THE MONKEY'S PAW is less an adaptation of the famous ghost story by British writer W.W. Jacobs and more a typical supernatural slasher flick with a generic Hollywood feel. It provides a role for the reliably evil Stephen Lang, whose appearance in AVATAR has made him extremely typecast in this genre, but other than that it's largely uninteresting. The story has been chopped and altered so that it's barely recognisable as an adaptation of the old story. The film itself has a dark, blue-tinted look and boring protagonists whose fate you never really care about. Inevitably there are some gruesome interludes but as a horror film, this one's a dud.

Brett Simmons is a director who manages to challenge as well as enlighten through the horror genre with style and intelligence. Putting our spirituality and even our basic existential beliefs to the test, he uses a timeless story of terror to force us to examine the very basis of our own identity. Stephen Lang, giving a performance even more extraordinary than his sublime characterizations in Gettysburg and Gods and Generals, breaks your heart with his humanity while shocking us with his incredible depravity. The violence is sudden and startling but never gratuitous. It serves an important purpose if we are to accept the greater questions presented in the film. The climax is both stunning and courageous and perhaps Lang is one of the few actors capable of pulling off the overwhelming task given him by director Simmons. The moody cinematography and understated score create an atmosphere that is both beautifully haunting and a bit unnatural to our senses. All these elements come together perfectly in one of the most impressive films of the last decade.

"The Monkey's Paw" is a movie for in between and looks like a movie version of one of Stephen King's short stories. Upon further investigation, it appears to have originated from W.W. Jacobs who has written this story in 1902. The story is based on the well-known 3 wishes which are granted to someone. In this movie the paw of a dead monkey can achieve this. However, there is a snag. The wishes are carried out but you have to pay an extremely heavy price because you are tampering with fate.The basis of the original story is mostly retained in this film. Only the end has a different turn. The final message behind the whole story is in the description of the leg. "There was a spell written by a fakir. He was a very holy man. He wanted to show that life depends on fate, and those who are interfering with it won't do this without any sorrow." Actually, it is a perfect story with the right atmosphere for an episode of "Tales from the crypt" or "Creepshow". Also there's a comic of "The Monkey's paw" and even a radio show. It actually sounds a bit corny and feels like an old-fashioned ghost story to read to children at Halloween.Despite the fact that I didn't expect much of it, the movie was still reasonable. You should forget about the overused banality, such as a phone ringing at the wrong time. Ultimately, it's an ordinary creepy story with a bit of voodoo and a zombie section. The feeling and atmosphere of "Pet Sematary" leans close to it, but nevertheless, this movie has its own personality.The acting is reasonably well . You do have the feeling that you are watching a TV episode. I don't think it's screened a lot in the cinemas. It appears also that the protagonist C.J. Thomason has quite some experience in the world of television. Generally he played his part convincingly. However, his actions weren't always logical. Jake didn't have a easy life thus far. His mother is in the hospital and is suffering from cancer . He has a bland, probably poorly paid job with a gland of a boss, who's also married to his ex-girlfriend he apparently still has feelings for. A reasonable person would immediately think of his mother at the first wish. Nope. The first thing he wishes is to become the owner of a glitzy sports car parked in front of the pub. You can bring up the arguments about his drunken state and his skeptical attitude towards the so called wishes. But still ! Stephen Lang looked familiar, but I couldn't place him immediately. Compared with Jake he's a more colorful figure. In the beginning he played an ordinary fellow who apparently can handle his liquor. The changing into a blood-drooling murderous zombie who kills anything that stands in his way of fulfilling his only desire by a wish, is rather successful. So we get a soft-slasher zombie movie where the massacres are not visualized too gross. The most original was the part with the machine working on air pressure. A typical horror story and an enjoyable entertaining movie. Don't expect more. One thing always amazes me. Am I the only one whose first wish would spontaneously be to ask for a 1000 wishes more ? More reviews at http://opinion-as-a-moviefreak.blogspot.be/

Oh boy. Another mildly amusing Victorian horror story has been converted into another American slasher borefest.The recipe how to do it is very simple: Ignore the original setting of the story an chose today's America instead. You may choose mildly interesting place like New Orleans if you prefer to make the story somewhat exotic.Get rid of original characters of the story and replace them with good looking young folks. They are more interesting to look at and the viewer will forgive them as they behave as brain dead. Also ignore the original mythology and premises of the story - replace all these cults and gods and mysterious sellers just with a drunken boy in a bar. This will also explain why the folks use powerful magical devices with an incredible level of stupidity: They just do not believe it actually works.And now for the real "American twist of the original story": The story is usually about the device itself and the ways how the main character plans to use it without the backfire as it was advertised by its seller. Just do not care about the device at all and just focus on cheap TV soap grade interpersonal relationships of the young and stupid characters. No real depth is really needed as in the TV.The plot it is also simple: The first third will be wasted on the introduction of the characters and their TV soap opera class problems. Then for a 60 seconds there is a device and the rest of the movie is running, driving, fighting, screaming, slashing, shouting and crying. You know - emotions. The more people are killed the better - you need a lot of blood in the horror stories these days. You know: How folks should understand their are watching the horror if there is no blood? Just do not forget: The main enemy must be older man with a beard. That makes him different from the young lovable characters.In the end please do not forget to show the plot device for about 5 seconds so the viewers can know that if they pay a lot for a tickets and DVDs they may have a whole series made in this very manner. Sort of preview I would say.I really have no idea why Americans hate so much other cultures so they feel entitled to "upgrade" their horror story to this mild tasting bland coca-cola-KFC blend. But it is really horrid. What's even worse I do love original American horror stories. Just this sort of cultural rape made by brain dead script writers and producers makes me sick. It's insulting and what is more - it's really stupid as this makes resulting coca-cola-KFC blend sooooo predictable and boring.Seriously: Stop doing that. Please just stop doing that. It fails most of the time. Do what you can do very well: Variations like The Cabin in the Woods. This was not dumbing down the original stories but improving over them by telling an entirely new story inspired on the older ones. That was way better.