10 Most Terrifying American Horror Movie Remakes

5. We Are What We Are (2013)

The Grudge Sarah Michelle Gellar
Entertainment One

After the sudden death of a family's patriarch, the surviving members are left at a loss and must find a way to continue an important family ritual in Mexican horror We Are What We Are. The ritual, it's soon revealed, involves cannibalism.

A few years later, the film was reimagined by filmmaking duo Jim Mickle and Nick Damici, who shifted the events from a grimy Mexico City to a rainy upstate New York. The result is a gruesome gothic horror that put a new spin on the premise.

This time it's the mother who passes and the daughters (Ambyr Childers and Julia Garner) are the ones left to continue their mother's macabre duty of preparing a meal for a sacred ritual.

Whereas the original presented viewers with a strange and frightening scenario that's never really explained, this interpretation places the cannibalism directly within a religious context. Combined with the family's Puritan appearance juxtaposed with their brutal violence, the film subverts the image of traditional American values to bone-crunching effect.

Led by a phenomenal cast and brimming with stomach-churning gore guaranteed to put you off dinner, this remake is one of those rare examples of an improvement over the original.

Contributor
Contributor

Glasgow-based cinephile who earned a Masters degree in film studies to spend their time writing about cinema, video games, and horror.