Coincidentally, just as Roman Polanski faces extradition for his 30-year-old statutory rape case, we get our first teaser for the pedophilia-centric A Nightmare on Elm Street remake. At least, I heard there was supposed to be a teaser. All I could find was a pretty full-length trailer that gives everything away.
First we see a snippet of Freddy Krueger’s origin, in which Jackie Earle Haley unveils the iconic sweater as if he’s Clark Kent ripping open his button-down shirt to reveal his Superman costume, while being burned alive by an angry mob of parents. Then we see a whole bunch of familiar imagery, including the razor glove in the tub, the girl floating above her bed and the creepy jump roping girls, all of which implies this remake is going to be fairly redundant. Yet we finish with something that separates this redo from the original: our first clear glimpse of the new Freddy, looking more realistically like a burn victim. And we hear his voice, which is far less memorable or frightening than the one Robert Englund introduced to us 25 years ago.
So the things I want to be the same aren’t and the things I want to be fresh are not. The only way I might see this is if the rumors are true about Freddy’s guilt being put into question. That would certainly give him greater reason for revenge.
Check out the other film blogs’ responses to the trailer after the jump:
…Read more
If you’ve already checked out our list of directors who made great remakes of their own films, you won’t think it that strange that David Cronenberg is reportedly involved in a remake of his version of The Fly, itself an update of Kurt Nuemann’s 1958 classic of the same name. And few movie bloggers could argue that it’s a bad idea given Cronenberg’s talent as a filmmaker.
Still, nobody can figure out any kind of logical motivation behind the change of heart, given that Cronenberg has always been against the idea of a remake (despite the fact that he was okay with remakes enough to do one himself). And most of us would really, really, really like to see the Goldblum brought back for the lead, as redundant as that may seem.
Check out what the film blogs are saying about this reboot idea after the jump:
…Read more
David Cronenberg stunned many with his decision to remake his own film The Fly, involving himself as writer and potentially director of Fox’s reboot effort. But this certainly isn’t a bad idea. After all, Cronenberg’s version is already a redo of Kurt Neumann’s 1958 sci-fi/horror classic of the same name, and it’s considered one of the best remakes of all time. It is very likely that he will now also deliver one of the best examples in which a director remakes his own film.
Sure, there are plenty of bad examples, especially when it’s a French filmmaker attempting to translate his hit comedy for Hollywood (see Three Fugitives and Just Visiting) or a Japanese filmmaker rehashing his own horror sequel in the States (The Grudge 2 and The Ring Two). And let’s not forget the unnecessary redundancy of Haneke’s Funny Games U.S.
But some of the greatest directors have made remakes of their own works that are at least as good, if not better than their originals. We take a look at five examples that Cronenberg could learn from — though he probably doesn’t need the help.
…Read more
Apparently Hollywood isn’t happy enough ruining my generation’s childhood, so it’s now also reaching back to my dad’s. Steven Spielberg is set to direct a remake of the 1950 classic Harvey , which stars James Stewart as an alcoholic who talks to an invisible, 6½-foot-tall rabbit. Based on Mary Chase’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play, the movie kept “Harvey” the rabbit up to viewers’ (and Stewart’s) imaginations, but many are fearing that this new version will feature a computer-generated character. Because that’s how Hollywood ruins childhoods best, with CG.
But this is Spielberg we’re talking about. No stranger to remakes — he redid A Guy Named Joe as Always, gave us an updated War of the Worlds and apparently did some second-unit work on Jan De Bont’s The Haunting — he’s still a lot classier than most Hollywood directors. He may go a somewhat boring route by casting either Tom Hanks or Will Smith in the lead, but there’s no way he’d show us Harvey. I think.
Check out what the rest of the film blogosphere is saying about this news after the jump:
…Read more
Now that Brüno is finished and in theaters, what is Sacha Baron Cohen to do next? Surely he can continue appearing in movies not his own, such as he did with Talladega Nights and Sweeney Todd, but will there ever be another shock-mockumentary in the style of Borat and Brüno? Even if he develops some new characters, people don’t believe he could make another one of these kinds of films stealthily enough to make it work.
Well, let’s hope that isn’t true, because we would love to see at least one more. And we think he’s enough of a chameleon that his increasing fame won’t get in the way. As Metromix recently pointed out, there are just so many people (live and dead) who still need to be interviewed and/or pranked by Baron Cohen. Also, there are so many more marginalized people out there who could use a Brüno of their own to challenge the stereotypes and expose the continuing prejudices of our country.
To help Baron Cohen come up with a new character and issue, we’ve selected five already existing scenarios — which should help garner funding since Hollywood is so into remakes — to inspire him.
…Read more
The opening credits of Tony Scott’s remake of The Taking of Pelham 123 are set to a remix of Jay-Z’s masterpiece pop single, “99 Problems.” Our first extreme close-up glimpse at the face of John Travolta’s goateed growler, with diamond cross stud in right ear to immediately clue us in to his Catholicism/Achilles Heel, coincides with the first burst of the song’s chorus: “I’ve got 99 Problems but a bitch ain’t one. Hit me!” When I saw the movie, I was sitting next to an older gentleman who, at the close of that first “Hit me!”, audibly groaned. This was just the beginning of his displeasure. In the film’s final scene, there’s a joke about a local New York sports team, which, I thought, worked thanks to James Gandolfini’s delivery. I laughed - not a sustained chuckle, but a single, barked “Ha!” The guy sitting next to me turned to his friend and said, in a voice far above a whisper, “That wasn’t funny! It wasn’t even funny!”
It’s hard for me to understand how someone could get so worked up about the choices made by director Scott in his completely unnecessary remake of the 70s cult classic. Aside from that laugh and a couple of others, which came virtually as knee jerk trained responses to John Travolta’s sleepwalk through his role as a crackpot train hijacker, I felt nothing whilst watching this film. It was almost a Zen thing, a level of calm non-emotion which, I must say, I have rarely experienced at a screening of a studio action film. I’d say that the ultimate affect of Pelham is like being trapped in a loop of white noise, but that sounds sort of cool and futurist, and this film is neither of those things — it’s more like swimming laps in bowl of room-temperature oatmeal. After the screening, I was 10th in line for the ladies room, which gave me time to think about the word “pointless,” and how often it’s wasted to describe endeavors that are merely so boring that they make us resent the expenditure of time, but which actually do have a goal. By the time I’ve moved up to 3rd in line, I’ve vowed to reserve my use of the word “pointless” for experiences like The Taking of Pelham 123, which are literally pointless, in that there is no point of impact. They simply do not have a reason to exist.
Well, maybe this one has *one* reason.
…Read more
If you were a movie producer looking to make a lot of money, and you had the chance to do this with a Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie, would you put the project in the hands of the people who made the first film, which was not successful in any way, shape or form, or would you put it in the hands of the guy who wrote the first, crappy film but who later redeemed himself with an enormously popular, long-running TV series adapated from that film?
Obviously, most of us would choose the latter, but then I guess we just don’t know something Roy Lee and Doug Davison (of the Asian-horror-remake factory Vertigo Entertainment) know. The duo is teaming up with Fran Rubel Kuzui, who hasn’t directed a film since Buffy but who “served” as an exec producer on the TV show, and her husband, Kaz Kuzui (producer of the original movie), to relaunch the franchise with a new, darker, event-sized Vampire Slayer movie, which will have nothing to do with the show, and which, as of yet, has no involvement from Joss Whedon.
Due to the success of Twilight and True Blood, I can see why someone would want to kick start another vampire franchise, especially one with name recognition, but is there anyone who would look forward to anything Buffy without Whedon? And even with him, would anyone accept a new actress in the title role after Sarah Michelle Gellar made it iconically her own? Let’s check out the film blog reactions to this ridiculous announcement after the jump:
…Read more
Years after it was first announced that a Straw Dogs remake is in the works, X-Men actor James Marsden has been cast in the lead role, which was originated on film by Dustin Hoffman in Sam Peckinpah’s 1971 version. While many complainers are focusing on Marsden’s involvement, others are taking this opportunity to whine more generally about the film being remade in the first place. When I first responded to the idea two years ago, I was mostly worried that writer-director Rod Lurie would try to one-up the original in terms of the violence, since torture porn was still kind of hot at the time. But apparently Lurie’s film won’t actually be as much of a gratuitous spectacle of rape and defense killings as is the controversial first film.
Personally, I never need to rewatch Peckinpah’s Straw Dogs anymore than I need to see Haneke’s Funny Games (either version), Alexandre Aja’s remake of The Hills Have Eyes or any other such film that’s so violent towards women. It’s certainly not a sacred film in my mind, so I couldn’t care less if anyone wants to recycle or reimagine the material. I do wonder, though, why Lurie doesn’t just title his version differently if it is indeed going to be unlike Peckinpah’s film. Why not go with the title of the source novel, “The Siege of Trencher’s Farm”? Or simply work from scratch. There have been so many other unrelated home-invader thrillers since Straw Dogs anyway.
Check out other bloggers’ complaints or defenses of Lurie’s plans after the jump:
…Read more
Variety reports that director Jay Roach, in partnership with Universal, is set to remake A Compelete History of My Sexual Failures, a crowd-pleasing personal documentary (in the loosest sense of the world) that premiered at Sundance in 2008. When I reviewed the film, my basic problems with it were that it felt too artificial, and too eager to prioritize laughs over truth. So it’s probably the perfect vehicle for the director behind the Austin Powers and Meet the Parents franchises, no?
In addition to winning Best Picture (and seven other awards) at the Oscars last week, Slumdog Millionaire passed a major box office benchmark. It has now grossed more than $100 million in the U.S., which is pretty astonishing for a film with one-third of its dialogue in a foreign language. But is Slumdog’s popularity a one-shot in terms of its audience’s interest in India, or are moviegoers actually now more curious about the nation and its own films?
Some websites are simplifying the question of whether or not Slumdog will be a gateway film with polls asking if American moviegoers will now “go Bollywood” (40% of Cinematical readers flat out answered, “no.”), which is rather silly since Danny Boyle’s movie bears no resemblance to the majority of Bollywood pictures. In fact, Americans have in the past received far greater entry points into Indian cinema by way of films involving Anglo or NRI (non-resident Indian) protagonists directed by culturally bridging filmmakers (such as NRI helmers Deepa Mehta, Mira Nair and Gurinder Chadha), than the more-touristy type of filmmaking represented with Slumdog.
If someone truly wants to become familiar with Bollywood, he or she should probably just jump right in and then patiently get used to the style, which can be quite difficult for Westerners to immediately grasp. The extremely interested might benefit from reading the section on popular Indian cinema in Dimitris Eleftheriotis and Gary Needham’s Asian Cinemas: A Reader & Guide, a book that does a really great job acquainting the Western spectator with Eastern film form. Or, the more casually curious cinephile could simply follow our guide to accessible Indian (or India-based) films for the Slumdog lover to watch next:
…Read more
We know you can hardly wait until My Bloody Valentine decide to come back, but at least the tacky My Bloody Valentine 3D comes out in two weeks! (Send your friend a “bloody valentine” over the Internet! Or, you know, don’t.)
Luckily, this clip from the 3D “masterpiece” that detail just how subtle and scary a remake of an underrated 80s slasher can be–especially in 3D! The original story involves a crazed, cannibalistic miner who raped a bunch of trapped mine victims (we’re betting this is tweaked in the new release) and who threatens to repeat his carnage if the town ever has another Valentine’s Day celebration. And yes, the original is only meant for those with a soft spot for crap/hack/slash films that have an unwarranted taboo–i.e. “9 minutes too graphic for the MPAA!”
Luckily we’ll get plenty of useless 3D shock scares in this needless remake, and see another clip at MTV. To be fair, that trailer promised flames bursting into a theater and a miner’s flashlight illuminating us. Then again, we are very confident that this will explode at the box office. Or implode. A fiery downfall either way.
…Read more
Hell hath no fury like Abel Ferrara underpaid for his intellectual property. In an lengthy interview with Nick Dawson for the FILMMAKER Blog (pegged to the long-awaited US first run of Ferrara’s 2005 film Mary, which starts at Anthology Film Archives on Friday), the filmmaker has more complaints about the Nicolas Cage-starring, Werner Herzog-directed remake of Bad Lieutenant. The big problem seems to be that rather than offer Ferrara and his crew a big (or, biggish), Ed Pressman and the producers of the remake simply paid Ferrara “twenty grand” and shut him out. My favorite quotes from the interview, taken out of context:
…Read more
Robert Downey Jr has signed on
