6/15/04 "The Stepford Wives" vs. "The Stepford Wives"

After an exhaustive search, I finally came up with a copy of the original "Stepford Wives", with Katharine Ross, by pure dumb luck. I called West Coast and they said it was in...except I went there and it wasn't. I called Blockbuster and they said it was in...but I went there and it wasn't. So I went on chance to Video to Go, and lo and behold, it was there. The lesson here? MAKE THEM GO AND CHECK THE SHELF, AND IF IT AIN'T THERE, IT AIN'T THERE. So, let's compare, shall we? First, my take on the new "remake". BEWARE THE PERFECT SPOILERS.

Notes From the Red Book

6/15/04- "The Stepford Wives"

trailers-"Wimbledon", "Vanity Fair", "Alexander", "The Manchurian Candidate"

cool retro opening, women ecstatic over appliances

man, she's already like a Stepford TV exec.

Nicole has brown hair...that's new

Stepford's a GATED town? creepy

uh...scary house

Geez, exercise group sounds like an AA meeting

"Clairobics"

funny gay couple

remote control inflatable boobs

"Are you making anthrax?"

boy, video games, beer...it's a man nirvana

"Let's celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ with yarn!"

ATM woman

Orlando Bloom! Viggo!!!!

men from Microsoft, NASA, Disney

eeewwww....NO eyes, just sockets.

interesting twist on ending

perfect doesn't work...yeah

Ok...this move isn't so much of a remake as I would say more of a spin off. Well, I don't know if spin off is the right word I'm looking for either, but these were two COMPLETELY different movies. The new "Stepford Wives" has Nicole Kidman as Joanna Eberhart, a harsh TV executive who's practically plastic already. She specializes in reality TV shows, the really crappy ones my mother gets guilty pleasure from, like Temptation Island. (Let me go off on a rant for a second and say, GOD, has reality TV gone into the toilet. I still love Survivor, of course, and I can be persuaded to watch the occasional Fear Factor or Amazing Race, but DAMN. Let's watch women whore themselves for money on national TV. Let's watch people humiliate themselves for money on national TV. Let's watch people get plastic surgery so they can look like the star of their choice on national TV?!? God has turned his face away, ladies and gentlemen. Ok, I'm done.) Anyway, she suffers a nervous breakdown when she is fired, and her husband moves the family to Stepford to chill out. At first Joanna is intrigued, and thinks that this may be just what she needs to be a better wife and mother...but she begins to be wary when first her gay friend Roger, then her slobby friend Bobbie, become "Stepfordized". Finally Joanna realizes her time is up, and she must think of a way out or spend the rest of her days "Squeezing the Charmin".

The movie was all right, I guess. I liked Bette Midler, even if she did come off as more annoying that Paula Prentiss' version in the original. Bette was loudmouthed and rude, Paula was sassy and brassy. Glenn Close was so over the top as the matriarch Stepford Wife Claire, I thought she was going to fall off the screen into the front row or explode or something. She looked like she had plastic surgery to get such a wide smile. Christopher Walken as Mike was just...Christopher Walken. He's the same in every role...with a few exceptions. Oh my gosh...I just remembered seeing Glenn Close and Christopher Walken together in the "Sarah Plain and Tall" movies...wow. That's quite a head rush...this was quite different. Huh. Anyway. Matthew Broderick was unremarkable, except I remember thinking he was a lot less weeny than the trailer made him out to be.

Now, in the original, Katharine Ross played Joanna, a fairly ordinary woman who has a photography hobby. Her husband moves the family (Mary Stuart Masterson as her daughter!) to Stepford, and Joanna is mainly bored. She meets Bobbie and Charmaine (Tina Louise-Ginger from Gilligan's Island! Oh, and have you heard about THAT reality show? Don't get me started.) who are very bored with the other wives also. They are all very soft spoken, polite, and obsessed with cleaning. But after a weekend away, the women begin to change, one by one. Joanna is at first nervous and confused, which gives way to irrational and paranoid. The ending is chilling.

Ok...the new version...ok. Not great. And not one of Frank Oz's best, either. That belongs to "Bowfinger". Someone should've told him, "Eh, Frank, leave that one alone. How about The Bad News Bears? That'd be a funny remake!" (I personally would LOVE to see Frank remake some old Neil Simon films like "Barefoot in the Park" or "Califonia Suite" or something like that, but I digress yet again) I admit, when I first heard Frank Oz was remaking the Stepford Wives, I just couldn't picture it. I was all...but Frank Oz makes FUNNY movies. I think he tried too hard. It had funny moments, and it had moments that were supposed to be creepy, but really weren't because the whole feel of the movie wasn't creepy, it was just satirical. The movie also focused less on "There's something wrong in the town of Stepford", and more on "There's something high-tech in the town of Stepford." Everything was about computers...smart houses, etc. One of the women could spit out money like an ATM, which made a gaping plot hole if they were all controlled by brain chips like it was stated. And the robot dog was just dumb. It looked like the AOL man's dog.

The original movie, even thought it feels dated due to raging feminism subplots, was chilling, because it starts out feeling like such a normal film. Even when Joanna starts feeling like something's not right, that's all you feel, too. Hmmm...something's not right. The scene where Joanna visits a therapist and breaks down saying "She'll look like me and talk like me, but she won't take pictures and she won't be ME," is creepy. And the end scene where she comes face to face with her robotic clone and it moves towards her, smiling peacefully, clutching a stocking in a very threatening way...then the sharp cut to the supermarket....yeah, that's creepy.

So, while some remakes can be done very well, ie "Father of the Bride, The Parent Trap", most should just be LEFT ALONE, like this one should have been LEFT ALONE. Sorry, Frank. Loved "Housesitter" tho. And "In and Out". And you're my favorite Blues Brothers cameo. Just...don't do remakes, ok? Leave it to the Myers-Shyer crowd.

So yeah...skip this movie, rent the original instead. If you can find it, that is!

Until the next time, this is Sarah saying, "Perfect definitely DOESN'T work." Thank God.