The Crazies (2010)

Directed by Breck Eisner. Starring Timothy Olyphant, Radha Mitchell, Joe Anderson, Danielle Panabaker, Christine Lynn Smith, Brett Rickaby, John Aylward, Preston Bailey, Joe Regan, Justin Miles. [R]

Lean, mean redo of George Romero’s underappreciated 1973 sci-fi/horror opus of a military virus accidentally being spread among the populace of a small town, which causes the citizens to behave in abnormal (even homicidal) ways. Olyphant stars as the sheriff who tries to figure out what’s causing all the “craziness,” eventually leads a small party in trying to escape the doomed borough (the action has been moved from Pennsylvania to Iowa, but it’s a relatively unnoticeable change in scenery). This retread is short on originality or ingenuity, but gets the job done; slightly above-average as far as apocalyptic zombie melodramas go (they may not technically be zombies, but that’s splitting hairs…or skulls), but it does too little to separate itself from the pack for there to be any resonance. Best bits are the early scenes when the strange goings-on can’t easily be explained, and later, the car wash from hell. Lynn Lowry, who had a supporting role in the original, has a brief cameo here.

61/100