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The Truth About Charlie/CharadeRating:
Release Date: 01 June, 2003 Retail Price: $9.99 OUR Price: $9.99 You SAVE: $0.00! Cast: Complete Cast (6 total) |
The Truth About Charlie/Charade Reviews
What a charade
Why? Why remake a glorious old movie like "Charade," which was perfect anyway?
Well, whatever Jonathan Demme's motive is, he didn't do a very good job. "The Truth about Charlie" is a disaster as a remake, and it's not much better even when taken on its own terms -- it lumbers clumsily through a humorless, standard plot, with a love story is so passionate you could chill drinks on it. The only reason to buy this: the original movie.
Regina (Thandie Newton) is planning to divorce husband Charlie, and makes up her mind on vacation. No sooner has she returned than she finds that she doesn't need to bother -- Charlie's been murdered, and their money has mysteriously vanished. As if that weren't bad enough, some creepy people are following her around, apparently looking for the money.
The problem is, Reggie isn't sure who she can trust -- including a strange man (Mark Wahlberg) who may or may not be an enemy. But she may have to trust him, to solve the question of who Charlie really was, and the question of where the money has gone. If she doesn't find it, she may be next to die...
This edition of Demme's remake is bundled (as bad movies often are) with a better one. On the flip side of the disc is the original "Charade." It has about the same plot as the remake, but with Audrey Hepburn as Regina and Cary Grant as her mystery man. There are a lot of rotten copies floating around, but the color and sound have been beautifully restored in this version.
But how does Demme's remake stand up on its own? Not very well. Paris looks creepy, seedy and dark. The script is a paint-by-numbers thriller, without a scrap of wit or intelligence anywhere. Demme is obviously unsure how to bring this to life, so he ends up with an unsubtle, unsexy, unappealing mess.
It's even worse when you compare it to the original flick. Stanlet Donen directed a tight, sharp little movie that could be terrifying (Hepburn encounters a clawed killer who tries to slash her face off), and suddenly switch to goofy screwball humour, like the hysterical scene where Grant takes a shower in all his clothes, much to Hepburn's delight.
Even worse, Newton and Wahlberg have zero chemistry. Newton smirks, pouts and tries to look sophisticated, while Wahlberg tries to be cool and sexy, and only comes across as smarmy. Hepburn and Grant have everything the other two don't: chemistry, sexiness, and a scene where they chase a kiss around an orange.
The only reason to buy "The Truth about Charlie" is to get the flipside, which is the only affordable, restored version of "Charade." The remake itself is a self-important disaster.
Worst remake I've ever seen.
Appalling. It's not like there wasn't a formula for the makers of this pointless remake to follow, the original worked, it could have been updated, if not equalled.
Instead, Demme throws out everything that made the original great - romance, humor, suspense, intelligent pacing, all so he can make a movie that seems to parody mainstream genre films and acts as a self-satisfied exercise in "New Wave" mimicry.
Except the "New Wave" films were just that, new, they were doing something original. Demme's film seems an excuse for him to enjoy working in Paris, it certainly isn't coherent. Plot elements are raised, then forgotten, and what on earth is the crazy mother who murders people doing here, is this a comedy? And the finale, in which the characters seem to lose interest in the mystery, just as the audience has done by this point.
Obviously remaking a film with Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn, two of the greatest movie stars of all time, was going to be difficult, but why even bother when all you have to offer is Marky Mark and Thandie Newton. With George Clooney and Nicole Kidman, or others of that caliber, it might have been a good idea, the original works because of the star power and their chemistry. This poor enterprise was doomed from the start.
The definition of the pointless remake, makes Gus Van Sant's "Psycho" seem creative and original.
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