Published at: Feb. 26, 2009, 1:11 a.m. CST by quint
Ahoy, squirts! Quint here. It has seemed for a while that Hollywood has gone remake crazy, but since FRIDAY THE 13TH had such a huge weekend it seems to have spurred a crazy remake rush.
I'm running two remake stories this morning. I'm not sure what to think about this. On the one hand, I've been hearing for years how the original Wolfgang Petersen family fantasy movie isn't a pimple on the ass of the original book... But I've avoided reading it. I honestly don't want to tarnish my love of the movie. That's the second hand there... I love it. It's a kid's movie that we don't get to see these days. It's serious, it's fucked up and scary... I mean, the two big villains of the movie is a godawful creature of nightmare, the G'mork... an evil wolf... and a disturbingly adult and heady concept of The Nothing. I go back and forth on which one freaked me out the most. I mean, as scary as the wolf is, a physical presence, there's something terrifying of everything you know, love and even hate just undoing... blinking out of all existence and memory.
And don't get me started on Morla or The Swamps of Sadness... fuckin' Artax... that horse sinking still makes me cry...
But even with all that, I keep hearing how great the book is and how the movie just scratched the surface. My worry is that an adult, real-risk family fantasy movie can't be made within the system today, so that we're looking at the very real possibility of a remake further disappointing the novel's fans and at the same time thrown in the ever growing "raped my childhood" category.
So, with all that out there, the news might not be all that bleak. Right now nobody has the rights yet, but both Kennedy/Marshall and Appian Way (DiCaprio's production company) are in talks with Warner Bros to remake the movie. And that's good news. If there's any studio putting out ballsy movies these days it's Warners.
What are your thoughts?
