Why does the movie industry make 'remakes' of films?

Did you ever get around to seeing the original Halloween? I saw in Newt's top 100 thread where you said you hadn't seen it yet. That was back in August, though. I'm taking it you saw the remake first. If that is true, then that's not really the best way to compare them.
Also, the new Halloween movie didn't appear to use heaps of money, either. It's not like it has loads of CGI, special effects, or whatever. They don't even have an expensive cast.
If anything, John Carpenter should get extra credit for pulling off making a classic horror movie, with pretty much no money at all. They even recycled their fall leaves.

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Money, money. It's a shame, but sometimes it can be very interesting (like in theater) to see multiple interpretations of stories and their characters.

Sounds like a question you need to ask the producers and directors involved, because folks in this forum can't read minds or motives


What "political correctness"? In which film?


Whoa, hoss--you're really reaching on this one. When The Magnificient 7 came out in the 1960s, there probably wasn't 10 people in the US movie-going public who'd ever heard of Seven Samurai, much less made the connection between the two films. And what the hell did World War II have to do with it?


Oddly enough, Hawks claimed Rio Bravo, El Dorado, and Rio Lobo were not remakes, explaining tongue-in-cheek that "one time they're holed up in jail, next time they're outside." Which is more odd, that Hawks remade one of his films two more times under two different titiles or that De Mille shot Ben Hur twice under the same title?

Originally Posted by adamfoy

John Huston once said: "There is a wilful lemming-like persistence in remaking past successes time after time. They can't make them as good as they are in our memories . . .

That's an odd thing for Huston to say since the very first movie he ever directed was an extremely successful remake of the Maltese Falcon that had already been made twice before, once under the same title and once as The Devil Met a Lady, starring Bette Davis.Turns out Huston's re-remake is the classic everyone remembers.

Naw, that won't fly--Unlike the two movies, the best-selling book on which they were based contained the complete storyline as portrayed in The Godfather and in Godfather II. The first film starts in about the middle of the book at the wedding of the Godfather's daughter and runs to close to the end of the book. Godfather II is a "prequel," starting at the first of the book and adding some previously unused material from the end of the book , elements not covered at all in the original Godfather film. Made from separate scripts as written by the author of the book, same director, but two totally different stories constituting separate films--not a remake.

I get the reason behind a lot of hate towards remakes, but not all of them are bad.

There are dozens of reasons behind why people want to remake films, and money/unoriginal ideas isn't always the case. Although it may be the most popular one.

Look at Peter Jackson's King Kong. His favourite movie of all time. Did he do it for money, I don't think so. I would love to work on a film that is my favourite and put my own spins on it. Let's not forget that this isn't the first remake of that film. Also with today's technology some people deem older films need a new face lift. King Kong is a prime example again. Kong went from claymation, to animatronic, to CGI.

The thing that makes me scratch my head is why would someone remake their own film almost shot for shot? Just to bring it to a foreign market?

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Now to me that's the worse possible reason for doing a remake, especially of a fondly remember classic because one of the reasons those classics are remembered so fondly is because they were simplier films made in simpler times. So why the urge to rev them up with new technology if technology is all one is bringing to the remake? Much of the charm of the original King Kong was the claymation. In Kong's every movement one could see all the work that went into creating that frame-by-frame progression of shots. The technology behind today's special effects no doubt make Kong appear more lifelike, but it seems to be done so easily and I've already seen it done in Star Wars and Toy Story and all of those shoot-'em-up, car-chasing thrillers that the bloom is off that rose. Yeah, it sure looks like a real ape, but so what?

Now in the case of a major technological breakthrough that can really alter a presentation, I can understand for instance DeMille remaking his silent Ben Hur as a talky. But is new computer technology enough to justify remakes like The Day the Earth Stood Still and War of the Worlds? Remember too that, aside from the book, the most brilliant production of War of the Worlds that still has people talking 70 years later was a radio program! Just words coming out of a piece of furniture to stimulate the minds of listeners. I still say a good story is better than all the special effects technology in the world.

I like too that DeMille did his massive crowd scenes with hundreds of extras and that the famous long pullback shot of all the wounded Confederate soldiers in GWTW is a combo of live people and dummies. Its kinda fun to know that some of my high school classmates who played the defenders of John Wayne's Alamo also in another shot were in the Mexican army they were shooting at. Now that a computer geek can crank-out a background of millions of different images, some of the movie magic is gone.

I'm curious as to what of "his own spin" Peter Jackson added to his remake. Is it actually very noticeable?

Your Question: Why does the industry make `remakes` of films?

My answer: Most people want to see the stuff they are used to.
And the industry like money (Greed is good.).

Last night I just watched the remake to Friday the 13th. Not as good as I thought it would be, it wasn't scary. Same thing over and over again: Jason gets a machete and slashes open every character. Pointless film, honestly. I liked The Amityville Horror and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre remakes, but this one did not do well in my terms.

WHich Friday the 13th films are scary? I would say none of them are. I do think this latest re-imagining (sorry, it isn't a remake) is clearly the most technically proficient film, that's for sure. All these films suck, what did you expect? I admit I like a few of them - Guilty pleasures, to be sure!

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