Friday the 13th
Dir: Marcus Nispel
2009
**
At first I was quite pleased with what was an unnecessary but not necessarily unwelcome horror remake, as Marcus Nispel seemed to get rid of all the expected cliches within the first twenty minutes, leading me to wonder if this truly would be something new. Alas, this wasn't the case and the remake remained unnecessary, not to mention predictable, gratuitous and dull. Nispel can't seem to get The Texas Chainsaw Massacre out of his system as Jason seems a little too much like Leatherface for my liking and everything else is basically all the greatest hits from all the previous Jason films (of which there are few). Making the gore more realistic (rather than fun) and more in your face is not an improvement and nor is it a welcome revamp. As subtle as a fork in the eye but a little less entertaining. If Marcus Nispel was asked to make a romantic film it would probably be the most graphic hard-core porn film of all time and not in the least bit sexy. Enough with the remakes Mr Nispel, time to find a new career me thinks. Have you thought about going into advertising?

Conan the Barbarian
Dir: Marcus Nispel
2011
*
Conan the annoying, turns into Conan the irritating and then grows up to be Conan the Egotistical and Conan the unnecessarily violent. Violence has its place in film, and maybe I'm just getting old but it was relentless and tiresome and more than a little gratuitous. I know it was to be expected from a film like this but still, there is only so much one can take. The original was 80's cheese and all the better for it, this one takes itself far too seriously and fails because of it. Enough of the pointless remakes please Marcus Nispel!