No. Any good?
His movies were really hit and miss. For every MASH, there was a Popeye, for every The Long Goodbye, a Beyond Therapy.
Haven't seen it. I was hoping to get the low-down from you.
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A new study by the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism seems to bear Dragonsong out.Actually as I said before as PG-13 sells far more tickets than R rated features so sanitized versions of those occurring is not beyond the pale. Also the blatant sexism is still part of the Hollywood machine.Look at the bright side.
In todays politically correct uberness theres no way they can do 80% of the old movies because they contain things like
Smokeing
Inappropriate language( huck finns title for jim comes to mind)
Blatant sexism.(big strong he-man charecters that helpless women looked up to and depended on for protection)
Raceism(too many examples to mention)
All of these things will force holywood to make new material eventually.
Fraid I will have to politely disagree with you Dragonsong.
In my Opinion and from what I have observed it's hollywood doing the exact opposite.
Women are in control and men are just stupid, seems thats hollywoods latest PC rant.
men had 67 per cent of the speaking parts, while women had only 33 per cent.
Yet actresses were more likely to be shot in sexy clothing (26 per cent of the time vs. five per cent for men) or at least partially naked (24 per cent vs. eight per cent.)The actresses most likely to be shown in a provocative light were teenagers, at 40 per cent of the time.
This compares to 32 per cent for female characters age 21 to 39 and 30 per cent for older women.
Teen girls were called 'attractive' by another character on screen 29 per cent of the time, compared to 18 per cent of the time for women ages 21 to 39 and eight per cent for women over 40.
I blame VHS.
No, really. It used to be that a film - or a TV show for that matter - was put it in the can and forget about it. There were ways to revisit older material, but it was somewhat limited in scope. Novelty was, in some ways, the only option.
But then, things like VHS came along, along with the explosion of television stations, not to mention the backlog becoming sufficient that post-theater markets or syndication became a goal, and not just a mere afterthought. It made these various media properties indelible.
VHS invented nostalgia. Nostalgia made a market.
And come on, if a rich uncle you didn't know about died and left you in charge of a film studio, do you seriously propose that there aren't at least six media properties out there that you haven't at least spitballed what the movie should look like with your friends? That deserve a modern remake or at least a fix?
I was thinking some more about the history of movies and I realized that this isn't quite true.
Although there has always been a rivalry between the film and television industries, tv did a lot to keep old movies in circulation before VHS.
When there used to be more local television, there were lots of programs like Boston's (on channel 38? 56? I can't remember which one was which anymore!) The Movie Loft where some pretentious critic (often visibly drunk) would introduce the film to the viewers and dole out trivia before and after the commercial breaks.
Of course, there was also Sunday morning's Creature Double Feature (or its regional variant) where they'd play Godzilla movies back-to-back, or two Universal horror flicks.
Then, of course, there are films like It's a Wonderful Life and Citizen Kane that were box office failures, and only became recognized as "America's favorite movie" and "the greatest film of all-time" by their recirculation, mostly (in IaWL's case anyway) through television.
I started thinking about this while having a conversation about Gregory Peck vs. Lee Marvin with my mother this morning. Happy Mother's Day!
loved "Let me in" over "Let the right one in",
Argh! NO WAY!
The swedish movie was so brilliant. It just gave you a real glimpse of how the swedish suburb is like. I have been there several times during winter months and coming from the opposite of Europe (Italy) I can tell you there's something magical about the silence of that country that's perfectly captured in the movie. Hollywood adaptation could be good, but no way it has the special think that made that movie unique.
Producer: "Okay, there are 5 bucks left for a script. Anyone has a retarded monkey who would give us a script for 5 bucks?"
Voila! New, and very profitable, movie! Yay!
You think I am exaggerating? See Armageddon and say that again...
That brings up something that has always been one of my pet peeves... movie clones, not so much remakes, usually released the same year as one another. Did someone out there in Hollywood NOT notice their script had been STOLEN or RESOLD to another company? Seriously.
A few memorable examples:
Volcano (1997) - Dante's Peak (1997)
Armageddon (1998) - Deep Impact (1998)
Ant's (1998) - Bug's Life (1998)
Yes but Dante's peak, Volcano, Armageddon, and Deep impact all sucked. But of course Bug's life was leaps and bounds better than Ants.
and why the heck make a revision of Titanic; that movie is the pits, like who really feels the need to tell that story again; pure garbage
shesh; next thing you know they will redo El Cid, or Roots, or Spartucus; heck already redoing planet of the apes; while I would go see a new El Cid or Spartucus; none of the remakes I have sceen or hear about are much good for the most part; some suprize me; I thought the Very Brady Movie was funny; but I would consider adaptions from TV series a bit different; I couldnt get into Scooby Do the live action movie; and havent seen underdog yet.
ok; this might have spoilers.
I liked Armageddon; very funny movie; lot of angst too; spacehappy nerd was very funny; Dante's peak, that car driving over lava ruined it for me; cant suspend my disbelief that far. Was indifferent to Deep Impact; didnt see Volcano
Yes but Dante's peak, Volcano, Armageddon, and Deep impact all sucked. But of course Bug's life was leaps and bounds better than Ants.
Going back to the ideas of producers' influence on films. I greatly enjoyed listening to Kevin Smith's story of writing the script for Superman and his conversations with producer Jon Peters.
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Look at the bright side.
In todays politically correct uberness theres no way they can do 80% of the old movies because they contain things like
Smokeing
Inappropriate language( huck finns title for jim comes to mind)
Blatant sexism.(big strong he-man charecters that helpless women looked up to and depended on for protection)
Raceism(too many examples to mention)
All of these things will force holywood to make new material eventually.
So, What, No Disney's the song of the South remake?
I must say I raised an eyebrow when I saw that someone's remade Straw Dogs.
Well, I am sure they will eventually remake things like Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction, Titanic, the original Star Wars movies, Alien, Matrix... Let's hear it for a remake of Kill Bill by Michael Bay!
Yeah, but Straw Dogs is something else.
Until the last decade, when I stopped paying as much attention as I used to, SD was by far the most controversial rape movie ever made.
I believe it was banned in the UK, and had to be edited and re-edited many times before it was released in the theaters and EVEN THEN it still caused people to crap themselves.
While I can't say that I want to see the remake, I am extremely curious to know what they did with Peckinpah's "ambiguous rape" set-up.
I think the worst part is when you have remakes of classics that don't bring anything new or original to table. Take The Texas Chainsaw Massacre for example. Classic horror film which did amazing things on a low budget. The remake in 2007 managed to spice things up with one slick camera shot through a hole in a girl's head. Otherwise, it was inferior in all respects. The seminal scene where Leatherface is first encountered in the house hardly got any treatment at all.
If you're going to remake a movie that's already great, then challenge yourself. Otherwise, there are plenty of movies out there that were crappy. It wouldn't take much to improve on them.
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All the original talent writers, directors, and visionaries are abandoning Hollywood because the paid cable channels like HBO, Showtime, and Stars are buying them up and treasuring them like they should be.
You want original writing, phenomenal acting, and genuine stories that don't cater to the pedantic majority?
The Tudors
A Game of Thrones (premiering tonight. I'm intentionally avoiding the previews)
Pillars of the Earth
The Borgias
Camelot
Spartacus
Kings (before it was cancelled due to lack of viewers - that's actually on NBC, but still, better than a movie in most respects)
Oh God! Kings! When did they play it on Australian TV? At 1:30 in the monday morning when you need sleep because Monday is Work...And I got to see the very last episode. Throw out that it is a modernization of a biblical tale. For me thats a nail in the Coffin but this had LOVEJOY in it...it was freakin.
When I first read this thread, I wasn't exactly sure of what he meant.
Then I saw one of the movies coming out this summer. "Fright Night".
In the 80s, I really liked this campy movie. But looking at the new version, it's absolutely NOTHING like the original (except maybe some names?).
So I'm thinking, one possible answer to your question is the movie makers are just running out of MOVIE TITLES. Because seriously, there's only so many titles to go around. Eventually (in 200 years), every movie title will have been used, at some point in time.