2024's Road House definitely falls in the latter category.
In 1989, the Double Duece was a bar that Dalton was hired to clean up because of the trouble makers that frequented it, the fact that the entire town was being run by a crime kingpin running a protection racket. Is just an extra problem he encounters and has to deal with.
In 2024, Dalton is hired BECAUSE of the crime kingpin, who wants to demolish the bar to realise his his real estate ambitions and Dalton isn't told about this until he runs foul of the goon squad sent to intimidate the bar and its patrons.
At least in the Double Duece there was usually reasons fights broke out. In the Florida Road House, people seem to pick fights because the guy next to him was turning oxygen into carbon dioxide too loudly.
To be fair to Jake Gyllenhaal, he does turn in a good performance given what he has to work with and he is the best thing in the entire movie. However, one thing is unforgivable, the CGI/AI action, it looks fake, cheap and takes you out of that reality instantly.
The character of Dalton has also been changed. Patrick Swayze's Dalton was good man, firmly in control of his emotions and attitude to life, spirituality and clinical in his profession. Gyllenhaal's Dalton is not even a bouncer to start with, he's an ex UFC fighter hustling the illegal fight circuit for PIN money who falls into 'bouncing' by chance and while occasionally getting involved in the action, he seems to be collecting $5000 a week for sitting down at the bar watching all the other 'bouncers' do the grunt work for him under his 'guidance'. He is also mentally disturbed and sometimes can't keep a lid on it. He is also suicidal...for about 2 minutes at the start, never to be mentioned again.
To show how unhinged this new Dalton is, he plants a bomb on a boat that is moored to a yacht that his girlfriend is held hostage on, and then detonates it remotely when they're still on board. You see, explosions are funny things, they're unpredictable and Dalton would have had no way of knowing whether that yacht would sink in 10 minutes or 10 seconds, a hell of a risk to take with an innocent life.
Now let's talk about two people I briefly mentioned earlier, Conor McGregor and Billy Magnussen. Jeez they are bad? McGregor is so over the top that any realism that this person could actually exist in real life is gone in a second. You've heard of over egging the pudding? Well here we have no pudding at all, just lots of egg.
Magnussen is as equally bland as he is bad. Again, this may not be his fault and the blame can certainly be placed on the script, as in one scene, he is seen getting a shave on the stern of his yacht in choppy seas, and the barber is using a cutthroat razor of all things and this absolute idiot seems shocked that he's getting hacked to bits by the barber with every stroke. I mean what did he think was going to happen?
2024's Road House is an OK action flick that suffers more for trying to pass itself off as a remake of a bonefide classic.....a bonefide classic I am now going to go and watch as it's always been a rewatchable favourite. However, I'm not going to be watching this version again anytime soon....if ever.
Enjoy!
Sadly, I can't say the same about this steaming pile of double deuce I have just witnessed. Is it even a remake? The similarities between the two are sparse. The main character is a bouncer named Dalton and he's hired by a bar owner to 'bounce'..... that's it, the only thing that would even make you think this was a remake.
Missouri is replaced with Florida, mullets are replaced with bullet heads and actors are replaced with Conor McGregor and Billy Magnussen.
With the occasional exception, (and I mean VERY occasional), remakes always fail. A lot of the time it's because they are being judged, at times unfairly, against the original. Others are simply bad movies trying to cash in on an illustrious name. 2024's Road House definitely falls in the latter category.
In 1989, the Double Duece was a bar that Dalton was hired to clean up because of the trouble makers that frequented it, the fact that the entire town was being run by a crime kingpin running a protection racket. Is just an extra problem he encounters and has to deal with.
In 2024, Dalton is hired BECAUSE of the crime kingpin, who wants to demolish the bar to realise his his real estate ambitions and Dalton isn't told about this until he runs foul of the goon squad sent to intimidate the bar and its patrons.
At least in the Double Duece there was usually reasons fights broke out. In the Florida Road House, people seem to pick fights because the guy next to him was turning oxygen into carbon dioxide too loudly.
To be fair to Jake Gyllenhaal, he does turn in a good performance given what he has to work with and he is the best thing in the entire movie. However, one thing is unforgivable, the CGI/AI action, it looks fake, cheap and takes you out of that reality instantly.
The character of Dalton has also been changed. Patrick Swayze's Dalton was good man, firmly in control of his emotions and attitude to life, spirituality and clinical in his profession. Gyllenhaal's Dalton is not even a bouncer to start with, he's an ex UFC fighter hustling the illegal fight circuit for PIN money who falls into 'bouncing' by chance and while occasionally getting involved in the action, he seems to be collecting $5000 a week for sitting down at the bar watching all the other 'bouncers' do the grunt work for him under his 'guidance'. He is also mentally disturbed and sometimes can't keep a lid on it. He is also suicidal...for about 2 minutes at the start, never to be mentioned again.
To show how unhinged this new Dalton is, he plants a bomb on a boat that is moored to a yacht that his girlfriend is held hostage on, and then detonates it remotely when they're still on board. You see, explosions are funny things, they're unpredictable and Dalton would have had no way of knowing whether that yacht would sink in 10 minutes or 10 seconds, a hell of a risk to take with an innocent life.
Now let's talk about two people I briefly mentioned earlier, Conor McGregor and Billy Magnussen. Jeez they are bad? McGregor is so over the top that any realism that this person could actually exist in real life is gone in a second. You've heard of over egging the pudding? Well here we have no pudding at all, just lots of egg.
Magnussen is as equally bland as he is bad. Again, this may not be his fault and the blame can certainly be placed on the script, as in one scene, he is seen getting a shave on the stern of his yacht in choppy seas, and the barber is using a cutthroat razor of all things and this absolute idiot seems shocked that he's getting hacked to bits by the barber with every stroke. I mean what did he think was going to happen?
2024's Road House is an OK action flick that suffers more for trying to pass itself off as a remake of a bonefide classic.....a bonefide classic I am now going to go and watch as it's always been a rewatchable favourite. However, I'm not going to be watching this version again anytime soon....if ever.
Enjoy!