Remakes & Hollywood

Remakes.....the very word can have two effects, it can make you smile, or cringe. Sometimes remakes are a good thing, they can be an improvement upon the original, or they can be just a more modern telling of the original. Other times, they are, how do I say this nicely....TOTAL GARBAGE.

Hollywood, since the early days has always done remakes, and the results are a mixed bag. Some movies transcend time and can be remade, some are not meant to be remade, and all a remake does is show you just how great the original was.

Look how many times "Dracula" has been remade. Now I am not talking vampire movies, I mean the specific character of Dracula. Each version shared similar qualities as their predecessor, but always managed to have their own style, and for the most part, stayed true to the character. Sometimes a remake can be true to the original, but simply does not have the same effect as the original. Such a case is "Frankenstein". The original 1931 film is a classic masterpiece, as well as its 1935 sequel, "Bride Of Frankenstein". In 1994, Kenneth Branagh did a remake and while the attempt was noble, and there were good things about the film, it just did not have the same impact as the original. So as you can see from just two examples, remakes are a funny thing.

The Good: Ok, I am gonna talk about a few movies that were good remakes.
"King Kong"- This movie has been remade twice, once in 1976, and again in 2005 by Peter Jackson. The 1976 version starred Jeff Bridges, Charles Grodin and a then unknown Jessica Lange. There were things about this version I liked, and overall I can say I liked the movie, but it was not nearly as good as the original. The visual effects were just ok, and the relationship between Kong and Jessica Lange's character (Dwan) seemed forced and I just didn't buy it. They also set the movie in modern times, which seemed ok at the time but looking back, it was a mistake. The 2005 version, on the other hand, is a great example of a remake that works. It was at the same time a tribute to the original and a great movie on its own. The casting was great. Jack Black was a great Carl Denham, Adrien Brody was great as Jack Driscoll, although I didn't understand why he was changed from a sailor to a playwright, but that is a minor gripe. Naomi Watts made a great Ann Darrow as well, and the love story between her and Kong worked this time around. The setting was also key to this movie working, as it was set in 1933, the same year the original was made. The natives of Skull island were savage and scary, another nice touch. The visual effects were top notch, Kong, the dinosaurs, the giant insects (yuch, I hate bugs). Even the theater in NY where Kong appears looks exactly as it did in the original. Overall this is a perfect example of a director having respect for the original, while at the same time adding his own touches to it and making it his own.
"The Thing"- Originally titled "The Thing From Another World", this 1951 film centers on a team of scientists at an arctic outpost that are being stalked by an alien creature. It scared moviegoers when it came out, and with good reason. Heck when I first saw it when I was a kid, it scared me! The scientists find a humanoid type body frozen in a block of ice. The creature thaws, accidentally, and the horror starts. You hardly saw the creature and when you did it was always a scary moment. The arctic setting also adds to the dread, creating a feeling of total isolation from the rest of the world. The movie set a standard for horror films for years to come, many times it was never matched. That is, until director John Carpenter released his version in 1982. It followed the same basic story as the original, but the creature was way different. The creature is discovered by Norwegian scientists, also in the arctic, and finds its way to an American outpost in the same region. The creature is able to take any form it wishes, and this just added to the feeling of total paranoia, nobody knew if the guy next to you was the creature, and there was no way to tell until it attacked. Eventually, one of the scientists concludes that if this creature were to escape, it could basically destroy the world, and that could not be allowed to happen. The tension in this movie was so high, I remember jumping, and sitting there feeling almost as tense as the characters. This film took the idea of the original and amped it up, and in my opinion, was even better than the original. A rare thing, but this one does it like very few remakes have.

Ugh....now onto
The bad: Unfortunately, there are more bad remakes than good, and I could probably rant on and on about all the bad remakes that have been done, but I am going to talk about two that are outstanding for me because of how much I love the originals.
"Planet of the Apes"- The classic Sci-fi movie with Charlton Heston, is one of my favorite movies, and when I heard that Tim Burton was going to remake it, I was cautiously excited. Burton is a good director so I figured in his hands this one had a chance to be good. Oh how wrong I was. First off, Mark Wahlberg is a good actor, but let's face it, he aint no Charlton Heston. They changed all of the characters from the original. Gone were Cornelius, Zira, Dr. Zaius. Even Charlton Heston's character was renamed Leo Davidson. In the original, humans were the animals, nothing more, and the apes were the rulers of the planet. The remake had the humans on the same intelligence level as the apes, changing the whole scope of the story making it a war between apes and humans. They tried making a love story between Whalberg and a human looking female ape and it was lame. Even the ending, which in the original was a complete shock, and a perfect way to end the movie. Burton tried to make the remake's ending have the same effect, and it didn't even come close, it was just stupid. The makeup in the remake was impressive, but not much more than in the original, and that itself is pretty sad. This movie had no business being remade.
"The Honeymooners"- Ok, where to start with this trainwreck. TV to movie remakes are hard enough to do, and most of the time they are lame ("Bewithced" anyone?). There are the occasional good ones, I thought the movie of "The Beverly Hillbillies" was pretty faithful to the series, and had a lot of good funny moments. But when I heard that they were making a Honeymooners movie, I was skeptical from the get go. The TV show is a classic that has seen no equal, it is one of my favorite shows of all time, I can watch it over and over and still laugh every time. What made the show great was the characters, and their devotion to each other no matter what. Well, the movie really had none of those elements. They were the characters in name only. Yea, Ralph was a bus driver, Ed worked in the sewers. There was the occasional line taken right from the show, and that was the only way you knew it was the Honeymooners. Sex jokes? LAME, Norton not even sounding like Norton? LAME. Some people didn't like the fact that it was a black cast, and that was not even a problem for me. Cedric the Entertainer is a funny guy, and probably could have done a good Kramden, but he didn't. What sucked was that the actors did not act like the characters they were supposed to be. It was as far from the Honeymooners as you could get. Like I said before, in name only. The only satisfaction I got from that movie was watching it tank at the box office, which means that the few who saw it found it as lame as I did.

Maybe one day Hollywood can get it right on a more consistent basis. The thing about remakes is to have respect for your source material which is not always the case. Also, there are some movies that should just not be remade, the aforementioned Planet Of the Apes, is definitely one of them. Looking at the remakes Hollywood has in the pipeline, I have mixed feelings, most I feel don't need to be remade. Take a look: "Robocop" (oh god no don't destroy that great film), "Red Dawn" (probably won't translate well because the cold war is long over), "Highlander" (after a bunch of lame sequels, why not ruin the original?), the list goes on and on. Am I the only one that feels imagination in Hollywood has gone the way of the dinosaur? What are your thoughts on remakes, your favorites, the ones you hate, the ones you never want to see? I know I wouldn't mind seeing the remake go away for a long time.