I posted a thing on my dumb Tumblr thing about how awful the Stallone Judge Dredd movie was, and a lot of people asked me if I’d seen the 2012 Dredd with Karl Urban. I hadn’t, and didn’t intend to, for reasons that will become clear shortly. So many people recommended it to me, though, and it had such a great group of creative people behind it, I gave it a chance … and I loved it. Here’s what I wrote about it this morning:
I hate reboot culture. I hate that studios remake movies that were perfectly fine the first time around, simply because they’re too afraid to take a chance on something new, different and unproven.
That said, in an instance like Dredd, where the original film adaptation was a catastrophic failure of flaming shit, I should be willing to make exceptions.
I should be, but I’m usually not, because I’m stubborn. So when I posted about how I didn’t want to watch the 2012 version of the film, about two dozen people urged me to reconsider. I decided to take a chance (you know, like studios won’t), and watched it last night. I am so glad that I did, because I loved everything about it. A lot of fans fixate on Dredd never taking off the helmet, which I understand, but I don’t think that’s its strongest selling point. What I loved about it was how it felt like a proper motion picture adaptation of the 2000 A.D comics I read in the 80s, and the Games Workshop games I played from that universe. The city blocks felt massive. The Judges felt powerful. The relationship between Dredd and Anderson felt real. She didn’t need him to save her, even when he was trying to. The design of the entire picture, from the costumes to the sets to the little details like graffiti was pitch-perfect. And the photography was sensational.
I felt like it started to wobble a little bit in the third act, but like I originally wrote yesterday, I was on board by that point so I was willing to go along with it and let it be. I’m guessing that there won’t be any sequels, or we would have heard about it by now. If that’s the case, it’s a bummer, because I’d like to see these characters and this universe again … but maybe it’s for the best that this film can simply exist as its own thing, without being tainted by a sequel that lets us down (OH HAI THE MATRIX). Or maybe it’s a tragedy that Dredd won’t get its Aliens or T2. I don’t know. I’m not a doctor.
So now I’m thinking about other movies that missed the point of their source material (Running Man and The Shining come to mind, though they stand on their own in their own glorious ways), and trying to figure out what other pictures I’d remake, if I could pass a universal law that requires two new movies be made for every remake, because I am a powerful, tyrannical king.
Following these rules, what would you remake, and why? Show your work.
Watchmen. Q.E.D.
Well the movie was a literal scene for scene replica of the book so any remake would have to depart pretty much from that.
Well, except for the ending, of course.
If you discount the ultra violence and that the Tales from the Black Freighter was missing
Absolutely – and V For Vendetta while we are doing Alan Moore’s material
The Last Starfighter I think would be incredible to remake. The technological innovations in movie making would super enhance an already awesome concept. Plus maybe 10 people saw it when it came out so adapting it for new audiences in the modern era would be a big hit.
I don’t know that I would remake that one. Yes, the effects would be better today, but…. it just wouldn’t be the same. It was an amazing movie on it’s own, and remaking just so more people will see it is the wrong intent.
Well doing a remake of a movie doesn’t harm the original, per say. If anything doing a remake or reboot brings more attention to the original that would’ve otherwise remained forgotten. For example The Departed didn’t hurt Infernal Affairs as a reboot of something already awesome and only brought more attention to its parent.
I think you may not be on the same wavelength as Wil on the remake philosophy.
I agree with Cyroden here – While new special effects would no doubt make it easier to watch, particularly in this time of HD and 4k, the story and film itself are well executed and a product of their times.
Remakes aren’t about copying the original frame to frame. It’s about adapting something for a new audience and Last Starfighter is ripe.
Sorry got to disagree (partially) – Modern technology would enhance that aspect of The Last Starfighter but at the heart of that movie there is a heart. So what you need to ensure is the story and the characters must be believable first – substance over style. But of course that is just my opinion and I also like movies full of huge explosions and effects.
You would have to rewrite it as a guy who is very good at a console game rather than an arcade game
Or, more likely considering the potential tie-ins, at a mobile game.
shudder
No remake needed. The leads are still alive… sequel. Alex Rogan returns to Earth because the universe needs more starfighters.
I agree with that. No remake needed. Let’s continue the story. Let’s make it a good story though lol 🙂
I’d rather see Armada be made. I’m sure if Ready Player One is done right, Armada will be just around the corner. (Wil did a great job on both audio books)
Armada is going to be made into a movie. Ernest Cline supposedly received a seven figure advance from Universal for the rights, 2 and a half years before it was even published. Ernest Cline is kicking ass.
Glad you gave it a go, too many wouldn’t. I’ve said to friends in the past that Stallone’s Judge Dredd looked like a 2000AD/Dredd film and Urban’s Dredd felt like a 2000AD/Dredd film. there wee rumours of Dredd being a netflix series but I’m not sure how accurate that is.
Total Recall. Oh darn…too late. Bladerunner…whoops again. Basically anything by Philip K Dick that actually stays true to the stories (although granted, like Running Man and Shining, the originals of these two are pretty damn good on their own – they just stray a long way from the source.)
Alas Dredd isn’t getting a sequel despite the scripts already having been written by Alex Garland. Basically the Stallone film cast too long a shadow and not enough people gave the 2012 version a chance until it was too late. And I’m embarrassed to admit I was one of them and now I regret not getting behind a fantastic indie film when I should have
There’s a certain irony to the situation. So many viewers complain about studios not taking chances, but many of those same viewers will turn around and refuse to take chances on seeing films. We see the problem on the other side without realizing that we’re also part of the problem.
I would have to say I would want a remake of Wing Commander. It was so awful back in the day that I think that ANY attempt to remake it would be better than the original 😛
And it held up even worse over time. I gave in to the urge to watch it again recently, thinking it couldn’t have been as bad as I remembered. It was. I think this is a great addition to the “remake it properly” list.
I want a Spawn remake that borders on horror/suspenseful while keeping action alive when needed. I also want a bit of the film to have some good crime drama from the Sam & Twitch side.
Smokey and the Bandit. Seriously. My favourite movie from childhood but considering the popularity of the Fast and Furious franchise, this seems like a no-brainer to adapt into a modern high energy, smartass endless car chase. Done right (unlike those 80s TV show adaptation abominations) it could be a blast. Here’s my work on the subject, as per request. http://www.acrockofschmidt.com/2015/12/16/the-1977-movie-that-really-needs-a-reboot/
Yes! You could cast someone like Matthew McConaughey or Josh Holloway as Bandit, and Alison Brie as Carrie.
I, Robot
League of Extraordinary Gentlemen
Hulk
A.I.
Bicentennial Man
The Golden Compass
All movies with great source material but terrible execution. All movies that tried to adapt the material to the “studio formula”. The studio formula doesn’t work for every film. I would argue that it no longer works for any film; we’ve just seen it too much.
Bicentennial Man was pretty true to a movie length Asimov style robot story.
Unlike I, Robot which was a glorified commercial that managed to make Stallone’s Dredd feel authentic.
YES, please try again on the Golden Compass! The script and pacing were just so off!
Avatar: The Last Airbender comes to mind. That was… not a good adaption of it.
+1
The source material is great. Making it into a movie went so wrong.
Similarly, The Golden Compass. You can’t make a His Dark Materials movie and try to tiptoe around the religious or moral quandaries just because you thought the set dressing was cool.
You know, I’m not into this, mainly because the animated Avatar series is so good that I don’t really need to see a live-action. Not sure it adds anything. And yeah, that movie was so . . . . Sigh.
You mentioned the Matrix. Here is my opinion of the Matrix’s Awesomeness Quotient:
Matrix 1 = 133% Awesome
Matrix 2 = 166% Awesome
Matrix 3 = 1% Awesome (99% Sucky)
If I was granted the all-powerful dictatorship over movie making I’d have Hollywood produce a remake of Highlander. I loved the general concept of the 1986 film of a Scottish warrior that lived forever. Maybe it was just the fact that it was filled with great actors to support Christopher Lambert like Sean Connery (everyone knows) and Clancy Brown (everyone should know but unfortunately doesn’t) but I felt the movie was well done and then tarnished by a string of just awful, awful, awful (awful cannot be emphasized enough) sequels.
With the advancement in technology I’d like to see what could be done with the flashback sequences and the fight sequences. I also think that the film could certainly put more emphasis on the emotional strain living forever can place on a person. I know there have been talks of rebooting Highlander and I’d like to see it done.
Highlander 2 is the worst movie I’ve ever seen lol
I thought the same thing until I saw Highlander: The Source. It makes Highlander 2 look like Terminator 2.
^This.
Came here to say just this. Highlander was so obviously conceived as a one-off, the creators seemed to be surprised by its success and didn’t know what to do . So they did something terrible, The series, in fairness, wasn’t bad at all once it hit its stride.
A full reboot, knowing what we know now, with the improvements in technology, and with an eye on a consistent mythology and a series of films (or a Netflix series) could be awesome.
Actually, a really good Wizard of Earthsea remake would be worth seeing.
I’ve always love the idea of remaking bad movies (that had potential). Personally, I have a partially formed idea in my head for how I would remake the Mortal Kombat franchise.
Also, have you seen SF Debris’ reviews? His main thing is actually Star Trek, but he also does a lot of other things, including SF movies. The intro to Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen includes a long bit about what makes a good sequel vs a bad one, and he even uses Aliens, Terminator 2, and the Matrix series as examples. I haven’t seen this movie, but from what you said seeing the charaters in the world again, I think it would be the kinda movie that could get a sequel.
The reason remakes/reboots are acceptable is because, as with The Princess Bride, a movie is The Best Parts. And The Best Parts are different for different people.
Making a scene-for-scene remake (as happened with Psycho) is idiotic, and generally doomed to failure. But when you look at, say, rebooting Spider-Man, you have people involved who focus on very different aspects.
There are also movies where someone thinks they could have done it so much better — let’s pick one that keeps having rumours, Highlander. While I enjoyed that movie a whole lot, the truth is it isn’t particularly coherent, and it would be possible to pick the bones of it, and make a better, more cohesive story from it. Possibly even one with accents that match the characters.
Yet True Grit got rave reviews despite being an almost shot for shot reshoot of a classic.
Avatar: The Last Airbender, so quickly it’d make your head spin. There’s a lot of great fan-made vids that show how excellent it could look. And I’d use a cast that actually reflects the characters.
Remake culture could have many more virtues if it was done out of excitement and love for the material rather than fear and complacency. All of the Austen and Shakespearen adaptations, or even something like the existence of both Jack Nicholson’s and Heath Ledger’s Jokers.
That said, I strongly support your universal law.
You speak of Austen adaptations, but I’ve never seen a version of “Pride and Prejudice” made with as much love and respect to the source material as the 1995 A&E (remember them?) 6-part miniseries starring Jennifer Ehle and Colin Firth. Every time they try to bring out a movie based on that book, I yell out to my TV, “Why?!? WHY even try to when you KNOW you can’t condense that story properly to 2 hours?!?” and throw something soft (can’t break the idiot box, now, can I?).
Hawk the slayer.
Just make it a bit sharper around the edges and add in some weta sized armies in the background.
Good grief, that’s taken me back. I loved that film as a kid in the 80s. I totally didn’t realise that the Abbess was Annette Crosbie (Victor’s wife in UK sitcom “One Foot in the Grave”)
I think rather than give a specific example there should be a basic rule. If the original scored over 7 on IMDB then you shouldn’t be allowed to remake it, or reboot it, or recast it for at least 30 years. And under my rule you have to make a strong specific case for the artistic merit of any sequel, you don’t get an automatic sequel because you make money.
That rule would have saved us from the horrors of all the Superman and latest Spiderman reboots, Predators, Footloose, Planet of the Apes, Rollerball, Arthur, FAME, Karate Kid (if Jackie Chan’s best ever screen performance can’t save a movie you know you are in trouble)…. the list is almost endless.
OK, applying my rule to the success of Keaton’s Batman might have cost us the Heath Ledger’s virtuoso joker performance, but I am almost willing to give that one up in trade for the hundreds of hours of my life I would get back.
And now that I have hopefully made my case, I am going to add a twist to your problem. Newer isn’t always better. A lot of the non-sequel crap that is churned out should never have been made either. It is just that it doesn’t have an existing fanbase to upset so it is more likely to die quietly. Even Doom and The Golden Compass with big budgets, big casts and big fanbases to build on make less of a splash on the upset list than a lot of the recent messy reboots.
PS You do realise your fame and subsequent career is built on a reboot and that makes the underlying premise of your whole post more than a little hypocritical?!
PPS I think Dredd has some major faults too, and Judge Dredd has some (not many but some) redeeming qualities.
I hear this whenever I bring up my distaste for reboots. I disagree. TNG was never a reboot or a remake. It was a further exploration of the Star Trek universe, set a hundred years after the original series.
I could apply that same description to Judge Dredd, or Dredd, or Batman Forever, or Doom….all arguable as extensions of their existing universe.
I think you are trying to create a line that doesn’t exist. Especially when you consider the cross-over of Deforest Kelly in the pilot, if that doesn’t scream reboot I would love to hear what you think the condition set is.
Notably I am a TNG fan but I would be willing to give it up until the 30-year rule passed in order to fit my own rule set.
Deforest Kelly tied TNG to TOS but doesn’t make it a reboot. The characters in TNG were entirely different. It was a continuation of the Star Trek universe but unique unto itself. I would say the condition set to be declared a remake/reboot is use of the same primary characters.
I would classify TNG as sequel rather than a reboot. If they had gone back to the five year mission with a new Kirk, Spock, etc. it would have been a reboot.
Exactly. All of the Treks until the latest piles of excrement reboot films have been sequels (or prequel) and at least tried to maintain some continuity to the original. Some more successfully than others, but calling TNG a reboot of TOS is completely off base.
I would click ‘like’ on this answer if that were possible. lol
Stand By Me was a reboot?
Starship Troopers, because the only things Verhoeven kept from the original were character names. I mean, how can you have a concept like the Powersuits and not even use it?!
I’d like an actual good adaptation of The Dark Is Rising, probably. One that doesn’t try to turn the books into some sort of weird Harry Potter clone, but lets it live and breathe on its own terms and is willing to invest into children’s fantasy that is dark and spooky, but not bleak.
That times infinity. I never watched the movie – I read the reviews and decided not to waste my time/energy/blood pressure. (Although, the DirecTV “parental info” for The Seeker is snark at its best.)
I saw a Radio Times article yesterday, though, that says Sky is planning a TV adaptation, for late 2017 at the earliest, but no details yet on whether it’s a one-off, series, or what. I’m very cautiously optimistic.
I’d forgotten about this one! That movie was so terrible. You’re right, they were totally just trying to bank in on the magical kid craze. I remember watching the trailer and thinking they needed an asterisk after the title, with a small footnote saying “Very, very, very loosely based on The Dark is Rising. We basically wafted the script in the general direction of the book and called it a day.”
Starship Troopers. The twist: mine the source material for ideas instead of throwing out nearly everything but the title and some character names. I have a strong sense that there’s a good, smart, hard-SF movie to be made from Heinlein’s book, and they certainly didn’t make it last time around.
Starship Troopers is the obvious remake. Make Juan Rico a Filipino the way it was supposed to be, and include professor Dubois.
I remember being fairly excited about Starship Troopers until I read that Berhoven was directing it. After that, I knew it was going to be about Nazis, because nearly all of his work is about Nazis.
I’d love to remake the Star Wars prequels, with a different take on the young Anakin and his fall to the Dark Side (starting as more of a young Han Solo-esque character, closer in age to Obiwan, who then becomes a great hero …except to the Jedi. When he finally falls, you actually feel he has some justification for it, even though it’s terrible and tragic).
A sequel to Dredd, where he faces the Dark Judges …obviously! (Hearing Urban say “Gaze into the fist of Dredd” would be nergasmic!).
I’d also love to have a crack at Dune.
I’d remake The Black Cauldron, though probably as part of a larger Chronicles of Prydain movie series. Disney recently reupped the rights to The Chronicles of Prydain series so maybe they’ll do it. Actually, the current Disney remake/sequel/companion piece trend needs acknowledging. The movies aren’t always good, but it’s just interesting to see Disney who most people see as the creators of the cultural canon for these public domain stories they’re using say “Hey, there are different ways to tell these stories”.
How much leeway do I have? Is there a minimum time from original release that I need to meet? Can I propose other mandatory restrictions? Because:
Fantastic Four, with the following conditions:
– The IP rights return to Marvel Studios/ Disney.
– The movie then is allowed to take place in the MCU.
– The actors are actually encouraged to read the comics/ original source material, instead of being told – “We aren’t doing that.”
– The movie stays true to the characters, rather than entirely rewriting them.
I was thinking Fantastic Four as well, but the perfect version has already been done, and it was a hit. The only mystery is why they changed the name to The Incredibles.
I thought that Martin Scorcese was going to remake “The George Gershwin Story”.
Alan Alda’s dad, Robert, did a good job playing Gershwin in the original film.
“Plan 9 From Outer Space” should be remade.
Oh, not “Plan 9 From Outer Space.” It’s so bad, it’s a cultural touchstone. And it is absolutely perfect as it is. It would be like remaking “Manos” for pitty’s sake.
No, Manos isn’t being remade.
There’s a sequel of sorts in the works.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1840778752/manos-returns
I hear somebody just remade Plan 9, actually.
Battlefield Earth! ducks
They should remake Spiderman, Superman, the Hulk, and the Fantastic Four, because those clearly have not been rebooted enough times………
But seriously, one movie that was otherwise popular that I thought really dropped the ball at the end was Stardust. The book is one of my absolute favorites, and to me the pivotal scene was where Dunstan comes back through the wall having completed his quest and meets with Victoria Forrester. In the book the scene was really moving, and the movie just completely trivialized it to “Oh, get over yourself”. If you could remake the movie and fix that scene it would be great.
Just out of curiosity, what did you think of the J.J. Abrams Star Trek reboots? I know you had a cameo in the first one.
ps…Hope you and your beautiful family are having a great weekend, Wil.
The countdown is on for the new Star Trek stamps….yay !
Dragonball Evolution. I love Dragonball and Dragonball Z,and they have great potential for a good live -action film, but the live-action film that was actually made is so bad that calling it a steaming pile of dog crap is an insult to actual steaming piles of dog crap the world over.
I would readapt “The Neverending Story”, even though the 80s movie was not bad, there were stuff in the book which they couldn’t do during the time. And that is possible with modern CGI and modern movie technology.
Also the second half of the book was badly adopted by “Neverending Story II”, so I would really love to see two new “Neverending Story” movies which would produced back to back and use the original cliffhanger-“ending” of the first half of the book.
I watched “The Neverending Story” with my daughter recently and found it hugely disappointing – definitely not the classic I remember and room to make a much better version.
I feel the same with the Punisher movies. I feel abandoning the PG13 restraint helped with the third movie.
However I’m holding out for a Punisher Netflix series now…
Heh….you might want to give Netflix Daredevil Season 2 a look….
This. So, totally, this. I have had numerous conversations with people about how much I really, really hope that Deadpool teaches the lesson to Hollywood that you don’t have to neuter your source material. You can make an R rated, faithful to the material adaptation and people will still go see it. Punisher has been so abused by the “appeal to all audiences” myth that, sadly, I don’t know if it can be revived. It might suffer from the same fate as Dredd on that point.
Unfortunately it seems that Deadpool taught Hollywood that rated R sells. So instead of creating something faithful to source material, they are instead going to try and make more rater R movies.
Word is Fox wants to make a rated R version of Fantastic Four.
2 options.
1) complete remake of buckaroo banzai across the 8th dimension
2) actually do buckaroo banzai vs world crime league
while the original has a tremendous cast, a fresh approach with updated fx and a light touch (think shane black writes and directs) could make it amazing. simply doing the promised sequel could accomplish the same thing, but i think a reboot could work very well.
“Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Heart’s Club Band.” The one Beatles movie made by somebody other than the Beatles (until that other one came out). I’ve always been bothered by the fact that the movie, while featuring great performances, feels like an afterthought. It’s like somebody had the idea to finally make a movie from Sgt. Pepper’s, then got wrapped up in selling the soundtrack and forgot that the film was actually supposed to entertain people. I think you could take the music, new performances, and even the original film’s concept and turn them into something worthwhile.
Honestly, I’d love to see more classic concept albums redone as movies in the Sgt. Pepper vein: Kiss’ The Elder, or TAFKA Prince’s Around The World In A Day, or Rush’s 2112. The thing is, would it be better to divide the roles, in that you have the musical stars performing the musical numbers, but then have lookalike actors do the acting? As I remember, audiences grumbled at Oh Brother Where Art Thou? when George Clooney’s character sang and his singing voice was dubbed.
I felt like ‘Judge Dredd’ was pitched to the studios as having a ‘Total Recall’ (not the new one obviously) meets ‘Cobra’ feel, which to me would also explain why Stallone was cast, as a way to distance the movie from the comic book adaptations that studios had done to that point which were still incredibly cartoonish.
Watching the original I felt as though someone at the studio said to the filmmakers “I know we bought the movie that you pitched, and we love your vision, but you really need to make this funnier so it’ll appeal to a wider audience, comedies make bank and a buddy-cop comedy would be even better! Plus, this is based on a comic right, so isn’t it supposed to be for kids anyways? Oh, and that Rob Schneider guy is hot right now, so if we use him, his fans will watch it… Guaranteed box office gold!. Do those, and we’ll give you your budget.”
I also loved the new ‘Dredd’. I was glad that this time around they had a lead actor that truly loved the character, we increasingly see that it makes for a better movie… Not always, but in my opinion it feels like it does and this one definitely felt that way to me. Also it was (mostly) people making reasonable choices based on the situation, rather than getting lazy and creating conflict by having supposedly smart people making stupid out-of-character decisions.
I also loved that the female lead (Anderson) felt almost like it was written as a male partner that they simply cast a woman for. By this I mean that she wasn’t written as a damsel-in-distress, or a fumbling sidekick that really should have no right to be there, but rather she was a real partner who earned the position.
I don’t like most remakes, but if I had to take one of my cherished childhood favorites, I’d love to see a faithful update to ‘The Last Starfighter’. I think that we now have the technology to make the space combat scenes look amazing. It was a film far ahead of time.
Small Soldiers. Because it would hit a certain nostalgia button REAL hard, have great marketing potential, and the merchandise tie-ins alone could fund the original films I’d follow it with, per your mandate: a drama set in the inner city centred around the family of a young black man fighting for justice in the aftermath of his shooting death by a cop who subsequently turned his gun on himself, and a Western about a charismatic gambler who cheats at poker.
… I maybe got more into your justification for allowing reboots than was warranted.
American cinema has dumbed itself down. It’s bad enough they’re remaking old movies, but they’re also turning old TV shows into movies. “The Flintstones”? “Bewitched”? Seriously?! The original “Stepford Wives” was creepy enough with Katherine Ross. They didn’t need to do a cheesy rehash with Nicole Kidman. How many “Transformers” sequels are necessary? I’ve seen many film excerpts that are more special effects than anything.
Several years ago Clint Eastwood opined that he’d like to see Hollywood return to the socially conscious attitude it adopted in the late 1950s and carried through to the early 1990s. But it’s been a cesspool of stupidity, violence and flashing CGI lights ever since.
The Shining was remade as a TV miniseries and it was spectacular. They pulled off the crux of the story — that Jack was a good but troubled man who was driven insane by the hotel (as opposed to being batshit crazy from the get-go) — really really well. Your heart broke for Jack as well as for Danny and Wendy, as it should have. If you haven’t ever seen it, I highly recommend it. This, by the way, comes from someone who is a HUGE Stephen King fan and is almost never happy with screen adaptations of his books. There are the rare few that are worth it though … Stand By Me (partially thanks to you!) and Misery along with this version of The Shining top my list.
As an aside, I’d LOVE to see a good screen version of Needful Things. I’m betting that Benedict Cumberbatch could do a great job with the role of Leland Gaunt.
The Last Starfighter. I would like to see a Sequel or a re-make of this movie.The graphics were a little ahead of it’s time when it was released and can be so much grander in scale in today’s age. The movie ended on a note begging for a sequel, but has not come to pass.
I’d also love to do a period version of The War of the Worlds. Something like Sharpe meets steampunk Martians.
Blade needs a reboot, badly.
I have high hopes now that the rights are back in Marvel’s hands, but i will miss Wesley Snipes (i doubt they’ll cast him again given all the problem he caused during the production of Blade Trinity) in the title role. Either way, we’re definitely ready for another superhero movie with a black lead and a character arc that deals with trying to find a place between two very different worlds.
Last House on the Left. The first was so depressing I have only seen it three times. The new one is updated, fresh, and doesn’t have the same depressing vibe even though the subject matter is dark. This is just my opinion, your mileage may vary and you may not even like horror but to me, it’s a good remake and one of the few that can hold its own to the original.
ITS OBVIOUS! CatWomen! Total flop with Halle Berry in 2004 and it should have been amazing. I think they should reboot it with all new cast and everything, with TIM BURTON at the wheel as director and producer!!!!!!!! He killed it with Batman 1 & 2 in the 80’s and CatWomen is mostly a villian with a streak of antihero and he could show that correctly. It could even star Camron Bicodova from Gotham. She’s killin it as CatWomen on tv and once the production got off the floor she’d be the right age by then.
So the rules are a movie based on well known source material that missed the mark and needs a remake?
I enjoyed the movie but I’d love to see a Logan’s Run that wasn’t post-apocalyptic. I don’t think it didn’t need it.
s/didn\’t//g
The problem with that is that Logan’s Run (the book) was a post-apocalyptic story. The gun was cooler (had different rounds that did different functions), and their survival outside the city was more problematic (I remember a scene where an honest-to-god ounce of flesh was required as payment – but then, I read the book way back when I was in high school 35 years ago…)
My druthers would be a remake of the Never Ending Story, not because the original was bad or failed some deep philosophical point, but because the darker issues could be explored with more maturity and a fuller sense of depth. Today’s audience is better suited to that sort of remake. Not unlike the rebirth of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, or the Alice In Wonderlands. Just my 2¢.
I loved Urban’s Dredd. But an additional thing that hurt it was that Indonesia’s The Raid: Redemption was essentially the same story in a modern setting. The Raid was released less than a year before Dredd and actually made a profit over its budget, unlike Dredd. Even though Dredd was more than likely in pre-production long before The Raid, it seemed like Dredd copied The Raid’s story instead of the other way around. Both are intense movies… The Raid seemed far more intense to me, while Dredd compensated with sci-fi future tech. Enjoyed both, just The Raid was better. The Raid also has a sequel, but its not quite as good. My opinion of course.
Not really trying to derail the “what should be remade” narrative going on, especially in the comments. Just wanting to point out an excellent movie that fits the mold.
As far as a remake possibility, how about something like Buck Rogers in the 25th Century? A modern day astronaut ends up in a future society that he feels is all screwed up, but the spin could be that he begins to realize how screwed up the 21st century society really was in comparison. I don’t know though… that might be too ‘liberal’ to be in any way successful. 🙂
Have you tried watching Pump Up The Volume with Christian Slater, lately? A movie about free speech over short wave radio? Few 80s movies feel so extremely dated now. I’m sure someone could do something interesting switching the medium from radio to the internet (or to internet radio/podcasts?) Mix in some dark web references? It could work.
The Shining already has the reboot we need already.
The tv mini series does a much better job of staying true to characters and intent.
Plus it makes Jack Torrance’s “normal” mode all the more scarier.
I’d make the law :
(1) 2 new movies just for thinking about doing a reboot
(2) 5 new movies if you actually do
(3) revoke your license to be an artist if you dare to think of something like “the last airbender” again …
This isn’t so much a remake as a reboot, but I’d like to see Akira re-done as an 12-24 episode series instead of a film. There’s a lot of really good narrative in the manga that didn’t make it into the movie, in part because the manga was still being published when the film came out. A longer running adaptation would allow some of the really good plot beats of the manga to get the screen time that they merit, and give some of the characters from the manga who got short shrift (like Lady Miyako and Kaede) more time to shine and be full fledged characters, instead of one-offs (Miyako being a egregious example of this, as her film version is a 180 from the manga version, and in the Streamline dub she was changed to a man).
Can we use this platform to stop continuations of series that reach a perfect ending?
Twin Peaks – for the love of God please don’t make any more episodes! The ending of the original series was perfect – it’s impossible to see how continuing the story would not detract immensely, and telling more stories in the same setting seems superfluous.
Wizard of Earthsea – Why is their a fourth book? I refuse to read it on the basis that the first three books are a perfectly polished gem and any addition or subtraction can be only subtract from the beauty of the first three. (Despite my huge respect for Le Guin).
By all means continue Star Trek and Doctor Who and other stories that are open-ended, but let that which is finished, end.
Rather than reboot, could I go back in time and change Star Trek Nemesis?
I sometimes play a scene in my head in which Shinzon turns to reveal himself: instead of being Picard’s clone (which has zero emotional impact), he is Wesley Crusher – scarred and disturbed after being misguided by the traveller and ready to take revenge on the people who let him go.
The ensuing conflict, physical and emotional, would actually give every member of the cast something meaningful to do.
So basically, Kes?