Remake Madness: Has Hollywood Run Out of Ideas?

http://filmtvindustry.suite101.com/a...#ixzz0SOcuPOsP



Shockwaves went through the movie world this week when it was announced the treasured 80’s movie “Robocop” would be remade for a modern audience. Actually, ‘shockwaves’ is a bit in accurate. More waves of exasperation at an industry to which, it seems, nothing is sacred any more, as more and more ‘untouchable’ films get the modern update, often forgoing the original’s charm in favour of a cheap, quick affair that depends on a famous name to pull the customer in. But is a remake always a bad idea? This article looks at the pros and cons of remaking old favourites…
Running out of ‘re-imagination’?

First the bad, and one really has to go back about ten years to find a starting point in this modern obsession with remakes. Before 1998, it was deemed that there were a stable of movies that one could not remake. Titles so loved that any studio wishing to do an update would be met with fan hysteria. However, the glass ceiling was broken in the fore mentioned year, when Gus Van Sant made the shock move of remaking Hitchcock’s signature movie, “Psycho”.
Out went Janet Leigh, in came Anne Heche, and the infamous Anthony Perkins was succeeded by the then up-and-coming actor Vince Vaughn. Huge opposition was met to the movie, although Van Sant almost religiously stuck to the original’s nuances- even mistakes made in the first film were purposefully kept in. Only just making it’s money back in worldwide box office, the biggest criticism levelled at the movie was it’s pointlessness- what was the point in remaking a superior film shot-for-shot?
Same Horror, New Faces

The horror genre picked up this idea of remaking classics, particularly picking up momentum in this decade. Another seemingly untouchable film, “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre”, was remade in 2003, produced by action director Michael Bay. Bay repeated this trick again with horror classics “The Hitcher” and “The Amityville Horror”. Outside of Bay’s plundering, “The Fog” and “Halloween” have both got the same treatment in recent years.
Remake or Mistake?

Remake doesn’t necessarily mean ‘bad’, however. A most famous example is the George Clooney-starring “Ocean’s 11”. Whilst there is affection for the original, starring Frank Sinatra and his ‘rat pack’, the 2001 version is widely regarded as superior, spawning two sequels. Often, a remake can be so good it eclipses it’s original. For instance, Jeff Goldblum’s breakthrough movie “The Fly” was in fact a remake of a 1958 B-movie; and Scorsese’s “Cape Fear” replaced the legendary Robert Mitchum with Robert De Niro, and the remake is considered at least as good as it’s predecessor. Finally, American remakes of Asian film have been wildly successful recently, with “The Departed” and “The Ring” both recent examples of successful remakes.

I do agree with it. The Hollywood is running out of idea. Out of curiousity I went online to find out what movies are coming out in the near future...2010, 2011, etc. It says that these films are in development but not in production yet
Here are some repeats as well as sequels and beyond that....

2010
Alice in Wonderland
Iron Man 2
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
Shrek Goes Fourth
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Part I)
The Smurfs
A Nightmare on Elm Street
Beverly Hills Cop IV
Robocop

2011
Spider-Man 4
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: (Part II)
The Hobbit (The Lord of the Rings prequel)

2012
Cars 2

here is my source
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010s_in_fi…


Right right, I wasn't going to list all the movies coming out because that would be too much. I was just pointing out some of the movies that were coming out these yeasr..that are sequels or have been made b4 etc.

Hollywood? Lacking imagination? No! Say it isn't so!

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I am not really a fan of Hollywood remaking the golden movies of our generation but I must say I do watch them and I have enjoyed some of the remakes that have been released, but some are just truly terrible. Some of the movies are just made to cash in on a franchise, just like Shrek is there any need for ANOTHER one? I liked the first two but was not impressed with the third instalment.

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I don't consider Clooney's Ocean's 11 to be a remake since it essentially rewrote the original story except for the title. The original Ocean's 11 was intended simply as a tour de force for the Rat Pack, something along the same lines as Robin and the 7 Hoods. In both cases, the drawing card was Sinatra and crew, not the stories. They should have kept the Clooney film honest by giving it a new title to go with the new storyline.

As for the The Fly (was that truly Goldblum's breakthrough? Thought he'd made his mark before that) I'll gladly concede that the remake was bigger budget and had more special effects with all the slime. Goldblum did a good job in his monster role--better than David Hedison in his much lower key title role with the giant mask. But although the original was made on the cheap, Vincent Price gave it that extra something as he so often did in low-cost films. And I'll always remember the tiny man-fly in the original calling "Help me! Help me!" as the spider approaches, while I'm hard put to recall a scene from the remake.

It seems the horror genre gets the most remakes, Texas chainsaw didn't have the gritty student film touch of the original, it was still a good film, as for the much anticipated "Friday the 13th" reboot, I felt much more could have been done, the kills were boring and not inventive like old school Jason, and I was really expecting more on the origins of Jason. The "Killer cut" DVD release was better and filled in a few flaws that were in the theatrical cut, that was just choppy and all over the place, felt like a really bad edit!

Although "A Nightmare on Elm Street" is an uber classic, it would be fun to see an updated version for a new audience, and judging by the trailer it should be pretty good, and more "Freddy" without the cheese is always a good thing.

"Sorority Row" based on "House on Sorority Row" a B-grade 80's slasher, is a much better stylized take on the cult classic, but still keeping that fun 80's charm

"Piranha 3D" by Alexandre Aja has me the most excited! This was a bad film that was riding the back of "Jaws", I do love the original (Who wouldn't love little fish eating people)...but I have been following the production of this remake and it's gonna be awesome! This film could only be an improvement and in 3D! It's gonna rock!

"The Wolfman" worries me a bit as it has been pushed back so many times, that by time it's released will anyone care? The cast is superb with Sir Hopkins and Benicio Del Toro in the leads this will be a hit if they can boost a proper marketing stint just in time! The trailer looks great and it has a great simple classic story and looks well shot and styled

"Grayskull" aka "Masters of the Universe" For now this film has been put on hold because of the CGI animated version of "Thundercats" bot of these films should be huge when they release, we all remember the severe disappointment of the 87 version of HE-Man with Dolph Lundgren, if the makers of "300" pick this up it should be outstanding!

Hmmm now we get to Platinum Dunes and Mr Michael Bay, he has gotten a bad wrap lately for being the king of remakes! I got wind of "The Birds" being re-done, lets consider this, with today's CGI and Bay's budget it could be an awesome film, if they just use the title and have no relation what so ever to the Hitchcock classic then I'm all for it, they were also considering doing it in 3D, like "Piranha" this could be fun as there would be feathers all over the place! We all remember the awful remake of "Psycho" by Gus Van Sant, it was such a bomb...And well quite frankly how dare you even try to remake that film? It was perfect in every way.

I think at the end of the day money is the object of the studios with all the remake and 3D hype, which in a way is sad but also gives the film we all loved growing up, that people today would think are the cheesiest crap a new life and up to date chance

What do you think?

Dave
On Screen

I'm pretty sure the problem is not a lack of new ideas, the issue seems to be 'safe' ideas.
Hollywood, mainstream studio Hollywood, doesn't like taking chances anytime, and we are in a very dark period now.
I watched a DVD copy of Naked Lunch the other night and was struck by an interview with the Producer (bonus features) recorded in '07, from memory.
The Producer was at great pains to point out that the film would never get made today, things have changed so much in the last 15 or so years.

I have to say...I recently got to see a sneak peek at Shrek 4 (Shrek Forever After), and it was really, really good! Only about a third of it was actually finished, and the rest was story board, and I still loved it. Not bad, if you ask me.

As for the lack of imagination in Hollywood...well, the way I look at it is this. There's a pretty good possibility that if the original did really well at the box office, then there are going to be a lot of loyal fans who are going to see the remake no matter what. Let's take Halloween 2 for example. I'm not exactly a fan of Rob Zombie movies. In fact, I haven't seen most of them, because I really don't like is style. Now having said that, I still saw this movie (and Halloween, too) anyway, just because I wanted to see how it compares to the original(s). And, honestly, if it hadn't been a remake, I wouldn't have even considered seeing it. Same with Friday the 13th (which I thought was a very well done remake), and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
It's easy money, and, actually, I think quite imaginative in a way I'm not sure I can describe in text.
Basically, I don't mind the remakes. I enjoy seeing different interpretations of my favorite and not-so-favorite movies.

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^I concur.

I don't think it is a lack of "original," (most stories have already been told) but as some already said, "safety." If you have an already built-in fan base, it reduces the strain that comes marketing a new property. The real problem is what the thresh hold is to qualify for a remake, movies that are barely 20 years old are being remade. My question is, why? Is a movie created in the 1970's or 1980's really so alien to the youth of the new millennium? Not enough current references to pop culture, or crass advertisements for iPods, soft drinks, and hybrid cars? In the 90's we were culturally bankrupt, now we're culturally overdrawn.

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...uh the post is up there...

This pretty much sums up what I was going to say.

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I think it's offensive to remake Fame. Fame set in modern times is stupid because it offers no insight.

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I do not believe Hollywood is running out of ideas but going after the money. Executive A "we have this great new script it could be massive. it is ambitious and will require a good budget."

Executive B "Hmm sounds risky Robocop was good and 20 years old lets remake that and watch the money roll in"

Executive A "Yeah lets do that instead, I want a new yacht"

I think a re-make should only exist if it's validated to exist.

The original "The Fly" for example was not only very much a film of its time as far as FX and content went, but it was also a pretty anonymous Studio B picture.

Cronenberg's "The Fly" though not only gave us something unseen as far as FX went, it also gave us far more explicit content and added a very personal, unique, take on the story by a strongly individual Director.

All of that exact same justification of course covers Carpenter's "The Thing".
As well as adding that it was just as much a more faithful adaptation of the original story than just a film re-make, and it did not actually share the same title.


For me then there has to be big technical improvements, FX improvements, censorship improvements and a personal new take on the film. Basically all of those should be covered.
OR...perhaps the original is a lost film ot a film very, very hard to see.

Which is why almost none of the horror re-makes recently actually hold up.
ALL the originals are easily available, often in nice new transfers.

No one involved in the re-makes has been a truly unique, personal, Director that brings a certain special aspect to the film.

Often the FX work my be better...but often the jump is not that great (compared to my "The Fly" and "The Thing" comparisons).

And often content wise it's a step backwards.
Take the re-make of "Dawn".
Not seen it, never will, but from what I understand that actually (even in the unrated version) there is almost no real gut ripping, fleshy chunk biting, entrail scoffing explicit action.
So as far as explicit gore goes of a certain type...the re-make was actually a step backwards!

Also, more often than not the originals have an historic aspect that makes them what they are because of the time they were made and how they were made according to how the tech/budget side went.
The original "Dawn" has a certain something because of when it came out and the tough, low budget, way it was made.
Most certainly that is also true of the original "TCM" as well.

Very few remakes are justified on any grounds sadly.

I also have a MAJOR problem with re-makes now taking the name of the original.
History is important. A film's basic identity as far as history goes IS it's title.
Look in a book or a database and how do you find the film?
Do we really want future generations to consider the re-makes of "Dawn of the Dead" or "Psycho" or "The taking of Pelham 123" AS those films?

Sequels are something different. "Friday the 13th part 2" is indeed NOT called or known or would be listed in history as simply "Friday the 13th".
As far as that identity goes...they are indeed completely separate films with completely separate basic identities from any reference point of view.
Which to me is a vital point also.

LoL, same thing i was thinking

Movies often tend to reflect the times in which they're made, so I honestly think that today's movies are often reflective of these times as well; the era of the "dumbing down of America", which has been going on for the past 20-30 years, has continued, and has affected Hollywood's ability to come up with any more creative ideas. Hence, the number of sequals and remakes have increased....by a lot.

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This does not really count as a remake but it does show that Hollywood is BAT SH*T CRAZY.

From Killerfilm.com

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