[Scarabin]

Saw the Mel Gibson version of "Edge of Darkness" recently and thought it did not measure up to the original. Too many histrionics and no real sense of loss?

Conversely I found "The Next Three Days" better than the original "Pour Elle" (translated as "Anything for her") although both were very well made. TNTD was longer but achieved more depth.

And then an old favourite, I enjoyed the first full season of "Forbrydelsen" but gave up on the remake "The Killing".

Seeking other titles, other views, and on a related point I have no objection to sub-titles but I am told they are unpopular in US?

[mike777]

The USa makes a ton of remakes. often with a different title but same basic plot.

This was true with many Old movies as well as foreign movies.


to go a bit further...many say there are only 5 basic plot lines for books, movies, plays, music etc...so everyone is a cannibal.

I once heard there are only two plot threads:
1) a stranger comes to town....
2) people go on a long trip...

iN any case a good thread ...thanks

[hrothgar]

Scarabin, on 2012-November-14, 21:59, said:

Saw the Mel Gibson version of "Edge of Darkness" recently and thought it did not measure up to the original. Too many histrionics and no real sense of loss?

Conversely I found "The Next Three Days" better than the original "Pour Elle" (translated as "Anything for her") although both were very well made. TNTD was longer but achieved more depth.

And then an old favourite, I enjoyed the first full season of "Forbrydelsen" but gave up on the remake "The Killing".

Seeking other titles, other views, and on a related point I have no objection to sub-titles but I am told they are unpopular in US?

As I understand matters, the major studies are becoming increasingly risk adverse.
For the most part, they are unwilling to try anything that is big and new.

Most of the content that they are creating and promoting is either

1. Part of a franchise (Batman, Tokien, Bond, Bourne)
2. A remake
3. Associated with well known director (Aptow, The Coen Brothers, Spielberg)
4. Extremely formulaic

[Phil]

hrothgar, on 2012-November-15, 09:55, said:

As I understand matters, the major studies are becoming increasingly risk adverse.
For the most part, they are unwilling to try anything that is big and new.

Yes, but the independent filmmakers are backfilling this need quite nicely (albeit on much lower budgets).

[barmar]

I haven't seen the original, but I really like Showtime's versions of "Shameless" (based on a British series) and "Homeland" (based on an Israeli series).

[kenberg]

I not only really like Homeland, I actually claim it is of high quality (the two are not interchangeable). It may be a stretch though to call it a remake. Based on an Israeli story, yes, and I would really like to see the original. Subtitles can be a problem on tv, I have found. Yellow is good, and not everything has to be translated.

To move the level of conversation down a few pegs, I liked the remake of Freaky Friday. I can't help it, I just like Jamie Lee Curtis. She made True Lies a watchable movie. The original Freaky Friday was unwatchable for me. I like Jodie Foster but I watched so little of it before signing off I had to look it up to see who was in it.


An Affair to Remember is a remake of Love Affair, and I guess I like both. You don't often see Love Affair so I can't really recall, but I am pretty sure I liked it. AATR is a Cary Grant movie. Cary Grant movies are basically watchable, basically enjoyable, basically stupid. So I basically liked it.

I really liked Day of the Jackal, book especially but also very much the movie. As I understand it, legal action prevented the directors of Jackal (a perversion masquerading as a remake) from calling it Day of the Jackal. I heartily support this legal action.

[blackshoe]

"Starship Troopers" wasn't a remake, but supposedly an adaptation of Heinlein's novel. I hated it. I first read the book when I was twelve, and really enjoyed it. Lot of food for thought in it. But the movie wasn't the book — it was Verhoeven's tirade against Nazism, which had profoundly affected him when he was a kid in WWII Holland. Rumor has it that Ginnie Heinlein, after seeing the movie, replied to a question about it that "it's crap". I agree. She may well have done so, she wasn't afraid to speak her mind.

Several years after the movie came out, I saw it again. Trying to view it without prejudice, as an "action" movie it's not terrible, although the anti-Nazi elements still detract from the story. I even saw one of the sequels (I understand there were several). But I still say that, as an adaptation of Heinlein's novel, it's crap. Of course, Hollywood is well know for buying the rights to a book and then producing a movie with a completely different story.

[kenberg]

blackshoe, on 2012-November-15, 12:49, said:

. Of course, Hollywood is well know for buying the rights to a book and then producing a movie with a completely different story.

I read The Subterraneans when I was in college. An African American woman (well, in the 1950s she was a black woman) , Madou Fox, has an affair with the white narrator. It was made into a movie in 1960. The part of Madou Fox was played by Leslie Caron.

Actually I never saw the movie, but I learned about this interesting casting choice recently while watching a movie historian on TCM.

[hrothgar]

blackshoe, on 2012-November-15, 12:49, said:

Of course, Hollywood is well know for buying the rights to a book and then producing a movie with a completely different story.

I am very VERY worried about World War Z

Saw a preview right before "The Man for the Iron Fist"

The movie was unrecognizable.

[dwar0123]

blackshoe, on 2012-November-15, 12:49, said:

Of course, Hollywood is well know for buying the rights to a book and then producing a movie with a completely different story.

The Postman was my favorite story as a kid/young adult. I was super excited about the movie but it turned out to be a totally different story. I was so pissed that regardless of how good the movie may actually have been, I absolutely hate it.

Still a great book though, even if it is no longer my favorite.

[barmar]

And "I, Robot" also bore little resemblance to anything Asimov ever wrote. He'd seen enough of Hollywood destroying other authors' works to allow them to adapt any of his books while he was alive (although there was a low-budget version of "Nightfall" in 1988, 4 years before his death, and then another turkey in 2000).

Basically, you should never expect much from a sci-fi novel turned into a "blockbuster" film -- there's just too much difference between the two genres. Probably the closest was "Blade Runner", but much of the psychological material was left on the cutting room floor (I'm not sure if I ever saw the "Director's Cut", which supposedly added some of this back in).

[dwar0123]

kenberg, on 2012-November-15, 13:06, said:

I read The Subterraneans when I was in college. An African American woman (well, in the 1950s she was a black woman) , Madou Fox, has an affair with the white narrator. It was made into a movie in 1960. The part of Madou Fox was played by Leslie Caron.

Actually I never saw the movie, but I learned about this interesting casting choice recently while watching a movie historian on TCM.

The girl from Gigi? Heh, I am not a big fan of musicals but Gigi is a huge exception, that movie is awesome.

Did they put her in blackface or something? Actually I just looked it up and apparently they turned her into a young French woman, which for Leslie isn't a stretch at all.

[kenberg]

dwar0123, on 2012-November-15, 14:37, said:

The girl from Gigi? Heh, I am not a big fan of musicals but Gigi is a huge exception, that movie is awesome.

Did they put her in blackface or something? Actually I just looked it up and apparently they turned her into a young French woman, which for Leslie isn't a stretch at all.

She certainly can play a young French woman w/o distorting herself. It would seem to distort the storyline in the book a bit.

I also like Gigi. Perhaps oddly, I didn't care much for it when it first came out, but I was nineteen or something like that, and neither John Wayne nor Robert Mitchum was in it, so that may explain my lack of enthusiasm.

[Fluffy]

It doesn't matter wich one, but the one I see first will look wonderful compared to the second one, no matter if its the remake or the original.

I started watching "The Killing" wich was fine, but then my wife wanted to see the original, and I knew I rather go away and do something else.

[gwnn]

TNTD was indeed better than the original. Dredd was awesome and widely recognised as better than the original (haven't seen it). The question 'which Office is better: UK or US ?' will probably never be decided to any semblance of a consensus. Personally I prefer the US one and somehow it still makes me laugh.

[billw55]

gwnn, on 2012-November-15, 18:47, said:

TNTD was indeed better than the original. Dredd was awesome and widely recognised as better than the original (haven't seen it). The question 'which Office is better: UK or US ?' will probably never be decided to any semblance of a consensus. Personally I prefer the US one and somehow it still makes me laugh.

You mean The Office, the TV show? Lots people seem to love that, but I just don't get it. It's like I am that one guy in the room not laughing at a joke. I have tried to watch it and the only response I can ever dig up is "huh, this is supposed to be comedy?"

[gwnn]

The jokes are getting kind of old and improbable but somehow the characters grew on me.

[phil_20686]

blackshoe, on 2012-November-15, 12:49, said:

Trying to view it without prejudice, as an "action" movie it's not terrible, although the anti-Nazi elements still detract from the story.

You realise that the move is meant to be a parody right?

[phil_20686]

barmar, on 2012-November-15, 14:19, said:

And "I, Robot" also bore little resemblance to anything Asimov ever wrote. He'd seen enough of Hollywood destroying other authors' works to allow them to adapt any of his books while he was alive (although there was a low-budget version of "Nightfall" in 1988, 4 years before his death, and then another turkey in 2000).

Basically, you should never expect much from a sci-fi novel turned into a "blockbuster" film -- there's just too much difference between the two genres. Probably the closest was "Blade Runner", but much of the psychological material was left on the cutting room floor (I'm not sure if I ever saw the "Director's Cut", which supposedly added some of this back in).

Authors like asimov who depend heavily on intellectual or quasi-intellectual thinking for enjoyment will never translate well into a movie. However, some authors, particularly Philip K Dick, have led to a number of good movies. Those novels based on clever plotting or compelling characters do better. Notable movies based on Sci Fi books include:

Blade Runner (based on, do androids dream of electric sheep),
Johnny Mnemonic (based loosely on neuromancer/burning chrome by Gibson),
Minority Report (based on Dick story of the same name), Solaris (based on a book by Lem),
Paycheck, (based on another Dick story),
Bicentenial Man was closer to the Asimov book than I robot,
Planet of the Apes was a book first,
I am legend was based on a very famous book by Matheson,
Jurassic Park is another classic based on a Micheal Crichton book.
2001 Space odyssey

Then there are the classics, Invisible Man, Time machine, War of the Worlds, Day of the Triffids etc

[mike777]

Speaking of remakes there have been a lot of rumors of Johnny Depp remaking the THIN MAN.

http://www.huffingto...n_n_942340.html


remake won't be coming soon to a theater near you. According to Deadline.com, Warner Bros. has slowed down the process on the presumed blockbuster, with attached director Rob Marshall moving on to "Into the Woods." That leaves "The Thin Man" without a director, leading actress or green light; Warner Bros. has received a budget for the project, but nothing has been accepted just yet.


http://www.huffingto..._n_1618332.html