I am the last one to say that any film by George A. Romero needs to be remade. The Tom Savini remake of Night of the Living Dead is amazing but Mr. Savini had Romero's blessing. The Dawn of the Dead remake by Snyder was an adrenaline thrill ride but couldn't come close to achieving what Romero did with the original. The Crazies however is one effective film, both of them.
If you are familiar with Romero's work you know there's always subtext. The original film was very much an anti-war film from the Vietnam era. Romero paints a very distrusting picture of the government and how the government war machine treats anyone that gets in its way, even its own citizens. The film is rife with government mistrust and anti war machine sentiment. Not much has changed nowadays. Feelings amongst people today are very similar. The Crazies is still a relevant film.
The remake expounds on the idea of Romero's original film but takes it in a decidedly different direction. This film is about what happens to the people caught in the middle. A government plane goes down in a water reservoir in Iowa. Its cargo, a new biological weapon, slowly seeping into the nearest town's water supply. As time goes by more and more people begin showing symptoms. Catatonia, violent destructive behavior, and a lack of emotion. Half the town goes crazy killing the other half of the town.
The government swoops in, rounds up the populace, and assesses the situation. The disease is too far along to save them. Extermination and containment is the order. The sheriff, his pregnant wife, and a handful of others are caught in the middle. At one turn it's the government. The next it's the Crazies. And nowhere to hide in the open flat lands of the midwest.
This film focuses closer on the plight of the regular people. The government machine is demonized but not the men and women told what to do. The effected people are shown more prominently than in Romero's. Thrills and scares a plenty! The acting is great and the story is palatable and exciting. The strength of this remake is that it takes the idea but shows it from a different perspective. It doesn't try to repeat what Romero did but rather explore the idea further. A very good film.
Overall Ranking: 7 out of 10
Nude-O-Meter: 0 out of 10
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