| Author |
 Topic  |
|
|
BradH812
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
1294 Posts |
 Posted - 01/10/2007 : 10:21:40 PM
|
Saw a sneak peek at a scene from the new version of The Hitcher. Oh, Lord, Lord, Lord.
Sean Bean is a worthy successor to Rutger Hauer as John Ryder. But if the rest of the movie is anything like the clip they showed, this movie is gonna be flat-out horrible.
I was hoping that they would finally release a decent DVD of the original Hitcher (restored print, director and star commentary, basically port the German DVD over to America) to capitalize on the remake. Problem is, the studio probably doesn't want audiences to remember that the first one was, you know, SCARY, and WELL-MADE, and GOOD — words that I seriously doubt will pass the lips of anyone describing the new version. |
|
|
Citizen Carrier
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
322 Posts |
Posted - 01/10/2007 : 10:24:26 PM
|
| The thing about remakes is that if a movie is good enough to warrant a remake...it is also good enough to not require a remake. |
 |
|
|
RossM
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
427 Posts |
Posted - 01/10/2007 : 11:39:30 PM
|
And if the movie is bad enough to make a remake, why bother? The movie wasnt any good to begin with.
There are some remakes that are indeed far better than the origional. John Huston's 1940 The Maltese Falcon was a remake of a 1932 movie with Ricardo Cortez. That movie is actually pretty good. It was remade 1n 1936 or so with betty davis and called satan Met A Lady, with was terrible. so the 1940 classic is actually the 3rd version of the movie. The Wizzard of Oz and the Thief of Bagdad are very high quality remakes of very good silent movies. These examples are quite rare though.
rossM |
|
|
|
Ericb
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
648 Posts |
Posted - 01/11/2007 : 07:03:30 AM
|
The thing is, studios are interested in making movies that people will want to see. They want to make a profit and trying to sell them on remaking failed movies seems like a pretty hard sell.
"I reserve the right to look as well as be boring." - Robert Fripp |
|
|
|
RossM
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
427 Posts |
Posted - 01/12/2007 : 01:03:07 AM
|
King Kong was perfectly good to begin with and Fun With Dick and jane was perfectly awful to beging with. I nver got the point of remaking either.
rossM |
|
|
|
Sardu
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
1126 Posts |
Posted - 01/12/2007 : 01:20:43 AM
|
Well, I get King Kong even though it wasn't strictly necessary. KK was a showcase for the state of the art in FX back in the day and PJ wanted to do the same. And he wanted to "cover' a hugely influential film on his own career, much like a musical artist will cover a song. Plus, KK was old and anachronistic enough to merit an update.
Most of these movies are being remade for the same reasons songs from the 80's are getting remade- todays audience doesn't even know them and studios figure if they hit once they can hit again.
"Meeting you makes me want to be a real noodle cook"
--Tampopo |
|
|
|
Flangepart
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
2329 Posts |
Posted - 01/12/2007 : 09:34:16 AM
|
quote:
Originally posted by Sardu
Most of these movies are being remade for the same reasons songs from the 80's are getting remade- todays audience doesn't even know them and studios figure if they hit once they can hit again.
[/i]--Tampopo
Maby, but the use of another artist, with his own arrangment and style, will change the take of the tune. Its different from a re-release of an original version of a song.
There still remains how an audiance will respond to the new take.
Marvin the Paranoid Android to Buzz Lightyear "Too infinity and beyond-i've been there, its rubbish!"
"Hoody Hoo, i waste 'em with my cross bow!" Bob Herzog- KDOT
|
|
|
|
Culfy
Preeminent Apostolic Prelate of the Discipleship of Jabootu
United Kingdom
113 Posts |
Posted - 01/13/2007 : 06:17:19 AM
|
quote:
Originally posted by RossM
There are some remakes that are indeed far better than the origional. John Huston's 1940 The Maltese Falcon was a remake of a 1932 movie with Ricardo Cortez. That movie is actually pretty good. It was remade 1n 1936 or so with betty davis and called satan Met A Lady, with was terrible. so the 1940 classic is actually the 3rd version of the movie. The Wizzard of Oz and the Thief of Bagdad are very high quality remakes of very good silent movies. These examples are quite rare though.
rossM
And are all based on books or storys. I can see how you can remake a novel; after all a book adaption can't capture all of a novel and so a remake could either be saying "that's what you thought the novel was about, here's what I think it's about" or "You missed the point of the novel; here's the point of the novel"
========================
Notes from a small cavy
www.culfy.blogspot.com |
|
|
|
Matrixprime
Diocesan Ecclesiarch of the Sacred Order of Jabootu
USA
69 Posts |
Posted - 01/13/2007 : 09:03:40 AM
|
I find the idea of remakes (especially as common as they are becoming) very odd. Mainly because I look at it from the perspective of an artist.
If you are an artist (literary, etc) you want to create. Some want to also innovate. So why re-do something someone else did? The only other type of art I've seen periodically cannibalize itself is the comic world; Marvel's What If's, DC's Elseworlds, the periodic origin reboots...but those usually seem to have a lot more THOUGHT to them.
Still, remakes can be interesting. John Carpenters The Thing was an excellent remake of an older film, while moving in a bit of a new direction. King Kong was WAY too long (and I will eventually see the extended version) but added some new twists.
The pointless remakes to me are one of two brands:
1) The 'scene by scene' remake: I've heard Psycho was like that, though I have not seen it. I have, however, seen 'The Omen' and MY GOD. That was so by the numbers even the actors looked bored. Not to mention that they kept it so true to the original that there were things that to me, didn't fit in todays world (for example, I could understand an American Ambassador in Britain being given some decent digs, but his tiny family of 3 was living in a mansion! And the bathroom - it looked like the quantum leap room, huge, white, featureless....the creepy mask kid was so far from her at first I didn't know why I was supposed to be creeped out). It also was a jarring alternate universe from the current political/social climate. For example, you'd think the kid would be the head of the EU eventually rather than the US (as a potentially much larger base, and one that in some countries is not as permissive as US culture). Also, the fact that we're not exzctly the most popular kid on the block, like we were during the original film.
2)That-Was-A-Generation Ago remake: Thus, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Hitcher...its as if Hollywood goes 'eh, I'm too lazy to have a new idea, and todays generation has tiny attention spans....whats old enough for most people to not realize its a remake?"
Bah Weep Granna Weep Ninny Bahn - Universal Greeting
Est Solarus Oth Mithas - Solamnic Knight Pledge
And now its me too:
http://matrixprime.blogspot.com |
|
|
|
jackspencerjr
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
262 Posts |
Posted - 01/13/2007 : 6:17:29 PM
|
quote:
Originally posted by Matrixprime
If you are an artist (literary, etc) you want to create. Some want to also innovate. So why re-do something someone else did?
I'm with you on the whole idea of remakes, but it does kind of make sense for film. Film has always been a cannibalistic, scavengeristic [sic?] art form, stealing what it can from other media and itself. One of the earliest "story" films was [url="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0001223/"]Frankenstein,[/url] taken from the novel. (Until then, movies tended to be stuff like [url="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0139738/"]The Kiss[/url], which is just two people kissing, go fig.)
I think two factors cause filmmakers to try remakes rather than coming up with anything original, the expense and the permanence.
Making movies are expensive. Not just in terms of cost in money, but it also requires time, lots of time from many people. Making a film is like directing a small army. Ask anyone who's been put into any kind of management position and they'll tell you that organizing things to accomplish their goal is a logistical nightmare. Granted, this is also a feature of stage productions, but film has a feature stage does not--
Permanence. As a recorded medium, film is done once and then it's all done. It would sound like an excuse to print money. Imagine going through all the rigamarole of a stage production, but only doing it once and then being able to show it over and over again without paying the actors, crew or anyone another dime. Just rent the hall space and a projectionist and you're all set. unfortunately, it doesn't work that way. As it's recorded, the performance has to be perfect. With a stage run, performances, dialog, sets, props, etc, etc can be slowly improved upon or at least changed so that each performance is never seen, never exactly the same twice. And can't be scrutinized the same way a film is. Every nuance of a film is under the microscope. (Makes you wonder why every film made isn't better,doesn't it?) This just compounds the problems with the expense.
What these two factors tend to do is cause the filmmakers and financial backers to hedge their bets as much as possible. Rather than risk resources on something fresh, original, but unprooven, they'll spend it on something that's already got a track record: a popular novel, a well-known TV show, a classic movie.
Problem is they don't notice how the law of diminishing returns effects the bottom lines of these remakes. I mean, why would I watch some 90's movie making fun of the 70's when I can just watch the brady Bunch TV show and enjoy the kitch of the 70's as show by the 70's? But, until some kind of breakthrough in the cost/resource management hit the filmmaking scene, we can expect more of this. And once that breakthrough happens, we can expect it to get exploited until we're right where we are now until the next breakthrough happens.
But at this point, I'm just rambling. |
|
|
|
RossM
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
427 Posts |
Posted - 01/13/2007 : 9:08:01 PM
|
When an orchestra makes a recording of a Beethoven symphony they are not simply remaking the score. They are doing it as composed but also making it their own though tempi, stresses and tone. The same is true when a singer sings a classic song. I hate the term "cover" as if singing another's song is somehow a lesser art.
Remaking a movie that was perfectly good to begin with though is just that. a cover, unless the film makers really add to it and make it their own movie. This I have rarely seen. Even as movies were remade from silent to sound and then to color almost always the origional is the one with the wit, the energy, and the pizzazz. Now, with home video so easilly acquired the origionals can be easilly rented and seen. Up until the 1970s though this was not the case and movies could be remade to new generations of audiences who had never seen the origionals. Also in Hollywood nothing succeeds like success. It often takes them years to realize that certain fims and actors are passe.
rossM |
|
|
| |
Topic |
|
|
|
Forum Locked
Topic Locked