Friday 2nd January

Poseidon

Director: Wolfgang Petersen
Year: 2006
Stars: Kurt Russell, Josh Lucas, Richard Dreyfuss, Emmy Rossen, Jacinda Barrett

Having watched the original Poseidon Adventure, and enjoyed it immensely when it appeared on TV (roughly when this remake came out at the cinema), I thought I would give the remake a try. I felt it couldn't go too wrong having such good source material to draw on.

Things started out well. A decision to stick to the original plot had clearly been made, whilst the time it was filmed in had been updated and the characters changed a little. This was mostly to give the characters sex appeal by making them younger and thinner. Although the characters being normal people (albeit quite rich) was a big part of the original movie, I forgave the makers of this remake for wanting a "sexier" cast as they appeared to have invested in giving the characters background and making you care about them.

What I couldn't forgive was the fact that these insights into the characters were never followed through, apart from in a couple of key scenes. Once the action started, it was all action - bigger and better set pieces designed to outdo the original, and all other disaster movies. For me, one of the strengths of the original was the continued focus on the human element, and this remake blew any sense of that away.

Rating: 3 out of 5 (and 2 of these are for the original script)