Review: Cabin Fever

Friends (Samuel Davis, Gage Golightly, Nadine Crocker, Dustin Ingram, and Matthew Daddario) go to a cabin in the woods for some fun. End up victims to a flesh-eating virus. Not fun.

The question is why? It’s not just because the original “Cabin Fever” sucked, but it did. It’s not just that the original “Cabin Fever” only came out in the early 00s, but it did. It’s not just that “Cabin Fever” was basically a rip-off of “The Evil Dead” which itself had two sequels and a remake, but it’s still true. It’s all of the above that had me asking why the hell this 2016 film from director Travis Z exists. Actually, the part about it sucking does potentially have some merit: A remake of a shit film at least in theory could try and succeed in making the original material work. And y’know what? It’s ever-so slightly less crap than the original film. So well done to Mr. Z for making a completely pointless, largely scene-for-scene (apparently the big difference being that shots are inverse to the original. I’m not kidding!) remake of the original Eli Roth film. Your virtual carbon copy of a carbon copy sucks a bit less. Bravo. I’d still rather watch the first two “Evil Dead” films any day of the week to get my ‘Youngsters in a cabin in the woods plagued by some horrific curse/virus’ fix.

If all you want is a slightly better version of such events as ‘the bit where the little hick kid bites one of the protagonists’ or ‘the hot chick shaves a little bit more than just hair off’ scene, here’s your movie. I’ll even praise the film for being a bit less disgusting than the original, but for many that’s not even a positive. I like gory movies, but they’ve got to be the fun kind of gory, and neither version of “Cabin Fever” is the fun kind of gory, and neither does anything terribly interesting or new with the basic set-up. I’m just beyond angry that this is yet another film that takes a perfectly workable ‘cabin in the woods’ setting and does pretty much the least imaginative thing with it. The setting is full of potential, Sam Raimi did a lot with it in his first two “Evil Dead” films. Pretty much everyone else since has done sweet bugger-all with it. Speaking of unimaginative, we get plenty of ‘jump’ scares early on, and whilst most of them did ‘get’ me, I’m a wimp and ‘jump’ scares are cheap, clichéd parlour tricks of little distinction. On the plus side we do get a bit of dark humour that I appreciated, as I’ve never considered Eli Roth to have a sense of humour in any of his films (at least not one that I’ve appreciated), so it has that over the Roth film at least. Having said that, most other people think this film lacks the humour the original had (Is simply referencing other horror films meant to be humour? I hope not).

I found the characters a bit less objectionable this time around, even though their arcs are the same as last time. This time around I felt there was a stronger level of humanity and compassion to a couple of them when things get horrible and messy and they need to make some tough decisions. Last time I felt that whole aspect was dreadfully conveyed. It’s still not remotely perfect here (right around the time one person ‘fucks the shit’ out of another who isn’t their girlfriend was where it lost me), but a bit better nonetheless. I thought it was cute that one of the characters (Bert) freaks out because there’s no electricity in the woods for him to play his video games. Yeah, that’s gotta suck. The character of Bert was a particularly loathsome, off-putting creature in the original film, but played here by Dustin Ingram, he’s much less of a pain. In fact, that’s probably the film’s biggest attribute, that I didn’t want Bert to die from moment negative five thousand. Bert is entertainingly awful, even managing to almost accidentally kill one of his friends within 20 minutes. He’s the absolute last person on Earth who should be allowed to bear arms. Stevie Wonder included. It’s with this character that I find the idea that Mr. Z used the same script to be somewhat questionable, as I can think of at least one scene involving squirrels having their sexuality questioned by Bert that is not in this film (and thankfully so, it was a dreadfully stupid moment). So the director has definitely made a few changes here, no matter what the screenwriting credits may be on screen. The rest of the cast are pretty fine, except Louise Linton and Timothy J. Zajaros. The former is one of those ‘progeny of a rich/famous person’ pretty people who seriously can’t act, and is badly miscast here in the one memorably entertaining character from the original, Deputy Winston. Linton (apparently the wife of Trump’s Treasury Secretary) is outwardly suspicious from moment one, which is a shame. A more seasoned actor probably wouldn’t have chosen that note to play on. Mr. Zajaros meanwhile, plays the stranger with the dog and massive bag of weed, and tries way too hard to be creepy.

It’s obvious what the thinking was here, and it certainly wasn’t trying to fix a broken toy. Nope, the original “Cabin Fever” made money, so these bright sparks thought they could make money too by doing an almost exact cover version rather than trying something different and taking a risk. There’s a reason why the only screenwriters credited here are the original film’s writers Eli Roth and Randy Pearlstein. It’s largely the same damn script, with only minor (albeit superior in most cases) alterations. At any rate, this is a slightly less crappy film than the original. Well-done, you’ve also made the most pointless remake since Gus Van Sant’s “Psycho”.

Rating: C-