The Ladykillers is the Cohen Brothers worst film. Its even worse than original movie. While the first film was a boring collection of unfunny situations, the remake is an awful collection of unfunny situations that eventfully gets boring.
Although the setting is changed from England to the American South, the basic story is the same: a bunch of criminals hide out in the house of an eccentric old lady (here played by Irma P. Hall) while they plot a robbery. What has changed however, is the tone: the original had a classic British understatement to it, here the Cohens are going for an all out farce. The problem is that what is presented is so disconnected from reality that theres nothing to care about. The first film was not a good movie, but its characters, (particularly Peter Sellers) were appealing. Every character in this film is such a cartoon that it gets grating watching them.
The Cohens are going for a Dr. Strangelove style of humor where absurd things are presented seriously. The reason why Kubricks film worked and this film doesnt is that a nuclear conflict is an inherently serious situation, which this isnt. Although Hall is does well in her part, Tom Hanks is miscast in the Alec Guiness role from the original. Hanks is unbeatable when he is playing an average Joe Everyman (clearly the heir to Jimmy Stewart), but he does not have the range to play such a broadly comic character (Hanks also went disastrously wrong when he tried to play a tough gangster in Road to Perdition). The other actors are effective in their one-note characters, but no one is allowed to do anything substantive.
On top of all this the fact that aside from a few amusing one liners the film is not funny at all. Even beyond that, the film goes into some dangerous racial stereotypes, as in the janitor played by Marlon Waynes. I dont think that the Cohen Brothers are racist, but the films is so wrongheaded that it comes off that way.
The Ladykillers is a complete disaster-even the curious should stay away. It was hard for me to believe that the same people who made Blood Simple, Barton Fink, Fargo and O Brother Where Art Thou could have made this.
The Ladykillers (2004)