Rest easy, 2012’s The Amazing Spider-Man: No longer are you the most needless remake/reboot in cinema history. You’ve been usurped by the squishy new version of Cabin Fever.
I get that when Eli Roth’s original infected the mainstream in 2002, members of the new movie’s target audience were still voiding into Pull-Ups, but that first film hasn’t aged; it’s not like it has become irrelevant to the point of unwatchable. I’m on the record as an all-in fan of Roth’s breakthrough project, yet I approached this clone by Scavengers’ Travis Zariwny with curiosity trumping trepidation.
Like damn near everything in it, the story remains the same: Five 20-somethings on vacation in the woods become most unhappy campers when a killer virus infiltrates the local yokels’ water supply and spreads like creamy peanut butter. Except for an end-credit stinger that makes no sense, Zariwny’s additions are minute and of no consequence: selfies, hip-hop tunes, references to gamer culture, upgraded firearms, more explicit couplings and gorier renditions of the original’s most notorious pair of gross-outs: the shaving and the fingering scenes.
The biggest departure is the gender flip of supporting character Deputy Winston; whereas Detroit Rock City’s Giuseppe Andrews was a hoot in the 2002 role, Louise Linton (The Echo) is stunningly awful. Even with the same dialogue, she’s not the least bit funny. Overall, the movie’s loss of Roth’s perverse humor proves its biggest drawback; here, a vomited geyser of blood is no longer a punchline.
At least Zariwny solves the mystery of the meaning behind “Pancakes!” and throws in an audiovisual tip of the hat to Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining — neither enough to warrant a recommendation. The new Cabin Fever is not a bad film; it can be enjoyed. It’s just wholly unwarranted. Why choose it when Roth’s movie is still alive and kicking? There’s a word that encapsulates the entire endeavor: Why? —Rod Lott