{"id":726,"date":"2024-02-16T10:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-02-16T10:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/leoloves.co.uk\/?p=726"},"modified":"2025-04-24T16:21:40","modified_gmt":"2025-04-24T16:21:40","slug":"my-bloody-valentine-1981-vs-2009","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/leoloves.co.uk\/index.php\/2024\/02\/16\/my-bloody-valentine-1981-vs-2009\/","title":{"rendered":"My Bloody Valentine 1981 vs 2009"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

WARNING: <\/strong>This Review May Contain Spoilers<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I don\u2019t think anyone will understand quite how long I have been waiting to do this article! I covered the original in Chick-Flick Free Valentine\u2019s <\/em>but it was almost IMPOSSIBLE to find the remake. What I love is that in a weird way, the title works on two levels \u2013 it\u2019s set on Valentine\u2019s Day and in Valentine Bluff, both of which end up pretty bloody. Well, happy belated Valentine\u2019s Day everyone\u2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Getting Stuck Right In<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

                You ever want to set people up for the film they\u2019re about watch? Kill someone within the first 2 minutes! This is the case for both the original and the remake but I feel the original is a little more subtle about it. Maybe it is the change in decade or the fact that the remake was made for 3D, I think they go extremely overboard with the fact that Harry kills 3 people when he awakes from his coma in comparison to the one person lured into the mine to die in the original film. Unfortunately, in my opinion anyway, the remake continues in this violent vain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Crazy Breeds Crazy<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

                Even though I had seen the original film before, I had remembered it completely incorrectly! From my recollection we didn\u2019t see the killers face \u2013 Harry Warden was more like Valentine Bluffs\u2019 Michael Myers or Jason Vorhees, your regular horror film bogeyman \u2013 however, it turns out that it is actually Axel killing the residents of Valentine Bluffs having gone crazy after seeing his father killed by Warren 20 years before. However, in the remake it seems they decided to resurrect Harry Warden to return as the killer\u2026 or so we think!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                The interesting thing in the remake is that you aren\u2019t sure for the whole film if it\u2019s Tom or Axel so, like Sarah, you\u2019re unsure who to trust. Instead, it turns out the incident at the Hanniger Mine party turned Tom into a schizophrenic \u2013 part Tom Hanniger, part Harry Warden.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Harbinger Flashback<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

                An important trope in a lot of horror films, especially those set around a past event, is the use of a harbinger. They are the storyteller, the warning for your main characters. In the case of the original, this role is taken on by the bartender \u2013 the man who found Harry Warden in the mine 20 years ago \u2013 who regales the kids with the tale of Hanniger Mine. However, it is with this story that the remake opens with so it makes me wonder if this is now a lost trope.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                Weirdly, the remake actually adds a fact about the Hanniger Mine incident that it is never mentioned in the original film \u2013 that Harry Warren killed the men that were buried in the mine with him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Disappearing Act<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

                It is mentioned in the original that TJ Hanniger disappears for a period of time, leaving Sarah feeling abandoned and she ends up dating Axel. At no point is it actually mentioned why he leaves, however in the remake we are given the reason. As mentioned before, the film starts with the awakening of Harry Warden and the killings in the Hanniger mine. It seems this puts Tom in a mental institute for 10 years, causing Sarah to end up with Axel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Focus on Romance<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

                OK, maybe this is slightly inaccurate as TJ and Sarah don\u2019t actually end up together in the end, but what I\u2019m trying to say is that the original focuses more on the battle of feelings between Sarah, Axel and TJ than her and TJ falling into bed together. I\u2019m not saying they don\u2019t sleep together but there\u2019s no reference to even the possibility that it happened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

                Now, what I was expecting from the remake was for them to double-down on this and for Tom and Sarah to actually sleep together. Thankfully that wasn\u2019t the case, instead they continued to use the love-triangle as a point of antagonism between the two men.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Holding off until the End<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

                Now I realise this probably contradicts the opening paragraph but think it also helps highlight it a lot more. What\u2019s great about the original starting off with one murder straight away and leaving the majority to the last 30 minutes is that it seems to lull you into that false sense of security that maybe more will survive than they actually do. However, you just don\u2019t have this with the remake as it is continually violence on top of violence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Homages to the Original<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

                Now, when a remake isn\u2019t frame for frame \u2013 it\u2019s always nice for them to pay homage to the original film. I only spotted this in two places. First, the chocolate box delivered to Axel mirrors that of the box received by the mayor in the original film. Also, the death of Rosa in the washing machine just before the end game of the remake is the same as the death of Mabel, the laundrette owner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Take Your Pick<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

                OK, normally I header this with \u2018In Conclusion\u2019 but because there is a really good song by Ice Nine Kills about this film called Take Your Pick, <\/em>I just couldn\u2019t resist. I think it\u2019s blatantly obvious from the above that I prefer the original film to the remake but I still need to conclude the article. Now, I can enjoy blood and gore as much as the next person but there are also times when there can be too much. There\u2019s something to be said for subtlety in a horror film.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WARNING: This Review May Contain Spoilers I don\u2019t think anyone will understand quite how long I have been waiting to do this article! I covered the original in Chick-Flick Free Valentine\u2019s but it was almost IMPOSSIBLE to find the remake. What I love is that in a weird way, the title works on two levels … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":974,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-726","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-to-remake-or-not-to-remake","latest_post"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/leoloves.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/726","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/leoloves.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/leoloves.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leoloves.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leoloves.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=726"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/leoloves.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/726\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":727,"href":"https:\/\/leoloves.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/726\/revisions\/727"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leoloves.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/974"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/leoloves.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=726"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leoloves.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=726"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leoloves.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=726"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}