First off I know this isn't news, view it if you will as an editorial, a guest editorial written by one of you, the common everyday movie fan. The guy or gal standing in that line at the multiplex weekend after weekend hoping to be flown away to new and wonderful experiences via the motion picture screen. I don't know, but when ol' Father Geek read that plea, "Let me remember the Great Escape as the 1st film I saw with my Grandfather" it touched me, so I print it here hoping it may touch one or two exec's out there and in so doing slow the tide of classic remakes, maybe just a little, one studio at a time...
PLEASE TELL THEM TO STOP!
I refer of course to all these remakes that are planned, or being shot at the moment.
I have one question.
Why?
The Great Escape (Steve McQueen on the motorbike IS that movie), Get Carter(Caine is Carter), The Italian Job, Mean Machine, Planet Of The Apes, Omega Man etc. If these movies are so cool, why not just enhance them and show them back on the big screen? Who wouldn't love to go see Jaws again 30 or 40 feet wide, or any of the originals? And when has a remake ever really been any good? I know you have "contacts" and I beg of you, make them see that they are killing precious memories I carry from my youth, that we all do. I want to remember The Great Escape as the 1st film I saw with my Granfather, not Bruce Willis shooting all the Germans and escaping via hot air balloon (which I can just see the suits salivating over)
I can see the meetings now if Orson Welles proposed Citizen Kane "Sure Orson, but nobody will know what Rosebud is, let's put a snappy prologue in, some guns. And does he have to die at the end? It's a downer, I dont know how that will play in Idaho." They are ripping the guts from movies that said something, and are turning them into pure commerce. This shouldn't happen, there are so many undiscovered writers out there with brilliant scripts - Give them a chance, don't rape classics like they are doing.
Did they learn nothing from The New Avengers? Don't fuck with a classic. They even needed Rene Russo topless to attempt to beat the original "Thomas Crown Affair". I'm not complaining about that, just that there was no need to do it. How long did "Anna and the King" last, its already forgotten. For all its effects was "The Haunting" any real improvement over Robert Wise's original? Did "Mighty Joe Young" really offer up anything of substance the original didn't? Gus Van Sant with "Pyscho", I rest my case.
So, in summary -
STOP REMAKING CLASSICS, restore the originals and PUT THEM ON THE SCREEN AGAIN.
If you show it, WE will come. Is it just me that feels like this? I sometimes think it is, sadly.
Thanks for letting me vent.
Andy Pandy
