Movies they shouldn't remake

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ScytheRexx

ScytheRexx

CynicismKills said:
Hey I loved Short Circuit as a kid, my brother and I still quote it to this day. That doesn't mean when I remove my nostalgia goggles I can call it a good movie, though.
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It was a different time, one full of campy awesome. Short Circuit was a good family movie with a robot, and that was all it had to be.

I own the DVD and make my wife watch it on occasion, and unlike movies like Weekend At Bernies, it still holds up under my older, more cynical self. Johnny Five is ALIVE!

P.S. I actually work with a guy that helped build, and during both films piloted, Johnny Five.
 
Necronic

Necronic

Staff member
I think the key to remakes is to not remake good movies (or at least, good for their genre), like:

The Manchurian Candidate
The Posiedon Adventure
The Omen
Disturbia/Rear Window
Flight of the Phoenix
The Hills Have Eyes
Miracle on 34th Street
One Missed Call
When a Stranger Calls
The Wicker Man
The Wolfman
The Parent Trap
Death at a Funeral


Those are just the ones that come to mind at the moment. But....on the other hand, there are some incredible remakes out there:

Gone in 60 Seconds
Father of the Bride
Fun with Dick and Jane
Dawn of the Dead
The Ladykillers
Little Shop of Horrors
Meet Joe Black
The Mummy
Munich
Oceans 11
Psycho (guess it depends on the viewer, I really liked it)
Scarface


I think it can really go either way with a couple of soft rules

-The movie should NOT have been considered one of the best movies ever made (posiedon/Manchurian candidate)
-Horror movies are probably a bad idea, but you may pull something out if you don't feel you have to put a Megan Fox look-alike in it
-Don't put Dennis Quaid in it.
-If its an old comedy from the 50s - 60s you could see some real improvement with a remake, as so much of the original value is based on contemporary social norms (father of the bride)
-Give it more than a couple years (death at a funeral)
-If it is heavily dependant on special effects, you could do well with a remake, but be careful (Little Shop of Horrors and Dawn of the Dead, but also the Hills Have Eyes)
 
M

Matt²

Damn.. now I want to see both versions of the Little Shop Of Horrors again.
 
Necronic

Necronic

Staff member
Depends on if you count foreign remakes. If you go there you have incredible choices:

Magnificent 7
The Birdcage
Vanilla Sky

...can't remember anymore at the moment.

For straight up remakes I don't think you will ever have that. That's because the best movies made have to be, at their core, great/incredible. Dawn of the Dead and Ocean's Eleven were great remakes, but at the end of the day that story could only be so good. You can't take Dawn of the Dead and turn it into The Posiedon adventure. It inherently lacks the potential for greatness. And any movie that has that potential for greatness probably was already made great the first time around, or the potential lies unrecognized in the corner somewhere until someone finally reboots it (Darkman would be a good choice for this I think).
 
SpecialKO

SpecialKO

The Departed was pretty awesome.

And Ocean's 11 (the new one) was considerably better than the original.

But they're not exactly typical.
 
Hailey Knight

Hailey Knight

ScytheRexx;442211][QUOTE=CynicismKills said:
Hey I loved Short Circuit as a kid, my brother and I still quote it to this day. That doesn't mean when I remove my nostalgia goggles I can call it a good movie, though.
Click to expand...
It was a different time, one full of campy awesome. Short Circuit was a good family movie with a robot, and that was all it had to be.

I own the DVD and make my wife watch it on occasion, and unlike movies like Weekend At Bernies, it still holds up under my older, more cynical self. Johnny Five is ALIVE!

P.S. I actually work with a guy that helped build, and during both films piloted, Johnny Five.[/QUOTE]

Such a great movie, you had to make your SO watch it with you, more than once.
 
M

Matt²

escushion;442287][QUOTE=ScytheRexx;442211][QUOTE=CynicismKills said:
Hey I loved Short Circuit as a kid, my brother and I still quote it to this day. That doesn't mean when I remove my nostalgia goggles I can call it a good movie, though.
Click to expand...
It was a different time, one full of campy awesome. Short Circuit was a good family movie with a robot, and that was all it had to be.

I own the DVD and make my wife watch it on occasion, and unlike movies like Weekend At Bernies, it still holds up under my older, more cynical self. Johnny Five is ALIVE!

P.S. I actually work with a guy that helped build, and during both films piloted, Johnny Five.[/QUOTE]

Such a great movie, you had to make your SO watch it with you, more than once.[/QUOTE]

Well yes, of course, it's in his name: CynicismKILLS ;)
 
Tress

Tress

I used to always tell a friend they should remake Clash of the Titans. I argued that it just needed a special effects update, and the acting/writing could only improve. :mmph:

Now I don't want them to remake anything.
 
ThatNickGuy

ThatNickGuy

The thing is, most of the remakes started as subpar horror flicks from the 70s. Now, they're starting to get into MY nostalgia territory with Nightmare on Elm St., Friday the 13th and The Karate Kid. The latter of which was surprisingly quite good.

I honestly don't see why studios don't just remaster the originals and re-release those, instead. Granted, the only time I've actually seen that done is with the original Star Wars trilogy. But that was goddamn Star Wars. But wouldn't a remastering cost a hell of a lot less than making a whole new movie?

Jaws was mentioned earlier. I'm really VERY surprised that hasn't been remade, yet.
Ditto on Casablanca. Maybe that's too sacred to touch.
I remember Tarantino joking he'd love to remake Citizen Kane and have "Rosebud" be Kane's wife's pussy or something, instead.

Heard somewhere that The Goonies was being considered. Hope that doesn't happen.
Wasn't remake of The Birds talked about? That might work, but I really don't know.

The only unbelievablely great and successful remake I can think of is Star Trek.
 
M

makare

Why is there so much hatred towards remakes? Ive never understood that.
 
SpecialKO

SpecialKO

makare said:
Why is there so much hatred towards remakes? Ive never understood that.
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I think it's because we associate movie remakes with the idea that the people behind the remake are looking to make a guaranteed return on the money that they would be spending to make it because they believe that the fans of the original will see it based on the name. To be sure, the large, large number of awful remakes backs up this theory. It's both a tarnishing of what the fans like, and an implied insult that the fans are too dumb and undiscerning to not see the film.

Of course, by way of contradictions, theater/musicals somehow escape this entirely in the cultural consciousness. Every time a Shakespeare play gets put on somewhere with a different cast, or visual concept, that's technically a remake. But we take it for granted that the people behind those productions are doing it (for the most part) because they love and honor the source material.

So I guess you could expand the question to: why do we give theater production companies the benefit of the doubt, but not movie studios?

It's not like a musical on Broadway won't fucking gouge you $60-100/seat in order to actually see the performers. Even TKTS is $$ if you want to see a new-ish show. D:
 
PatrThom

PatrThom

I think that many people feel the remake is an unspoken assertion by the people doing the remaking that a movie was flawed in some way and needed to be fixed (Transformers?). This treads on the tender treasured memories of some, who get all bent out of shape about the slight, imagined or otherwise.

--Patrick
 
Covar

Covar

SpecialKO said:
So I guess you could expand the question to: why do we give theater production companies the benefit of the doubt, but not movie studios?
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Because while I can pop in my dvd copies of Miracle on 34th Street or King Kong and watch them anytime I want. I can't go to the Globe Theater and watch the original cast perform Romeo & Juliet.
 
M

makare

But just because they make a shitty remake doesn't make the good original disappear. That's what I've never understood. Who cares if they make a hundred crappy versions of a movie the good one is still there.
 
Cog

Cog

Covar said:
Because while I can pop in my dvd copies of Miracle on 34th Street or King Kong and watch them anytime I want. I can't go to the Globe Theater and watch the original cast perform Romeo & Juliet.
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I think that reason is also valid for why I should not care about remakes.
 
ScytheRexx

ScytheRexx

escushion said:
Such a great movie, you had to make your SO watch it with you, more than once.
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Hey now, I don't force her to watch the movie. She is just not the type to watch older movies on a whim though, and didn't watch television hardly at all as a kid. When I say I make her watch them, I mean I am the one to buy them and we sit down for a night of older 80s camp, and sometimes go back to our favorites.

Recently I found "The Goonies" on television and she was like "What movie is this?".
 
E

Element 117

Ive often thought of remakes as licensed fan fiction. Like little kids going "me too, me too!" at story time
 
IronBrig4

IronBrig4

makare said:
But just because they make a shitty remake doesn't make the good original disappear. That's what I've never understood. Who cares if they make a hundred crappy versions of a movie the good one is still there.
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Most remakes are of older black and white movies. Most viewers are turned off by anything that looks too old, so they'll usually choose the new, crappy version because it simply looks shiny. As a result the classic version doesn't get the attention it should.
 
ThatNickGuy

ThatNickGuy

The thing I hate the most is where these horror remakes try to make the originals more "scary" by having that stupid super-fast editing where it seems like the movie is having a seizure. Christ, I'm tired of seeing that in horror flicks.
 
fade

fade

Staff member
And when they try to make it more "scary" by beating you over the head with the gore instead of going for the subtle psychological terror.
 
LittleSin

LittleSin

I found a DVD copy of the cabinet of Doctor Caligari yesterday. I can rest easy knowing that one will NEVER be remade.
 
W

wana10

makare said:
But just because they make a shitty remake doesn't make the good original disappear. That's what I've never understood. Who cares if they make a hundred crappy versions of a movie the good one is still there.
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Because it's a waste of money that could have (hopefully) gone into making an original new movie instead. (no it wouldn't, i'm not even fooling myself)
 
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