Movie Remakes - What the F*ck For?

There are three main reasons why movies are remade. One is money. Two is that the producers/director/writer wants to present a new twist to an older version of a film. The third, and possibly stupidest in my opinion, is when a foreign movie is remade in order to be more palatable to the audience of the country(ies) remaking it. For example, the huge proliferation of Asian (predominantly Japanese) horror films remade for Western audiences.

Before I go any further with this post I'd like to point out that in most cases I hate remakes, and believe that in many cases they do a great disservice to the original movies. Having stated that though, there are a bunch of notable exceptions to this opinion of mine. John Carpenter's The Thing and the David Cronenberg directed 1986 remake of The Fly are two examples of remakes which I love to bits.
But for every well crafted movie that takes the original source material and does something truly outstanding with it there are a myriad of insipid, drivel riddled and asinine remakes of classic films that really, really fuckin' irk me, that drag the good name of the original film through the mud, and generally serve to make the culture of which I am a part just that more stupid. I mean, the Shutter remake? WTF was that? The original was genuinely unsettling, but the remake is about as scary as a plate of Grandma's scones.

Now me, I ain't no film snob. Sure, I love a lot of obscure, hard to find, esoteric, "arty" and non-mainstream/commercial films. A lot of films with (gasp!) subtitles, that aren't in English. A lot of films with subject matter/approaches that aren't considered to be all that palatable to a lot of folks. But there's a vast array of popular and commercially focused films which I love also.
I could say in all seriousness that I'm somewhat obssessed with films. I adore the act of watching movies, to me its not at all a passive experience. I get very wrapped up in it. A really good film to me is a life altering experience. A really good film can change a person, affect them deeply in their souls. A quality film sticks in one's mind long after its been viewed, rolling about in the conscious/subconscious. A good film can be watched time and time again, rewarding the viewer by revealing new elements/layers/things to discover about it with each subsequent viewing. A good film is a richly rewarding experience, and I spend a fair old amount of time and energy seeking out films to get into, and add to my collection, which is... large.
So in short, I'm very passionate about the medium of film.
And this is why the subject of cack-handed remakes raises my ire more than most.

Now, its no big revelation that studios can oftentimes be a pretty fuckin' lazy lot. There's the mode of thinking that goes like this; "hey, that movie was pretty successful. If we remake it its quite likely the remake will also be successful! Its a surefire winner! Why risk money on something new when we can just play it safe and redo something that was a proven winner the first time round?" Well, studio executive people, that original movie you feel would be so bankable if was remade, in the majority of cases it was the first version of that movie. Which means it wouldn't exist to be remade if a bunch of jerks had decided it wasn't worth putting money into to making in the first place.

I know all about the art vs commerce quagmire. I know how risky it can be for a studio to invest capital into anything that they don't have a good idea will make them money, or at least make back the money they invested in it. But Jesus Christ, if we just go on remaking films, or making films that are of a similar premise to other films (a la that whole "swapping bodies" pack of films; 1988's Vice Versa [itself a remake of the 1948 film directed by Peter Ustinov], 2003's Freaky Friday [a remake of the 1976 film. Notice a trend developing here folks?] the list goes on and goes on further still), then the medium of film itself just slides further and further on down into bland and homogenised rubbish, with all the excitement, entertainment and thought provocation sucked clean out of it. Then you may as well just give up and go watch television. Do we really want this to happen? Really?
So movie remakes are a (sometimes) financially successful enterprise. Whoop-dee-fuckin-do. Its pretty damned lame if you ask me.


So, on to the second main reason films are given the remake treatment, which is the old "filmmakers wish to present an updated/new interpretation of/alternate take on an existing film" scenario. Some of the films in this category are excellent, such as the two films I mentioned at the start of this post. Some are completely pointless, such as Gus Van Sant's almost shot-for-shot reamake of Hitchcock's filmic interpretation of the Robert Bloch novel Psycho. Most are pretty dire. Some of these remakes are made by the same directors or producers or writers (or a combination thereof) as the original (or the version of the film that immediately preceded it). For instance, the director of the 1986 The Fly, David Cronenberg, is the guy who's attatched to direct and potentially write the new remake. Whatever dude. The version of the film you did in the eighties is one of my all time favourite films, but if you think you can improve on it... Will you be inviting Jeff Goldblum back to reprise his pivotal role as Seth Brundle, as Goldblum's performance was one of the main things that made the movie so awesome? Will Geena Davis also be in this new version? Surely she doesn't have anything better to do at the moment right?
Please oh please don't screw it up Cronenberg. You don't want to break my wee heart now do you?
OK, enough rhetorical questions aimed at a guy who won't ever be reading this blog. Let's move on to the third main reason films get remade.

The "audience won't understand this/won't like to bother reading subtitles/are a pack of xenophobes" notion. Plenty of film remakes in this category. The American remakes of The Ring, and later The Grudge are both popular examples of this. Interestingly, Takashi Shimizu, the guy who directed the Japanese The Grudge (Ju-on 呪怨) series of movies also directed the American version. And Hideo Nakata, the director of the two Japanese Ring films, went on to direct the American remake of The Ring 2. He's also on board to direct the American The Ring 3, but who gives a fuck, right?
There are many many films out there that deal with the classic Japanese horror trope of the "vengeful ghost", including the original version of that movie Shutter that I mentioned before, though that was a Thai film.
Actually, if I may digress briefly, if you're a fan of those "creepy Asian ghost" films, I highly recommend you check out Honogurai mizu no soko kara (仄暗い水の底から or Dark Water in English), its very well done and is deliciously creepy. Of course, it too got the American remake treatment, but the less said about that the better.


I ask myself why there are so many non-Western films that get remade by Western film companies. OK, so a lot of people seem to dislike reading subtitles if the movie happens to not be in English. But a lot of such films also have versions that are dubbed into English. Personally I prefer to watch a film with subtitles if the film is in a language that I don't speak. Preserves the vibe of the film much better I reckon. But that's beside the point. No, the main reasons for the remake approach in this case, as far as I can figure out, are either that its just generally harder to find foreign films in places such as Blockbuster et al, and that a big chunk of the Western populace (I'm looking at YOU, mainstream America) really can't see past their own country and its culture, and are just plain uninterested in seeing a film that stars people from another country, especially a country that doesn't have English as its main language. Either they don't understand the culture of the the country where the original films come from, or they plain just don't wanna know about films from places they're not at all interested in familiarising themselves with. There's also a whole bunch of people out there who (whether or not they like to admit it) are a bunch of pathetic racists too, but let's not get into that today.
But take a film from overseas, remake it with a couple of popular actors (or at least actors that the audience is familiar with) and voilà, people will part with their hard earned to see it. It doesn't matter to them that the remake is often a watered down version of the film its redoing. These people won't ever bother to check out the original so they're unaware of what they might be missing.
Not that I'm saying that I think all the original foreign films that are remade are good films and all the remakes are bad films. But generally speaking I have a good point here eh?

There's a film that was made in South Korea back in 2006 called The Host (괴물 - Gwoemul) which I happen to think is bloody brilliant, and is one of my very favourite monster films ever. It was a huge hit in its native country, and yep, looks like its gonna get the Western remake treatment. If you, like me, happen to think the US remake of The Ring was pretty average, and the Pirates of the Caribbean sequels to be exercises in ham-fisted twattery, then you'll understand why I take such umbrage at the notion of Gore Verbinski quite possibly lousing up one of my favourite films. He's only slated to produce this remake, but still.
The point is, The Host is an awesome film as it is. It doesn't need to be remade*. It set a new record in South Korean box office performance during its opening weekend. By the end of its theatrical run in South Korea it had sold over 13 million tickets, in a country with a population of 48.5 million. This from wikipedia: With a limited American release starting March 11, 2007, The Host garnered very positive reviews, with a 92% "Fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes. In addition it was ranked one of the top films of 2007 on Metacritic with a score of 85. The key words here being "limited American release". Its not a film that deals with esoteric elements of South Koran culture. You could take the plot and apply it to any country and culture. If it had been promoted more in the USA it would have done far better. I guarantee it. I'm psychic, remember?
*But then the studio remaking it won't stand to make any money off of it now will they?


Can you imagine a band you really like releasing an album, then a different band re-records the same album and releases it and a whole bunch of people go and buy the remake album because its more palatable? Of course, there are cover songs all over the place, but a whole album? Oh, wait...
OK, what if people started rewriting classic books? Umm, ahh.
And of course there are the vast amount of copies of paintings and such out there.

Will there be any place for original creative works in the future? Will everything be a copy of a copy of a copy? Will our cultural artefacts be homogenised to Big Mac™ proportions? I dunno about you, but such a scenario, as far fetched as it may seem at this point in history, scares the living daylights outta me.

Well guys, I reckon I've said all I need to say on this subject today. Thanks for bearing with me while I had this little rant. I don't usually like to get up on a soapbox about things to this extent, but this is a subject that is very dear to my heart, and quite possibly something far more enjoyable to read than other topics that really piss me off, such as humankind's intolerance to its fellow humans and so forth.

To finally ram home the points I have been trying to make today, here is a three page list of List of 60 Upcoming Horror Remakes. That's right, sixty. And those are just the films that go under the horror category (I dunno about Total Recall being on that list though, its more of a sci-fi thriller innit). A big chunk of these films are films that I believe to be quite fine just the way they are thankyouverrahmuch.

Read it and fucking weep.

⊙﹏⊙ Chloé