‘Road House’ Review

The original Road House is not a “good” film. It is certainly a memorable film; an iconic film; a bizarrely entertaining film. But it is not a good film. It epitomized 80’s hyper-machismo and quickly became an infamous cult classic. What then does a remake stand to gain from adapting it? Should a remake take the outrageousness of the original and push it even further like 1983’s Scarface? Should it take a more stylized approach like Soderbergh’s Ocean’s Eleven? Should the remake be grounded and treated with more gravitas like the Coen’s True Grit? Doug Liman’s Road House does none of these things, instead sanding down all the unique edges of the 1989 original.

Our new Dalton, this time played by Jake Gyllenhaal, finds himself in such dire circumstances at the start of our story as Patrick Swayze did. He is a washed-up UFC fighter, making ends meet by scaring off combatants on the underground circuit. He is ready to end it all and park his car in front of an oncoming train when he meets Frankie (Jessica Williams). She hires him to clean up her rowdy roadhouse, which so happens to be called ‘The Road House’… what was wrong with ‘Double Deuce’? Dalton heads to the Florida Keys to take the task head-on, but soon finds himself in the middle of a feud between ‘The Road House’ and businessman Ben Brandt (Billy Magnussen).

The updates to the original’s setting and plot are fine changes, however, the plot of the 1989 film wasn’t that version’s hook. The original picture had a pretty basic setup for an 80’s movie, and as such this film feels dated in 2024 by comparison. What helps Road House 89 stand out is its cartoonish writing and dialogue. Liman’s version is played relatively straight; everyone is taking this very seriously. That is to the movie’s detriment as the majority of the picture is pretty boring. Gyllenhaal is doing his best to make the most of things though, and he does have a natural charisma in the role that keeps your attention. I found the majority of the rest of the cast pretty uninspiring. There is one glaring exception.

Conor McGregor struts into this movie as if he wandered onto the wrong set. It is such an unhinged performance that I could not look away anytime he was on screen. He has a goofy smirk etched onto his face the entire movie, and he walks around like a bear on its hind legs. He would have fit right in with the original movie, so I’m not sure how well the tone of this project was indicated to him. That said, he lends the action scenes a lot of actual weight and realism.

I found myself pretty underwhelmed by Road House for most of its runtime. There is some promise early on with Gyllenhaal’s Dalton embodying the “be nice” mantra of the character in an interesting new way- the potential there goes unrealized very quickly. Even the majority of the action scenes early on left me wanting more. They’re shot in a way that undercuts the violence and impact. Also, Dalton’s romantic subplot with Ellie (Daniela Melchior) felt like it was there by obligation. In all honesty, she could have been cut from the movie entirely with minimum impact on the story.

All this said though, somewhere along the line it felt like Road House realized what it’s supposed to be. With about forty minutes left, something happens that flips a switch in Dalton (much like in the original) and it’s as if a switch is flipped in the movie as well. Suddenly, the movie seems to become self-aware and it delivers on the promise of an adrenaline-fueled update on the original. It all culminates in a pretty fun brawl. It’s a shame that the entire movie isn’t as unhinged as the ending.

Doug Liman has been quoted as saying that this may be his best film. He was disappointed that the movie didn’t see a wide theatrical release, it was instead sent straight to streaming. I sympathize with the sentiment, but it feels pretty at home in this format. The film feels less like a daring remake in the vein of some of the other films I mentioned at the start of this review. It feels more like a direct-to-video sequel. The type of release we’d see in the 90’s and 00’s, a ‘sequel’ that only shares a concept with the original but is less ambitious in every way… a de-make.