Japanese sleeper hit 'One Cut of the Dead' gets a French makeover in a movie that never really becomes its own thing.
Remakes are hard, aren’t they? For most filmmakers, there are two realistic options: be extremely faithful to the original, or strike out and try and do something different. The latter option is undeniably the more creatively interesting of the two: that’s how we end up with films like Guadagnino’s Suspiria, or Sommers’ The Mummy, or even, for all their flaws, Zombie’s Halloween movies (say what you will, they try some stuff in those two). Sadly, the French remake of Japanese smash hit One Cut of the Dead takes the former option. Final Cut, from The Artist director Michel Hazanavicius, decides to play things extremely safe – much to its detriment. It plays out almost shot-for-shot like the original film, and doesn’t really do enough new of consequence to justify its existence.
The narrative of Final Cut is the same as the original Japanese film – which is strange, given the events of One Cut of the Dead (a film crew make a low-budget, one-take zombie movie in which a film crew making a zombie movie are attacked by zombies) are confirmed to have also taken place. This raises the question: isn’t it weird that all the things that went wrong when filming the Japanese flick also go wrong in the making of the French remake? It’s not a world-breaking question by any means, but it’s certainly one hell of a coincidence.
It's this that ties into the ultimate problem with Final Cut: what’s the point? What is this movie’s reason for being? Is it just to remake an Asian movie with a mostly white cast? There isn’t much else going on here, so… maybe? It’s very hard to say, because if you’ve seen the original One Cut, you’ve basically seen this (with the exception of a handful of gags). There’s very little that’s new or innovative about Hazanavicius’ film: nearly everything about it that’s good is from the original. It’d be very easy to sing its praises were it its own thing… but it isn’t. It’s a copy of something that did it better. That isn’t to say Final Cut is bad, because it’s not – it’s just that we’ve seen this exact film before, and a few positives won’t take away from that.
But hey, there are some positives, so let’s explore those. For one thing, the cast is incredible. Romain Duris is a particular standout as the fake film’s director, Rémi. There’s a real balance of intensity and humour to the role, and Duris attacks it with all his might – ferocious at times, funny at others. Bérénice Bejo also deserves a mention for her excellent turn as Nadia, wife of Rémi. This is perhaps the meatiest role in the original film, and Bejo is admittedly great in it. Also excellent is the wonderful Matilda Lutz, who’s no stranger to being covered in copious amounts of fake blood. It’s nice to see her in more of a comedic role here, and it’d be even nicer to see her in more movies going forward.
Everyone else in the film’s ensemble cast is good at what they’re doing, but, aside from Jean-Pascal Zadi, we’ve seen all these characters before. Zadi is a stellar addition to the cast as composer Fatih, a character not present in the Japanese version. Quite simply, he’s very funny, as his deadpan nature contrasts very well with Duris’ frantic, stressful way of tackling problems. It’s notable that this character is the only way in which the film decides to try something new, and he is probably its best element. If only the rest of the film had been quite so daring…
In all honesty, Final Cut is the strangest film I’ve reviewed in quite some time. It’s proven tricky not because it’s overly complicated, but because I haven’t been able to figure out why it was made in the first place. It’s not a bad film at all: there are some good gags here and there, the cast are incredible, and it’s definitely nice to look at (with a budget of €4m, it’s a hell of a lot more expensive than the film on which it’s based) – but there’s no real reason for anyone to watch this over One Cut of the Dead.
Despite this new version being nearly twenty minutes longer, the two films are virtually identical, which leaves it feeling like it’s missing something to differentiate itself properly. It certainly isn’t a bad movie in any way, but if you asked me which one I’d recommend to a new viewer, I’d undoubtedly point them in the direction of the Japanese original.
Signature Entertainment presents Final Cut on Digital Platforms 7th November.
Images courtesy of Signature Entertainment. All rights reserved.