The Guilty: A Unremarkable and forgettable remake.

spoilers ahead for both original and the remake, I would advise you would watch either one of them before reading this, preferably the original)

Rob Ryan

The Guilty is a remake of the brutal and excellent Danish film of the same name directed by Gustav Moller, which was one of the best films of 2018 and was undeservedly snubbed at all western award ceremonies for best foreign film. As with everyone else who had already been introduced to such an astonishing piece of work, my initial reaction to this remake was one of eye-roll along with a depressed sigh. Remakes are not bad on their own. Some of our favourite films are either remakes or at the very least influenced on some level by another source material. When it comes to Hollywood remakes of foreign language films however, there is no way you're going to get something that isn't a watered-down version of what already existed. Why watch something safe and standard when something so original and innovative with a unique identity of its own is already ready and waiting to be viewed by people outside of its country of origin?

Due to this being an American version of a Danish film, there are some notable changes in the setting and character. Instead of Copenhagen, we have Los Angeles, and instead of Asgar Holm (Jakob Cedergren) here we have Joe Baylor (Jake Gyllenhaal) who is the most irresponsible and bad-tempered 911 operator who has ever existed in film history, a man so rude to his fellow officers and callers that he would be more than perfect for the American police force. When it comes to helping people in their time of need through phone, on the other hand, there is no way he would last no more than a week in this line of work.

One day, a wildfire is raging in the mountains, law enforcement and rescue services are too busy dealing with the situation. When confined to his desk while desperate people phone for help, Joe receives a phone call, not from a wildfire victim, but from a distressed woman who's been abducted by her ex-husband. The woman's name is Emily. (Riley Keough) at first, she speaks to Joe like she's talking to her daughter. This is to disguise the fact that she's phoning for help from the husband who remains oblivious to what she's doing.

The race is on to find the white van that she's being held in which during a wildfire with dust and smoke everywhere and officers set on other duties might be very hard to accomplish. As Joe becomes more and more absorbed in this case, researching details about the people involved and even managing to phone their place of residence and speak to their 6-year-old daughter, he learns that this case is not as black and white as he thought and he even explores his inner demons in the process.

This remake comes from Antoine Fuqua who despite being a competent filmmaker with some decent action flicks in his resume, is not only a workmanlike director but is faced with a tough challenge, to make a tense flick in a limited and enclosed space. This is hard to do as his films achieve in being big and showy as possible, something that is the complete opposite of the "less means more" mode of filmmaking that is used so well in the original. Despite this and my general annoyance of the existence of this film, I still went in with an open mind, while there is no way an American remake of a successful foreign film is never going to achieve what was accomplished, sometimes in rare cases, American remakes end up either being more memorable than their successors (I.e Some Like it Hot, The Departed) or end up being as memorable (I.e The Ring, Ringu) This is down to some innovative changes that manage to make the remake it's own thing and giving an extra dimension to the original that people may have not considered before, so was Fuqua able to achieve this?

Well his version is a little different in a few ways, for one, setting this in LA during a wildfire provides some dramatic tension, as LA is a heavily policed city a case such as a kidnapping would probably be dealt with much sooner, however with a natural disaster as chaotic as a wildfire, not only are most police drawn away from their normal duties to deal with regular crimes, the dust and smoke produced makes visibility much harder to identify specific details such as the colour of a vehicle or a licence plate, so when Joe calls first responders and highway patrols to pursue the white van, it becomes a near-impossible task.

Secondly, the reveal of Joe's killing of a 19-year-old man on duty much like the twist in the original is applied very well within the American setting given its troubled history of police violence under the guise of justice. When Joe learns of the horrific death of Emily's baby, much like Asgar in the original, impulsively phones Henry the husband (Peter Skarsgard) telling him he should be executed, this is pure projection coming from Joe and shows the anger in him that lead to him playing judge, jury and executioner, something that the system that he partakes in allows him to do without a second thought. To use this moral ambiguity to confront the American police system makes you think about those themes in the first film in a wider context.

Lastly, the use of low angle establishing shots of the events taking place through phone providing a visual aid for what's happening is fairly effective without sacrificing the claustrophobia of the original. While they are not as utilised as I would have liked, they at least made the film feel different.

Beyond that, however, this is pretty standard stuff. While those who haven't seen the original might be captivated by this, for those who have, it's a fairly bland experience that occasionally intrigues due to its changes but not enough to justify it for being, and while the themes as mentioned earlier are still timely, it's not something you can give this version credit for.

The problem's start with Fuqua's direction, which abandons the original's minimalism and social realism in favour of extreme crying closeup's, intrusive music score and slow-motion shots that are fairly nice to look at but ultimately make the film feel fake and dramatised. It constantly reminds you that you are watching a movie and not desperate people trying to solve a situation, which goes to show that his best strength is anything other than small enclosed spaces.

Then there's Gyllenhaal, there is no doubt that he's a fine actor and I don't have a problem with his performance, (although them close-ups of him crying without tear's is a little distracting) But his character's behavioural changes don't ring true and are completely unearned. Asgar's transition from a calm and collect man to an angry man bent on revenge makes sense given what he learns in this case, here, on the other hand, as soon as Joe learns of the kidnapping, he immedelty retorts to bashing his desk and shouting at fellow officers when he learns they can't reach her cause of the fire or there is not enough info to pursue the van. It makes him come across as extremely unlikeable rather than someone flawed and complex.

The movie also reveals Joe's upcoming trial too quickly and leans too heavily on it for five minutes at a time when that time could have been dedicated to tension building. The film takes a few detours to detail Joe's predicament in the middle of the case before jumping the viewer right back to the film's narrative and these moment's ruin any sort of tension and makes the film feel somewhat unfocused.

In The Guilty (2018) the reveal happens near the third act, this is appropriate as this plot point is revealed in small details before the hour mark, at that point, your belief of Asgar is questioned while also keeping the film consistent with the central focus, here not only do we get some tension deflating detours, our protagonist starts as an asshole and ends an asshole who is going to jail and any attempt to give him any layers is resort to reveal that in the most predictable Hollywood movie trope ever to make its male character redeemable, revealing he has a wife and daughter. All of these things make the film feel cheap when the original didn't need to do any of this and gained so much more from so little.

As suspected from the initial reactions of the film's announcement, The Guilty (2021) while doing some things well, really doesn't do much to justify its existence and no amount of talent involved could have ever made this come close to be anything other than a passable experience. After only seeing this film a few day's ago it's only just starting to fade away from memory whereas the original stayed with me for at least a week. This is yet another nail in the coffin for American remakes and perfectly exemplifies the classic saying, "If it ain't broke...don't fix it"

Rating: 2.5/5

The Guilty is out in limited release now and will be released on Netflix on Friday.