Film: Stepfather Joins the H-Wood Regurgitation Parade

Dylan Walsh: Not only not my real father...not even my real stepfather!

Just last week I was having dinner with my lovely wife and a few friends at my mother's apartment and talk turned, naturally enough, to the 1987 Joseph Ruben Directed b-thriller The Stepfather. Friend George, like myself, is a big fan of the Terry O' Quinn (Locke from Lost) starrer about a teenage girl (Jill Schoelen) who starts to suspect that the law and order family guy who's swept Mom (Shelley Hack) off her feet may be a serial family killer. George pointed out (quite rightly) the subversive Reagen-era commentary inherent in O'Quinn's ultra-tough love performance.

Well wouldn't you know the green minded folks in Hollywood have finally gotten around to recycling The Stepfather -- This time starring Nip/Tuck's Dylan Walsh as the stepfather and Sela Ward as mom. It's directed by...oh who cares. Really is there such a dearth of ideas in the world that we have to go to second string 80's films for remakes? The thing that really tees me off about this is when I'm cruising through my cable guide and I see Bad News Bears and I'm all psyched for some Walter Matthau and boom! It's Billy Bob Thornton. Oh The Hitcher's on, maybe I'm in time to see Jennifer Jason Leigh tied between a tractor and its trailer and who wouldn't want to torture C. Thomas Howell but...oh crap it's a bunch of actors I could care less about. Seriously Hollywood -- before I have to turn on Cinemax to see The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai starring Sean William Scott and Sophia Bush -- stop the madness!

Here's the trailer for the real Stepfather: