Hollywood Remake Madness
Ok, so what’s happened to Hollywood then? Where have all those bright ideas gone? I mean, they’re remaking films that WERE original. So what’s wrong with more ORIGINAL?
I’d like to ask you a question. Are you happy to pay out your hard earned money to watch a different actor play a role that has already been done by a class act? Like let’s take My Fair Lady. That was a classic film with Audrey Hepburn in the lead role. How can anybody improve on that and why bother anyhow? Well, it’s being remade.
It’s not that I have a problem with sequels or prequels, but actually remaking again and again is just mind numbing. Was Charlie and the Chocolate Factory really an improvement? Why not do a sequel instead and do something new?
Ok, so what’s happened to Hollywood then? Where have all those bright ideas gone? I mean, they’re remaking films that WERE original. So what’s wrong with more ORIGINAL?
I’d like to ask you a question. Are you happy to pay out your hard earned money to watch a different actor play a role that has already been done by a class act? Like let’s take My Fair Lady. That was a classic film with Audrey Hepburn in the lead role. How can anybody improve on that and why bother anyhow? Well, it’s being remade.
It’s not that I have a problem with sequels or prequels, but actually remaking again and again is just mind numbing. Was Charlie and the Chocolate Factory really an improvement? Why not do a sequel instead and do something new?
Here’s a few other films that have or are being remade and that have made my blood boil:-
Poltergeist
Highlander
Lethal Weapon
Overboard
Starship Troopers
Never Ending Story
Barbarella
An American Werewolf in London
The Crow
Mad Max
Dirty Dancing
War Games
Time Bandits
The Birds
Romancing the Stone
Short Circuit
Westworld
I’m going to leave the list at that, but there are dozens more and it’s just depressing. Why is it depressing? Our entertainment is being dictated by the “few”, which has always been the case from Nero to Pope and from DJ to MGM, but please, it’s getting way too obvious now. What’s more depressing is the fact that we “individuals” are going to watch these predictable (because
we’ve already seen them) unoriginal piles of toss in our millions. They will keep making them you know… stop it.
Surely, I ask you brothers and sisters, there have to be enough screenwriters out there with original, entertaining, exciting and lucrative ideas for our money men of the movies to fleece? I know there are, because I watch a lot of indie movies and a great many of them stand head and shoulders above the big blockbusters because they are imaginative, creative and original. OK, some, no, a lot of them, are utter rubbish from start to finish, but not all. There are some very cool films coming out from indies and in fact it does have Hollywood rumbled a little because there is a growing market (they are creating) for people who want a little more than mindless, predictable trash. A lot of these people are prepared to overlook the lack of money for super effects or on screen talent with named stars because that’s better than watching good actors being wasted on yet another remake of some British minis being stolen by a bunch of Americans. I think we all know what I mean by that.
Ink (the movie) was an independent film and it was utterly brilliant and original. It had a half decent budget, but nothing like the amount wasted on The Lone Ranger recently. British horror flick, Exorcist Chronicles (I just saw) had zero budget and is full of nobodies, but it is original, retro, funky and entertaining. I could go on with lists of good indie films, none of which are remakes or wasted millions. Take one budget, say $225 million that was just wasted on The Lone Ranger. Divide it by 100. Give that to 100 of the best up and coming indie filmmakers out there and I guarantee you a large percentage will come back with brilliant, clever and ORIGINAL ideas that will recoup the outlay and give a much bigger catalogue than one single film that is predicted to lose $150
million. Yes, it will make it back eventually, but one film, I ask you.
Please Hollywood accountants, stop thinking like jackasses and start balancing your books with the fact that you’re supposed to be entertaining us as well, not just stealing our money because we’re all intrigued to know whether the new Barbarella is as good as Jane Fonda.
Support the indie filmmaker or at least buy in some of their talent!
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