Remakes: Pros and Cons

Posted by torgette on May 12, 2008 at 1:36pm in About Movies

Remakes are popular movies and sometimes the remake is hard to catch if you've never seen the old movie it came from.

What movies do you think should have never been remade? Which do you think were better than the original?

Tags: movies, old, remakes

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Permalink Reply by Moviebunny on May 12, 2008 at 10:41pm: Well, the Long Riders might be considered a remake because it was yet another retelling of the James Gang story, but it was so original and used do much first person source material, that I would not consider it a remake. So many of the Leone Spaghetti Westerns were shot-for-shot-word-for-word remakes of Japanese originals (and Magnificent Seven was remade as Beyond the Stars). But then, the originals were not widely available in the US, which may be why US film makers are back out it, ripping off Japanese originals with sometimes questionable results.

When I think of remakes, I think Dirty Rotten Scoundrels did not improve upon the original, Bedtime Story; Birds of a Feather was 100 times better than The Birdcage; Blow-Up made sense in ways that Blow Out did not; and what were they thinking by remaking Charade?

Conversely, I can think of a number of movies that might be improved if remade today. I thought that Downfall, for example, was an excellent remake of The Last Ten Days of Adolph Hitler, but then it drew on new material. Little Shop of Horrors is a successful remake because it is such a departure from the original. But the remade Manchurian Candidate just didn't work for me, or, for that matter, the remade Omen (again, another shot-for-shot remake).; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by xlorydr on May 13, 2008 at 9:45am: I think the remake of "The Thomas Crown Affair" is an example of a great job. The newer movie is much better.; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by pihkal020 on May 13, 2008 at 9:48am: That assumes you accept that Pierce Brosnan > Steve McQueen.

I find that to be heresy. :-); ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by pterosaur on May 13, 2008 at 10:13am: Seconded.; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Microwaved on May 13, 2008 at 11:04am: I'm having trouble finding the right words here folks.

Not to be mean or anything

Godzilla with Raymond Burr > Gorjia
Pierce Brosnan > Steve McQueen

Well maybe we're getting old folks?; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by pihkal020 on May 13, 2008 at 11:10am: No, the world is getting lamer in many ways.

Back in the day, having the name Pierce = automatic beatings. Now we're more enlightened or something

OTOH, I have more music and porn than I ever dreamt was possible as a child! oh brave new world...; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by torgette on May 13, 2008 at 11:58am: Too true. "Pierce" would always be "it" no matter what game was being played. Unless he could turn his eyelids inside out and make the girls scream and run away, he'd be toast in the school yard!

Alas, we're no longer allowed to play games that have anyone being called "it" and we give out medals just for showing up.

Have to agree that it's so much better now...for losers. We get to lock ourselves in our homes and make friends we never have to actually talk to in person. Yeah...it's better now. In fact, why have street lights? There are no kids left who need them for a clock anymore. They're all inside doing nine hours of homework.; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Whatchawatchin on May 13, 2008 at 1:21pm: Yet, jocks who can barely write their names are still passed on because they can 'catchdaballcoach..harharhar', those same arseholes beat up kids who happen to do their homework, sanctioned fully by the schools who see nothing wrong with 5 200lb football players ganging up to pound on some 90lb kid who happens to be on the chess club. It's okay to beat up people smarter than you (or who just apply themselves more to things that have any value whatsoever in their future life, hell the president supports the smack them in the head and scream when they embarass you by being smarter, why shouldn't we do it in school!). We hold fund raisers and beg for money for more bats and balls and new uniforms and screw the computers or the library, after all only sissypants use those and they're not bringing home any trophies for the case, right? I mean, everyone knows that sports is the way to be productive in society and pay your bills.

The school district my son attends sends out a paper every month. Front page, football team wins! Basketball team wins! Not mentioned, the fact that the mock trial team took the state, the economic simulation team took nationals and is going to Florida to compete in the international competition this summer, or the fact that the 4 capts. on the football team crashed their car because they were drunker than monkeys and were found to have several illegal substances in their vehicle and that one of them was already pending charges for date rape. Economics...who needs it. Obviously we are all doing beautifully and the dollar is just rising exponentially against all foreign currencies.

Sure, we need more slope browed, slack jawed little troglodites who enjoy hitting someone else with a ball as hard as possible for amusement. Ahhh..the good old days. O.o; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Microwaved on May 13, 2008 at 1:33pm: I'd like to get my tooth back that got beat out of me one day in high school when the football team decided it would be fun to beat the shit out of me all day long and not one teacher stood up to help me. This isn't a joke either, this actually happened to me. All day long they beat me up from the time I got to school until band at the end of the day when one of the football players used my own trumpet to shut me up.; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by NetflixJunkie on May 13, 2008 at 1:47pm: When I was in the fourth grade, I had my arm broken in two places by a group of five other kids. When the administrators asked why they had done what they did, they said they didn't like my name.

These kids weren't into sports. They were just a bunch of punks with nothing better to do after school.

As I became bigger, I joined the baseball, basketball and wrestling teams. Probably my reason for watching as much MMA as possible.

I really don't see an issue with being pro-sports for high school. With the right direction, I believe these activites can mold young men and women into being good people.

My school was able to sell tickets to our sporting events which in turn paid for these sports. Now, getting people to put down money for the debate team was much more difficult, but they spent money, too (travel, food, etc...); they just didn't bring it in.

Most people do not pay to see the debate team; that's life.

~former Jock
~current junkie; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Whatchawatchin on May 13, 2008 at 2:04pm: Sports are great. Are they necessary for a curriculum in school...no. Should they get even a 1/4 of the funding, attention, and free rides they get...hell no. When people finally wake up and realize that all we're preparing our kids for in real life with this focus on sports is for them to end up bitter and disappointed that they didn't go to college on a scholarship, make the big leagues and rake in millions a year, and that we would help them a hell of a lot more by teaching them how to do things like balance a checkbook and understand how things like APR rates and adjustable interest loans work we are going to keep cranking out kids with no ability to function in the real world, but who can still remember catching that ball!