Ryan Kruger, the director of the 2024 remake, took James M. Muro’s 1987 horror classic and potentially did it better. “Street Trash” is a 1987 horror classic that is gruesome and has hidden political messaging. Ryan Kruger kept both in his remaster of the film. The 2024 film had a corrupt government that caused a decline in the middle class, which resulted in homeless people at every street corner. The corrupt government decided to resolve the surging homelessness by creating a bioweapon. The bio weapon in the 2024 remake was gas that once inhaled caused the individual to melt from the inside. However, in the 1987 film, the bioweapon viper was found in an old box by a liquor store owner. Rather than being created by the government to intentionally dispose of the homeless population, the liquor store owner did not know viper would be lethal. In the original film viper was a drink, which the store owner decided to sell to the local homeless for $1.
The 2024 film had a cruel government conducting inhumane experiments in order to create the bioweapon. The political message is that throughout history, countless corrupt governments have conducted inhumane experiments for the purpose of bioweapons and medicine, which is unforgivable. Despite the majority of our world eliminating human experimentation, it still exists and when it is not humans, countless animals have suffered for medical advancement. With the continuously decreasing economy and down talk of homelessness throughout the 2024 film, it provides another message of cruel social hierarchy based on wealth. Too often, the media portrays homeless and financially struggling individuals as sub-humans. The 2024 film gave a different perspective of homeless people being social and forming communities. In the 2024 film, the homeless discover the corrupt government’s plan to massacre all of them, so they band together for a final battle for their survival.
In “Street Trash,” 2024 the president was in office for 8 years and was running for re-election. In the entire film, no other candidate was mentioned through news or advertisements, which is strange considering the economic downfall under his power. That shows how corrupt of a government it is since no one can have a differing opinion unless they want to face punishment. The lethal punishment is the bioweapon, but the penalty prior to that is being beaten by the president’s police force. No military is ever mentioned in the film, but that is likely because the police department serves like one. The 2024 film’s police department is corrupt and beats the homeless then captures them for human experiments. This also establishes a political message that police brutality does exist and the film shows how people who live in corrupt countries suffer.
The most significant difference between both films is the difference in content. The 1987 film had way more offensive content such as sexual assault, rape, necrophilia, etc. The 2024 remake is undoubtedly more lighthearted and has likable characters with whom the audience forms empathy, while the 1987 film doesn’t build its characters enough, which makes it hard to form connections. Debating if the 1987 or 2024 version is the better film is subjective, however, both films are good and should be watched.
