The Crazies (2010)

The Crazies is a 2010 American science fiction horror film directed by Breck Eisner, with a screenplay from Scott Koser and Ray Wright. It stars Timothy Oliphant and Radha Mitchell and is a remake of the 1973 remake with George A. Romero, who wrote and directed the original.

Plot
The film focuses on a fictional Iowa town that becomes afflicted by a military virus that appears after a plane crash, which turns those infected into violent killers.

Cast

 * Timothy Olyphant as David
 * Radha Mitchell as Judy
 * Joe Anderson as Russell
 * Danielle Panabaker as Becca
 * Christie Lynn Smith as Deardra Farnum
 * Brett Rickaby as Bill Farnum
 * Preston Bailey as Nicholas
 * John Aylward as Mayor Hobbs
 * Joe Reegan as Pvt. Billy Babcock

Production
The film was first announced to be in development at Paramount Pictures in 2004. After putting the project in turnaround, Rogue Pictures picked up the film, with the director and writers being announced. The film was later moved to Overture Films months later. Much of the film was shot in central Georgia, and Lenox, Iowa, with settings including the Georgia National Fairgrounds and Priester's Pecans in Perry, Georgia, the Fountain Car Wash in Macon, Georgia, areas in Dublin, Georgia, Peach County High School in Fort Valley, Georgia, and areas of Cordele, Georgia (the truck stop used during filming is an old TravelCenters of America site). The film was produced and distributed by Overture Films. The special effects were created by Robert Green Hall. Actress Lynn Lowry, a star from the original film, makes a cameo in the remake billed as "Woman on Bike".

Makeup
The makeup for the film was designed by Almost Human Studios; they also did makeup for other horror films such as Quarantine, Frankenfish, and Prom Night. Director Breck Eisner's early visions of the infected were zombies. He and the makeup crew made many molds and sketches of the infected, with deformities and skin sloughing. Eventually, he grew tired of the cliche "zombie" look, and went with a realistic "go under the skin," in which the blood vessels appear to be bursting forth and face and neck muscles and tendons tight and wrought. Eisner described this look as "hyper alive."

The director's one and only rule for the makeup design -- they research in medical books and consult medical professionals for the design of the infected. Lead make-up artist Rob Hall said "If we were to pitch something to Breck, about, if you know, one side of his face should look like this, Breck would immediately want to know what disease it came from, and what version of reality it could be implemented into Trixie. But the most important thing was to make sure it felt real. Make it feel like you could get it, too." The basis of the makeup the crew used was mainly rabies, tetanus, and Stevens–Johnson syndrome.

Each "Crazy" design had about twenty-one sections requiring over three hours to apply for the final effect seen in the film. Robert stated the final effect in the film seen was not just the makeup, but the lighting, camera angles, and post-production effects. The theme for the design was "stress." He stated he wanted the "Crazies" to look stressed. The veins and eyes were the main focus of the design. The contact lenses covered the actors' entire eyes and required eye-drops every five minutes to reduce injuries.

Release
The film premiered on February 24, 2010 in Los Angeles and received a wide release in the North America on February 26, 2010. The film opened at #3 behind Cop Out and Shutter Island with $16 million. By May 2010, the film has grossed an estimated $50 million worldwide. The Canadian DVD and Blu-ray Disc were released June 29, 2010. The DVD and Blu-ray Disc + Digital Copy combo pack was released in the North America on June 29, 2010 and in the UK on July 19.

Reception
On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a rating of 71% based on 148 reviews and an average rating of 6.4/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Tense, nicely shot, and uncommonly intelligent, The Crazies is a horror remake that, unusually, works." On Metacritic, which assigns a rating to reviews, the film has an average score of 55 out of 100, based on 30 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B–" on an A+ to F scale.

Michael Phillips of The Chicago Tribune awarded the film 3½ stars of 4, adding he "greatly prefer this cleverly sustained and efficiently relentless remake to the '73 edition. It is lean and simple." Eric M. Armstrong of The Moving Arts Film Journal states "The Crazies is a solid B-movie and one of the few remakes surpassing the original." Ty Burr of The Boston Globe gave the film 3/4 stars touting the film as "extremely solid stuff – about as good as you could hope from a B-movie re-tread." Variety film critic Dennis Harvey states it "emerges an above-average genre piece equal parts horror-meller and doomsday action thriller".

However, Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly graded the film a C, adding "I don't care how this premise is dressed, we saw it a jillion times." Mike Hale of The New York Times states "The filmmakers seem so determined to make a serious respectable horror movie, they have only the bare minimum of fun." Amy Biancolli, writing for San Francisco Chronicle states the re-make "boasts less of the plot and fewer characters than the original, but the hairdos are spiffier and the special effects graduated from cheapo stage blood to the extravagant gross-outs horror audiences expect."

At the People's Choice Awards, the film was nominated for Favorite Horror Movie.