The Rocky Horror Picture Show: Let's Do the Time Warp Again (2016) Reviews

• "It's Worse Than I Imagined"

  marloweisdead2016-10-22

  The original film of The Rocky Horror Picture Show was flawed and at times sloppy, but it was brimming with heart and a genuine weirdness of character. It could be confusing to follow at times but it remained a mostly straight-faced homage to the weird science films of the 1950s with the added attraction of sexual and gender twisting, but crucially presented without comment or focus - this is one of the reasons it succeeded so well and why it became an underground hit. This new version of this classic film made sure to disembowel the original, reach up and pull out its heart, and to then airbrush the empty husk that remained. One of the major downfalls is the absolutely lifeless soundtrack recordings of the songs: they sound as if they have been compressed and muted of life to ensure that nobody's heart rises above sixty beats per minutes. Over this limp soundtrack the characters mime their songs, mostly badly, some not even making a huge effort to even sync up at times (particularly guilty of this is Columbia). As to the casting, gone are the individual characteristics and introduced are a parade of generically handsome and pretty boys and gals with all the individuality of a Toys R Us dolls aisle. The original worked because it was played mainly straight; the new version gives us hammy overacting with too much self-awareness which obviously does nothing to draw an audience in; it's as if the new production had either never watched the original film or had so grossly misread it as to be almost imbecilic. Talking of Frankestein, we are treated to an on-the-nose depiction of Mary Shelley's gravestone, despite the fact she died in London, England; anything to ram down our throats the Frankenstein connection! In the original film Rocky was slightly neanderthal in appearance - blankish expression that reminded us of Frankenstein's monster (after all that's what he represents) with a hard muscular body, with tight buns showing through tight gold undies; the new Rocky looks like a gym-bro with dipped highlights who may or may not be slightly constipated: he is more Brut than brute. Dr Frank-N-Furter, crucially, is a transvestite not a transsexual - Transsexual is the name of the planet. The stunt casting of Laverne Cox is badly done: whereas the original had a skinny flat-chested Tim Curry working brilliantly as a transvestite, Laverne Cox is a female Dr Frank-N-Furter and, as the transvestite she sings about being, should be dressed in a male attire: this casting was ill-thought-out. I enjoyed Laverne in Orange in the New Black but her attempts to channel Tim Curry's origination of Frank-N-Furter is embarrassing: the British accent is all over the place, often with an American twang at the end of phrases, and often sounded like it's being strangled out of her. Her rendition of 'I'm Going Home' at the climax should have been emotional and stirring, as in the original, but it was in fact as empty as the preceding hour and a half had been. Speaking of the climax, Riff-Raff and Magenta strongly resembled a pair of Red Dwarf villains in their silver get-up, and the castle crumbling brought to mind the old British children's show Knightmare. The film also suffered from an almost total lack of character delineation - far more-so than even the original which, as I said before, certain had its sloppy moments of confusion. Magenta and Columbia were more marginal than in the original and Eddie's cameo was almost completely pointless if not for the fact that he is used as a postmortem device later on in the film. The film also suffered from a real lack of chemistry, not only between the viewer and the cast but also between cast members; Rocky and Janet's bedroom scene lacked any sexuality or tension whatsoever: Hank drinking Manny's corpse-water in Swiss Army Man was more romantic and sexual than this white-bread colourless scene; not to mention the bed-hopping hilarity of the original was almost entirely airbrushed to be as inoffensive as possible. The nod to the cult of audience participation at theatrical showings of the film fell very flat also - the audience seemed to be a TV exec's idea of what edgy, weird, non-mainstream people looked like in the 1980s (TV punks) and 1990s (TV grunge). The saddest crime of all was the rolling in of stroke-victim Tim Curry in a pathetic attempt to give credence and validation to this travesty - the only moments of any emotion in the film were when he appeared on screen and my heart filled with sadness at what they had persuaded him to do, and to watch him valiantly attempt his line-readings. I am not looking forward to an anemic version of Cronenberg's / Burroughs' "Naked Lunch".

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• Overproduced

  tyler_dean_smith2016-10-20

  This remake attempts to stay true to the original. While the story line modifications are fitting the performances are lacking the emotion of the original. The musical performances also stay true to the original, which I enjoyed but it was very difficult to get over the overproduction of the vocal performances as it clearly highlights the lip syncing. I feel that if the vocal performances were recorded during filming that it would be much better. The acting lacks any emotion. It's like watching the cast going through the motions and running lines to an empty audience. I want to give a better rating, but this is not how we should be honouring a classic.

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• Sad day for Rocky Horror fans

  jeffreydemerly2016-10-20

  I cannot believe Tim Curry actually agreed to be a part of this. They have taken a cult classic and ruined it. The dialog is horrible and over dramatized making these actors and actresses seem like middle school kids doing their first play. Truly sad that some talented people had to be a part of this production. The changes to the musical numbers further ruin this version. The only thing that they seem to have gotten correct are the character names and the general plot. i would classify this as either a very bad tribute to the original or a total mockery of the original and the cast. If this is you first introduction to Rocky Horror please, please watch the original instead of this.

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• Casting Laverne Cox was a big mistake

  sylvesterthekat2016-10-21

  Now don't get me wrong, she performed fine, sang reasonably well and had 'attitude'. But she's too feminine! The whole point, at least for me, of the Frank N Furter character is that it's obviously a GUY dressed as a woman, ie a TRANSVESTITE! Not transgender, not a woman. A man. Think about it, Brad and Janet aren't going to think hey, that's a guy wearing risqué women's clothing. No, they're going to think it's a tall woman with big boobs wearing risqué clothing. The shock value is reduced. And while we're on the subject of shock value, they totally messed up the Frank entrance scene after Time Warp. Then, later on, the whole dynamic of Frank ending up in bed with both Brad and Janet is substantially altered if Frank is a woman. Just think about it! I've given it 5/10 mostly because they did a fairly good job with the songs and who can go wrong with those? But, exacerbated by the monumentally annoying commercial breaks, it's really not worth watching this. Buy or rent the original instead, it's much much better.

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• 20 minutes into this so and I'm regretting it.

  skipper_mso2016-10-20

  In the late 70's we used to go to the theater and watch the original. Before they banned using lighters in theaters. The characters, if over the top, were 3 dimensional. There were things you could see in their faces and hear in their voices that told you they were really there. So far in this show all of the songs come off as flat. If there is any emotion in the characters faces or voices it seems forced (as if the director said "YOU MUST EMOTE"). A woman playing a transvestite that dresses like a woman seems a little off as well. Columbia can't tap dance, they try to cover it up with sound effects but it's very obvious she's not dancing. It's depressing to someone like myself that grew up with this show and actually went once dressed as Magenta (I'm a guy, a 50 year old guy) I think I'll turn this off and go dig up my old VHS and watch that. It's infinitely better.

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