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Posted in: Movies, Review | Tagged: blumhouse, james mcavoy, Speak No Evil, universal
Speak No Evil: See The Original, Skip This Toothless Remake {Review}
Speak No Evil is a pointless, toothless, not scary remake of one of the best horror films of the last few years. Watch the original instead.
Article Summary
- Speak No Evil is a disappointing, toothless remake missing the horror essence of the original Danish film.
- The remake changes the original's impactful ending, undermining the film's overall message and tension.
- Despite strong performances by James McAvoy and Mackenzie Davis, the film lacks the subtlety and bleakness needed.
- For a true horror experience with powerful themes, opt for the original 2022 version instead of this bland remake.
Speak No Evil seems to think it is saying something very important about trust, human interactions, and our role in our relationships. But then, in the last half hour, it betrays everything that came before it and throws all of those lessons out the window. Even more unforgivingly, it changes the ending of the film it is based on, rendering the whole thing a toothless, gutless remake with little reason to exist. Universal would have been much better off getting the rights to the Danish original and throwing all its marketing muscle behind it. We should have known from the first trailer. Watch that one instead.
Speak No Evil, More Like Don't See Evil
While on vacation, a couple and their daughter meet another family and hit it off. Later, they accept an invitation to spend a weekend with them on their farm. Right away, they get a much different vibe from Paddy (James McAvoy) and his wife Clara (Aisling Franciosi), especially in the way they treat their son Ant (Dan Hough). Husband Ben (Scott McNairy) is convinced by his wife (Mackenzie Davis) to grab their daughter (Alix West Lefler) and run, but they come to that decision too late.
For almost the entire run time of Speak No Evil, it is pretty much a straight remake of the 2022 Danish film from director Christian Tafdrup. Here, James Watkins manages to match the tension in patches but never quite makes it to the unhinged bleakness of the 2022 film. The cast is game, as McAvoy and Davis both do some of their best work in recent years here. McAvoy especially has a particularly gnarly venom in every scene, which also betrays his character's turn in the third act. The lessons of being overly polite and sacrificing your comfort to avoid any kind of conflict, even to your own personal detriment, are central to the story, but the way the script hammers that point home over and over lacks the subtlety of the original. This is especially true at the end, where the biggest problems lie and where the central concepts of the film are completely betrayed. The ending is the thing that fundamentally breaks this film, and to get into it, we're going to throw up a MASSIVE SPOILER WARNING. If you don't want to know the ending of this film or the 2022 film it is based on, do not proceed past this image. This is your final SPOILER WARNING.
In the original 2022 film, the family finds evidence that their hosts kidnap children, cut out their tongues, and kill their family, taking the children as their own. They do not get away. They are forced to watch as their daughter's tongue is cut out, and before being beaten to death with stones, are told their fate was sealed: "Because you let us." It is one of the most brutal and haunting endings to a horror film ever; it stays with you for weeks and pays off the painful realization that sometimes, you need to be rude for your own well-being.
This remake of Speak No Evil includes none of that. Well, it includes the "Because you let us" line, but the lessons are not learned. Once Paddy's bunch is revealed as evil, Ben and his family square off against them in their house in an action thriller standoff that lasts way too long, and one by one, they kill them and escape, with Paddy being beaten to death with a rock by Ant. The family then leaves with Ant in their car, having vanquished evil and won the day. For a film that is at times a slave to its originator, to betray its central theme that much is a cardinal sin. Why present this story and not see it all the way through? This is exactly the type of Hollywood corny ending Tafdrup was trying to avoid with the original. To take so much from the original, except for the toughest parts, is unforgivable. It is cowardly and embarrassing.
Really, though, Speak No Evil is just not scary, and that is the film's biggest problem. McAvoy is unnerving, but even he cannot do this all alone. Universal would have been better off getting the rights to the original, putting some marketing muscle behind it, and exposing that to audiences. Instead, they are left with a meandering and pointless film that is completely skippable.
Speak No Evil
2/10
Speak No Evil is a pointless, toothless, not scary remake of one of the best horror films of the last few years. Watch the original instead and skip this.
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