The District 13 remake hits cinemas this week with a sad, tear inducing whimper.
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| "Sorry dude. If I knew it was gonna be this bad, I would have stayed far far away!" |
Haven't we figured out by now that not everything needs to be remade for U.S. theaters? They're like a scourge upon the earth, devouring intellectual properties like a black plague set forth by Hollywood suits that say, "Sure. Remake that too! The original was great!".
District B13 was a unique 2004 feature that starred David Belle in a story focused on the sport of Parkour, the criminal underworld and a whole lot of ass kicking. Brick Mansions is nothing like the original and is in fact a catastrophic failure of a spring release that does more harm than good in its cliched portrayal of Detroit as a run down, criminally neglected city with corrupt politicians at the helm. Haven't we had enough of this abuse yet?
It's with a heavy heart that I had to accept this as Paul Walker's final full length role in an action movie. Let's not beat around the bush. No insult intended, but the man wasn't a great actor. Yes, he brought something special to the Fast and the Furious franchise. He played that character with an innocent sensibility that only he could bring to an over the top, unbelievably fun series of adrenaline infused car racing movies. But (there's always a but), it's totally missing with Brick Mansions. In fact, the acting here is so bad that the whole production should have been taken out back and burned, no questions asked. When a lackluster, uncharismatic, non-actor like RZA shows up every other bad performance, just take the movie, douse it in gasoline and set it aflame because you know your movie outright sucks.
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| "Hi. We're the white guys that represent all of Detroit." |
Brick Mansions is unquestionably the worst of the worst. There is no excuse for this remake. There is nothing of quality to be had in the ninety minutes of mindless treachery it will cause for audiences. The action is boring and nowhere near as groundbreaking as District B13 and the substandard characters are all one sided, underdeveloped, soulless cut outs that audiences are supposed to relate with.
If you're a huge Paul Walker fan, you may find some joy in seeing him on screen one final time before his shortened Fast and Furious 7 role. Yet, Brick Mansions is so very tediously boring that you might be better off staying at home with your autographed Paul Walker poster and your blu-ray copy of Running Scared. Now that's a movie.
-Chris George