TB4000
01-18-2005, 04:59 PM
White Noise barely makes a sound
Remaking horror movies is not a bad idea in itself. Once in a while, you get something like a Ring or a Grudge and it’s not really that bad. Then you get the movies that try to blatantly copy the style of said earlier movies without the same effect. Then you become cursed with stuff like Feardotcom, and most recently White Noise. The commercials try to play up the fact that this movie is based on supposedly real phenomena, and that alone could be enough to get you into a theatre. But when the movie fails to even provide decent scare moments, that’s when it becomes straight horror movie blasphemy.
White Noise features the return of Batman himself, Michael Keaton, to a starring role.
He is Johnathan, an architect with a great job, a loving wife, and, since these flicks always require it, a little boy that acts creepier than the ghosts in the movie. When his wife is suddenly reported missing, Jonathan breaks down and dedicates all his effort to finding her, until it’s revealed that her body was found at the bottom of a steep cliff. Soon after, he runs into Raymond, a man fully versed in the art of EVP, or for the demonic spirit-challenged, electronic voice phenomenon. Raymond tells him that he’s been hearing messages from his wife, and that she wants to contact him. Soon after, Jonathan becomes obsessed with hearing any sign from her, basically going back to dedicating his life to it once again, forgetting about work, food, sleeping, showering…you get the point.
Of course, he manages to locate her, as well seeing and hearing other dead people. Unfortunately for him, not everyone that has died is good, as there is a ghostly trio on the other side as well that likes to make a habit of killing anyone that messes around with EVP. You’re never told who the ghosts are, or why they have a problem with people using a means to contact their loved ones, but rest assured they don’t like you doing it, so that’s all you really need to know, apparently.
My problem with this entire take is that it was possible for it to be somewhat on the bizarre side, but not really scary. Unless you find scrambled cable channels and AM radio stations scary, like I do once in a while, the movie isn’t really going to be all that captivating. Poltergeist and even The Ring did the whole “dead TV” thing a whole lot better than this, and I think most of the problem was that they attempted to play the whole thing serious, which is a definite negative in any horror flick. One scene features Keaton telling a friend that his dead wife tells him that she wants him to help people, which immediately made me want to yell out, “You’re not Batman anymore!”, but I held it in. The movie doesn’t know what it wants to really be…is he supposed to be some kind of hero now, is he supposed to be a victim watching out for evil ghosts, or does he need to check if his cable dish is hooked up correctly?
I seriously can not believe that this is the same man that was Beetlejuice back in 1989. If Tim Burton had directed this, I’m like 100% positive it would’ve been scarier and funnier, and he would’ve let Keaton become his former character to give us some good nostalgia. All I can say is, you will never hear the phrase, “and the award for best picture goes to White Noise!” at all this year, unless it’s for most clichéd.
Remaking horror movies is not a bad idea in itself. Once in a while, you get something like a Ring or a Grudge and it’s not really that bad. Then you get the movies that try to blatantly copy the style of said earlier movies without the same effect. Then you become cursed with stuff like Feardotcom, and most recently White Noise. The commercials try to play up the fact that this movie is based on supposedly real phenomena, and that alone could be enough to get you into a theatre. But when the movie fails to even provide decent scare moments, that’s when it becomes straight horror movie blasphemy.
White Noise features the return of Batman himself, Michael Keaton, to a starring role.
He is Johnathan, an architect with a great job, a loving wife, and, since these flicks always require it, a little boy that acts creepier than the ghosts in the movie. When his wife is suddenly reported missing, Jonathan breaks down and dedicates all his effort to finding her, until it’s revealed that her body was found at the bottom of a steep cliff. Soon after, he runs into Raymond, a man fully versed in the art of EVP, or for the demonic spirit-challenged, electronic voice phenomenon. Raymond tells him that he’s been hearing messages from his wife, and that she wants to contact him. Soon after, Jonathan becomes obsessed with hearing any sign from her, basically going back to dedicating his life to it once again, forgetting about work, food, sleeping, showering…you get the point.
Of course, he manages to locate her, as well seeing and hearing other dead people. Unfortunately for him, not everyone that has died is good, as there is a ghostly trio on the other side as well that likes to make a habit of killing anyone that messes around with EVP. You’re never told who the ghosts are, or why they have a problem with people using a means to contact their loved ones, but rest assured they don’t like you doing it, so that’s all you really need to know, apparently.
My problem with this entire take is that it was possible for it to be somewhat on the bizarre side, but not really scary. Unless you find scrambled cable channels and AM radio stations scary, like I do once in a while, the movie isn’t really going to be all that captivating. Poltergeist and even The Ring did the whole “dead TV” thing a whole lot better than this, and I think most of the problem was that they attempted to play the whole thing serious, which is a definite negative in any horror flick. One scene features Keaton telling a friend that his dead wife tells him that she wants him to help people, which immediately made me want to yell out, “You’re not Batman anymore!”, but I held it in. The movie doesn’t know what it wants to really be…is he supposed to be some kind of hero now, is he supposed to be a victim watching out for evil ghosts, or does he need to check if his cable dish is hooked up correctly?
I seriously can not believe that this is the same man that was Beetlejuice back in 1989. If Tim Burton had directed this, I’m like 100% positive it would’ve been scarier and funnier, and he would’ve let Keaton become his former character to give us some good nostalgia. All I can say is, you will never hear the phrase, “and the award for best picture goes to White Noise!” at all this year, unless it’s for most clichéd.