Remakes; An Argument.

There is a whole...thing right now in Hollywood. Remakes of respected properties, coming at us left and right. Predominatly based on horror films, but even true classics like Captain Blood are not immune. And I can't say I'm totally against it.

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm wary about every new project that gets announced. They are currently remaking some of my favourite movies. And some of the news sounds grim. Will Smith in Oldboy? Really? You know what, though? I still have Oldboy on my shelf, nothing they can do will replace that. Same with all the other remakes. And you know what? Maybe some of them will be good.

The Thing, The Fly, The Blob. All excellent films, one could argue even better than the original. That alone justifies the remake craze, at least creatively. It's also a little interesting to see someone else's take on a subject, even if it's contrary to your own. It's a conversation piece, something a fan (hopefully) did to portray how the original affected him, and maybe make an audience feel the same way.

One thing that has me worried is the seeming lack of new material. They're effectively eating themselves. They'd rather rehash old ideas, and rush them out. Which negates what I said about remakes being fans work. They'll hire any old someone for the job, and push it out to make a quick buck. And they do it, cause it works. There's a reason that most of the remakes are of horror films. Typically, it's cheap genre to construct films in, particularly in the case of the movies made in the 70's and 80's. They can quadruple the budget, get some hot TV actors to star, and still make a bundle. It's been that way since they decided that chain and saw should be one word. All of this means, that truly original works and ideas are being pushed under the rug. Why risk money on something new when you have an established brand you can milk. That's why movies like Repo! struggle to even get released and Friday the 13th gets it's own panel at Comicon. What happens when everything's been remade (sometimes twice over, in the case of The Thing)?

The other trend I'm seeing which bothers me is remaking foreign films that have only jsut been released. For half the budget of Quarantine, they could have done a wide release of Rec. and done a killer marketing campaign. And next one up is Let The Right One In. I like Matt Reeves. I thought Cloverfield was a great first movie and am eager to see what he does next. I'm not even against him remaking LTROI eventually. But the original has barley been released here, and had no marketing. It could have been this year Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, or Pan's Labrynth. Why not trust audiences? On that note, why not re-release the older originals as well. Hype them up, put billboards up. Get the cast on talk shows. I'm sure John Carpenter and Kurt Russell would have a blast promoting a real re-release of The Thing. Get the surviving cast of The Day The Earth Stood Still in front of the press. You have quality movies just sitting there, begging for a new audience.

Which brings me to another reason I'm pro-remake. It alerts a usually ignorant populace to a property they may not have heard of. And the original tends to get a nice DVD release at the same time. I'm sure most people who saw I Am Legend didn't bother hunting down The Last Man On Earth, but I'm equally sure others did. And maybe those people told some friends about it. It adds up, and a bunchy of people may have discovered a bunch of classics that they love because Will Smith wanted a new star vehicle.

I guess what I'm trying to say in all of this, is that I'm caustiously optimistic about remakes. Some are actually good, even great. Sure, a lot stink, but even in those ones there may be some good to come out of it. I just wish Hollywood, and people in general, would trust new talent and new ideas, cause in 20 years, we're really going to be in a pickle.