I just re-watched John Carpenter’s “The Fog” again the other night. I wasn’t even five when it originally hit theaters back in 1980, but it is still one of those pictures, for one reason or another, sticks in my mind. Carpenter certainly fills the screen with indelible images and bristling disconcerting suspense. While it isn’t remotely perfect (and it’s clear listening to his and Debra Hill’s audio commentary on the DVD they agree) the movie is an elegant and effective ghost story that only seems to have gotten better with time.

But remaking it isn’t the worst idea I’ve ever heard. While the bones of the story are strong (small coastal burg Antonio Bay discovers during their anniversary town fathers were responsible for murdering the passengers of the Elizabeth Dane, wealthy leprosy victims looking for a quiet place to settle down, and stealing their gold to make Antonio Bay a thriving success – a century later their ghosts come out of the fog looking for revenge), there was definitely room for improvement. Room, that is, unless you are director Rupert Wainwright and screenwriter Cooper Layne, the minds responsible for such cinematic wonders as “Stigmata” and “The Core.” If you’re them, you take “The Fog” backwards, discarding the things Carpenter’s film embraced like subtlety, character development (played by actors who actually looked their parts and not by WB and ABC matinee idols) and pacing, and in their place crafting a movie so transparent it almost doesn’t exist.

The studio certainly didn’t have faith in their work. When a major Hollywood studio cancels press previews, it’s usually a bad sign. When they cancel all previews and don’t show it to anyone, that’s an even worse sign. Of course, the funny thing in this case is, although Sony Pictures did just that with “The Fog” (and while the picture certainly isn’t any good), it’s nowhere near the disaster these events usually signal. Technically well made and offering one (just one, don’t expect any more) good adrenalized jolt, this remake isn’t anything to be too ashamed of. Heck, the studio screened both “The Boogeyman” and “The Cave,” two horror films so bad I’m still having nightmares about sitting through them.

Not that any of this should be construed as a recommendation. Except for a few nice touches here and there (most notably Graeme Revell’s delicately eerie Carpenter-like score and Nathan Hope’s smoothly lush cinematography), “The Fog” is certainly worth passing on. Both Tom Welling (whose character, in a nice homage, is named Nick Castle) and Maggie Grace, while perfectly lovely and attractive, should stick to their respective television careers. Selma Blair, doing her best Adrienne Barbeau impersonation (and doing it badly), should hire a new agent for getting her a part in this, while poor Rade Serbedzija looks plain embarrassed to have to mug his way around the screen as menacing phantom killer Blake.

But the real pain is all inflicted by director Wainwright and screenwriter Layne. “Stigmata” already proved that the former didn’t know how to generate suspense (at least, not with subtlety, which is what an effective ghost story needs), this picture only cements what we all already knew. Even Hitchcock, though, would have had trouble creating anything other than laughs with Layne’s script. In his world, little things like cohesiveness, continuity and common sense plot progression apparently do not exist, it far more important to pile cliché upon cliché in some psychotically bizarre experiment to discover how many a single 100-minute movie can actually handle.

So “The Fog,” all spanking new and digitally enhanced for a new millennium with younger, fresher faces and a teen-friendly PG-13 rating, turns out to be almost as bad an idea for a horror film as anything else that’s already sucked this year. If I don’t hate it, or find myself spewing a few more insults, it’s either because I was actually happily surprised to see at least a few moments of genuine restraint or because I’ve already had my senses bludgeoned to death by 2005’s far more heinous features. I’m going to admit – and hope I’m right – to the former reason and then plead the fifth on the second. Either way, give it a week or two and it’s a sure bet “The Fog” will already have disappeared from theaters along with the morning dew.