Great films you just can't re-make

i'm always curious with THE ROCKETEER... i'm not sure if it can be re-maked in a different touch coz that was a classic...

They probably will re-make To Kill A Mockingbird in the near future.

Dirty Harry.

__________________
100 Favourites From The Future: REWIRED

I haven't seen many pre 1980 movies but i think some modern classics such as The Green Mile should never be remade.

Nooooooooooooooooooo

__________________
Health is the greatest gift, contentment the greatest wealth, faithfulness the best relationship.
Buddha

as a huge wizard of oz fan, i would like to add this one in to never reamke this classic. the only way i could see it happening is to cast robin williams as the lion. but it gives me nightmares to even think of this happening.

I think most epic films should not be remade. Look at the bible epics. No amount of CGI is going to improve them and we could end up with a 21 year old playing Moses. Arghhhh!

Some actors carried the films in the old days; like Bogart, Stewart, Robinson, Grant, Lancaster and so on. Without those brilliant actors, a powerful film can end up mediocre.

__________________
All secrets are safe with this man, because none are as deadly to him as his own. His secret is that he is Richard Kimble. (The Fugitive - Conspiracy of Silence)

Source? Oh, a guess? No remake in the progress, and none on the horizon. It's not getting remade in the near future, so it isn't very probable.

__________________

Let's hope, anyway.

But it seems likely, maybe not in the near future, but in ten years' time they might.

Great films you just can't remake.

Psycho, The Omen.....oh wait.....

-UJ

Okay--here we go:

Films I would not want to see remade:

West Side Story
Sound of Music
Lawrence of Arabia
Bonnie and Clyde

as well as a whole slew of others.

Duel. How can you possibly add to the film by remaking it?

Any of the classic westerns because most young actors and actresses today don't know how to ride a horse. They just sit there with their butts bouncing off the saddle and their elbows sticking out and flappling up and down like a chicken trying to fly. Back in the studio days, when actors under contract to the studio were not involved in a film, they were expected to attend classes at the studio on how to dance, how to sing, how to ride a horse, etc. Plus many actors actually grew up on ranches and learned to ride practically as babies--Ben Johnson, certainly; and Gary Cooper and Tom Mix, if I remember correctly. Others like Joel McCrae had their own ranches and loved to ride. Even Roy Rogers really owned and rode Trigger. I once saw a rating of the best horsemen in movies--real-life cowboy and rodeo champ Ben Johnson was rated the best (Johnson is the only person who won both an Oscar and a World Champion buckle for team roping, along with a place in the Professional Rodeo Association's hall of fame), but McCrae was in second place. Audie Murphy was in the top 5 or 10, even though he lost a large part of his butt in a nearly fatal explosion during World War II. On the other hand, a Hollywood contest to find the actor with the fastest Western Movie draw was won by---Sammy Davis Jr.! And if you ever catch the episode where he was the guest star on The Rifleman TV series, you can see just how fast he really was.

"All they did was add a little here and there" is arguable, particularly for purists or just dedicated fans. One of the major changes that certainly "altered the movies" would be the replacement of Sebastian Shaw's "ghost" at the end of Return of the Jedi for Hayden Christensen's goofy-looking form (check out the contrast--http://www.dvdactive.com/editorial/articles/star-wars-the-changes-part-three.html). Removing the original actor for the new yet poorly portrayed Anakin was just an abominable act: Shaw's place has been taken by a punk kid! That was a huge, horrible change that, if taken offensively, could be seen as a slap in the face of fans--it happened at the end of the film, almost like a "Ha, Ha! What are you gonna do about it?" kind of change. And the addition of the more "kid-like" musicians on Jabba's ship was a little over the top.

However, a lot of changes for clarify of image, character development, and restoration of scenes previously unusable were improvements. In general, a remake of this material is not repeatable, at least for a long time. Does it really seem like something people would want to see reinterpreted? I am inclined to say no.

This is such a great post.

Isn't it the height of gall to even contemplate remaking Psycho? I mean, WTF??? I'm still in shock.

If they want to remake not so good movies, fine, but don't touch the classics. EVER. It only works when the films are considered good, not great.

Heaven Can Wait was a great remake. So was Branagh's Henry V which was much better than Oliver's, but, hey, I guess Shakespeare is different...

Public Enemy was mentioned on the previous page. Actually, I'd like to see a good remake of Public Enemy, but the actor chosen would be everything.

Originally Posted by tramp

Heaven Can Wait was a great remake.

Got to differ with you on this one, Tramp. But then I’ve never been a fan of Warren Beatty or co-director Buck Henry. I think they’re way overrated. Never cared much for Dyan Cannon, either. Always liked James Mason and Jack Warden, however.

Beatty’s Heaven Can Wait stole its title from a good 1943 classic starring Gene Tierney, Don Ameche, Charles Coburn, Spring Byington, Louis Calhern, and its storyline from an even better classic Here Comes Mr. Jordan (1941) with a great cast of Claude Rains, Robert Montgomery, James Gleason, and the always delightful Edward Everett Horton. Plus a brief glimpse of a very young uncredited Lloyd Bridges as the pilot of the plane to heaven. As good as he was, Warden couldn’t hold a candle to Gleason’s Max Corkle.

Wonder what the storyline of Sound of Music would be like if a remake concentrated on the attempt to get away from the Nazis instead of the music? Doesn't have to be the Trapp family--could be any of the millions of others who tried to escape the Nazis.

rufnek, we often disagree.

Of course, who can forget Edward Everett Horton? I haven't read that name in years! He really was wonderful, wasn't he?

Well, I did like Heaven Can Wait a lot, especially Beatty's manic type performance, running around in that bathrobe.

While I see your point regarding The Sound of Music, rufnek,
I think that the title of the film definitely reflects the story behind it.
I could see a movie about the attempt to escape the Nazis being made, but it would be a whole other story--and title, to boot.

One of the highlights of the story of TSOM is the fact that Mr. Von Trapp, who was a patriotic nationalist who'd worked for the Nazis, finally saw the light in the end; he realized what the Nazis were up to, what they stood for, and what they did, and finally took his family over the Alps to escape.

rufnek. I have to agree. How can some punk kids replace the tough guys in the old westerns. It annoys me when I see some youngster in a position of authority in a film, that he is obviously too young for.

I liked Superman Returns but the actor was too young. He's been Superman for some time, he then takes off into space for five years and comes back still looking like he's at College.