In response to the leaked promo trailer for Werner Herzog’s Bad Lieutenant remake, some people are claiming the film doesn’t look like a Herzog work at all. This is surprising, especially since the scene with the old ladies reminds us of the Aguirre act-at-gunpoint legend. Plus, ever since we heard the news of this “reimagining” we thought it was too befitting for Herzog to rework Abel Ferrara. However, that had more to do with the idea that both filmmakers are batshit crazy, not that their films are really that similar.
Still, wouldn’t it be more exciting to see Herzog take on something even less appropriate for his style and taste? Inspired by the Twitter meme #wernerherzogremake, which began yesterday in connection with the Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans promo, we’ve selected ten films we’d love to see Herzog redo just to see what his warped perspective would bring to these stories. While most of them are slightly tied to something he’s made in the past, each is still a completely unlikely project for Herzog to take on. But hopefully he’ll only see such implausibility as a challenge and actually go with one of our suggestions. …Read more
Even if you love the original Escape to Witch Mountain, you have to welcome a remake. The 1975 sci-fi Disney film has some very dated special effects — though the visible wires used to “levitate” a handgun and a harmonica give it a campy charm — and it’s not exactly the well-respected classic that The Black Hole or Old Yeller is, anyway. So, better a remake (or “modern re-imagining”) of a slightly beloved movie, which has already been redone once, to give The Rock another fulfillment of his Disney contract and utilize all the “perfect” digital effects now available.
While it seems that eventually all Disney live-action classics will be remade, potentially rendering obsolete the careers of Dean Jones, Kevin Corcoran and those ugly kids from Mary Poppins, there are some that may, like Witch Mountain, deserve to be recycled. Disney has previously erred in reworking films like The Absent-Minded Professor (Robin Williams is no Fred MacMurray) and The Shaggy Dog (Tim Allen is no MacMurray, either, nor even is he Tommy Kirk), and it’s mistakenly producing new versions of Swiss Family Robinson and 20,000 Leauges Under the Sea. But there are so many other films, most forgotten, that would better lend themselves to remakes.
Here we’ve selected 10 such classics, all but one live-action features, and we welcome you to suggest any others you may wish to see updated and/or re-imagined. …Read more
Ratings were up 10% from last year, and polls indicate that viewers of the Oscars last night mostly enjoyed the telecast and would like Hugh Jackman back to host next year. So why am I still harping on the negatives? Well, no matter how many entertaining elements of the ceremony people remind me of, I have to argue that while the awards themselves were great, the television show was not. And unfortunately, I was not inside the Kodak auditorium where I might have better appreciated the things we all at home should have been able to appreciate. And anything I found entertaining from where I sat in my apartment was pretty much thanks to talented presenters and winners, such as Philippe Petit, Tina Fey, Janusz Kaminski, Dustin Lance Black, Kunio Kato and Danny Boyle.
And I’m not the only one who has complaints. Below you’ll find some criticisms from bloggers who either thought the show was completely terrible or thought it was mostly good with only a few minor gripes.
I hope my mom sees this: researchers have discovered that Brad Pitt is related to Barack Obama while Angelina Jolie is related to Hilary Clinton. Surprising? Apparently not, considering the rest of the findings by the New England Historic Genealogical Society. The presidential candidates are actually related to a whole mess of celebrities. For Obama, there’s Gerald Ford, Lyndon Johnson, Harry S. Truman, James Madison, George Bush I & II, Dick Cheney, Winston Churchill and Robert E. Lee. For Clinton, it’s less political, more artsy; her relatives include Madonna, Celine Dion, Alanis Morissette, Jack Keroac and Camilla Parker-Bowles. And even John McCain has been included in the research. But he’s only connected to Laura Bush (his ancestry was more difficult to trace than the Democrats, however — because Republicans are so much shadier?).
Now I guess I can shrug off the fact that I’m an ancestor of the English monarchy (broken off, I believe, at Edward II). And to think I was actually beginning to get cocky about being a blue blood, despite my sitting here in a free t-shirt and writing on a four-year-old laptop that doesn’t completely work. Well, now I’m throwing out my DVD of King Ralph. I’m back to my argument, which my mom has heard from me many times, that if you go back far enough, we’re all related (whether via Adam and Eve or monkeys). I bet I’m even related to both Obama and Clinton, as well asMcCain. Same as you. Fortunately, thanks to the revealed research, we can check our own ancestries for at least a few names: 17th century Cape Samuel Hinkley connects Obama to the Bushes; 18th century Virginian Edwin Hinkman links Obama and Pitt; and 18th century Canadian Jean Cusson unites Clinton and Jolie.
We’ve had a bit of trouble getting this episode to go through the iTunes feed, so we hope this re-post will fix the problem. The original post, with episode description and embedded player, is here.
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