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Get Carter (2000)

Rate: 3
Viewed: 7/14, 5/22

Carter2
7/14: "The Truth Hurts" is the tagline for the 2000 version of Get Carter.

Hm...okay, then. I shall follow that advice. A prime candidate for Worst Film of the Year, Get Carter has nothing on the original. It's not so much of a rip-off but a complete remake and a bad one at that. Two classic lines are ripped-off from the British masterpiece: the color of the eyes and what Carter does for full time.

Sylvester Stallone is so atrocious that his ever-paralyzed face is incapable of displaying human emotion. In fact, I still haven't gotten over the sight of his nasty veins in The Specialist. Once again, he shows them to my displeasure. So, it's safe to say Stallone's thespic abilities have been long dead. He hasn't turned in a good performance since 1997 when he did Cop Land.

With the exception of the bored-looking Mickey Rourke, it appears everybody, especially John C. McGinley, is speedballing. The direction, the camera work, the editing, the acting, and the script are chaotic and frenzied. What the 1971 brutal British masterpiece had the remake doesn't have is subtlety. One particular scene in the original, which is a stroke of genius, is when Michael Caine's Jack Carter witnessed something that would be instantly crystal clear. Yet when the same moment was replicated in the remake, it's obviously and blatantly done in a forced way. Stallone meeting up with Caine to settle matters is awful, too.

Meanwhile, it's painful to hear the lines uttered by the characters. They all sound stupid and corny. What plot? There isn't any. Finally, shame on Michael Caine for agreeing to star in the remake. In the name of Joseph N. Welch, has he left no sense of decency? Does he have any shred of integrity?

All in all, the remake of Get Carter shouldn't have been green-lit in the first place.

5/22: Why did Get Carter have to be remade?

The British original was already a masterpiece. Hence, they should've left it alone. At least, to my satisfaction, the remake grossed $19 million against a budget of $64 million. Michael Caine's decision to appear proves to be as equally bad as taking on Jaws: The Revenge to collect a paycheck. I honestly can see him reprising the role of Jack Carter, even if he's old-looking despite coming back from the dead. Meanwhile, I don't see how Michael Caine, as Brumby, fits into the plot.

Well, well, well...Sylvester Stallone certainly looks finished. There are two famous lines lifted from the classic, and when he says them, I can only cringe. To be outdone in the bad acting department is Rachael Leigh Cook. Who cares about her? And stop chain smoking for once! She doesn't look cool doing it. I should say the same thing for John C. McGinley, but he's been acting like a jackass for a long time anyway. Mickey Rourke is terrible, too. The only question I have is: why are he and Stallone so leather-looking?

All in all, when Sylvester Stallone agreed to do the remake, his Victory co-star Michael Caine should've asked him point-blank: "Do you want to be dead, Sly?"