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I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this movie but, since it was starring James McAvoy and since it was available on Netflix, I thought I might as well check it out. I actually saw the Danish version with my film club in the movie theatre and, to be honest, even if it was not bad at all, it didn’t really blow me away so I have to admit that I was rather sceptical about this US remake. On the other hand, it was definitely an intriguing story and the idea of James McAvoy playing this character was really cool so it still could work. Something that did bother me with the original version was that the Danish couple was just so tedious and spineless, I just never really cared for them at all. At least, with Mackenzie Davis and Scoot McNairy, they did get some really charismatic actors this time around, even if this couple still remained spineless but it was also the whole point of this story. Something I was really missing with this remake was the culture clash aspect. Indeed, in the Danish version, it was dealing with a Danish couple going to a foreign country (the Netherlands) to visit a Dutch couple so everything felt strange and alien for them. However, this aspect was here completely downplayed as I didn’t feel such a huge cultural gap between this US couple who already lived in the UK for a while and this British couple. Basically, there was one boring regular couple and a more unconventional seemingly free couple but the whole cultural aspect was actually pretty much gone which was too bad. The main attraction here was obviously James McAvoy who was basically born to play such unhinged psychos but, to be honest, I think I actually preferred Fedja van Huêt. Indeed, I believed he brought more nuances to his character. To be honest, it was never clear why Ben and Louise were interested in Paddy and his family since they didn’t have anything in common. This aspect was also better developed in the Danish version as van Huêt was often weird but also very often actually really fun and charming. Finally, they obviously completely changed the ending and, this time, this US boring regular couple of course had to prevail so the whole message that middle-class people are just so polite and boring that they might cause their doom was obviously completely lost here. Eventually, I think the only real issue was that it came too fast after the original version (only 2 years) and a bigger gap between the two movies would have been nice. Anyway, I have to admit that it was still a decent watch.
6/10
