Remakes

*Please take note, these are my personal opinions. If you disagree with them feel free to write your own post on this topic.

I'm not sure where you all stand when it comes to remakes and not-from-the-first-original-movie type sequels, but as a general rule I could live without them. Same goes for book 'sequels' that are not written by the original author. Don't get me wrong I do like some remakes and sequels, but most I want to burn in a fire hoping that it never plagues the world with it's wrongness ever again.

What brings on this topic you may ask? Lately it seems that Hollywood thinks it a wonderful idea to sequalize or show re-imaginings of everything. For example; Oz: The Great and Powerful. I have not seen this movie and make no plans to do so considering the entire idea just aggravates me. Raimi has made some great movies in the past but this is unforgivable to me. Frank L. Baum wrote ALL OF THESE BOOKS.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Oz_books
Please tell me where is Oz: The Great and Powerful on there? That's right it isn't. This is an original idea from Raimi and it just makes me mad that people keep wanting to make "original stories" from Frank L. Baum's original novels. If you want to do that write fanfiction and stop with the musicals and the books and the movie remakes. Oz is not yours, it is L.Frank Baum's. 

From what I have read about Oz I cannot imagine me liking it even if it is a masterpiece. Sure, ideas were indeed left out of the 1939 movie with Judy Garland and obviously the movie was not 100% like the book, but when people hear the title The Wizard Of Oz they usually associate it with the Victor Fleming classic musical movie version despite the fact that a few movies were made out of the Oz novels before 1939 but they fell short. 

Either way though, I am personally not a fan of The Wizard of Oz being redone or having the story line screwed over because it is the cool thing to do these days. Also, is it possible for Hollywood to stop CGI-ing everything?  I am talking about Oz specifically because on facebook a girl I know stated that she has never seen The Wizard of Oz and that the only reason should would ever watch such a film is to make comparisons to Oz: The Great and Powerful. Now things like this really infuriate me. I can understand if you have never seen the original movie if you live in Zambia or something, but to have not seen the original film when you are a living,breathing citizen of the U.S. that is just sad. Have your parents no heart? It is a right of childhood to be terrified of The Wicked Witch and her flying monkeys! 

In 2014 another adaption of The Wizard of Oz is going to come up. Why can't people just watch the original? Have people really become that lazy that they have to depend on remakes with famous actors to enhance their watching experience? If this is the case then I weep for future generations.

Now that I am done writing about The Wizard of Oz I feel that a list of horrible and not so horrible movies are in order;
The Bad
1. Psycho. This Alfred Hitchcock's most famous movie, best known for the shower scene. Why on earth did    anyone think it was a great idea to remake this in 1998? Who the hell agreed to this? Personally the 1998 version takes away half of the terror of Hitchcok's original black and white version. Did they really think they could do this movie better than Hitchcock? Idiots. 



2. Arthur. Now I saw the original movie when my director told me to watch it to get a sense of "drunkness." I'm not sure if it helped but I absolutely loved it. I recently saw the Russell Brand version and I was not that impressed with it but that may just be because I am partial to the original. I love Helen Mirren and thought she did brilliantly in it though.

3.  Charlie and the Chocolate Factory-I am a huge fan of Burton and Johnny Depp but I really couldn't stand this movie and the Oompa Loompa's made me want to throw myself off of a bridge. Also, I found most of the kids to be terrible actors, or maybe everything was so scripted that it just left out all the magic that the original had. I will admit that some good quotes did come out of this though.



4. The Wicker Man- I shall say this once, this movie was intended to be a horror film. However it is comedy gold. Yeah, everyone knows Cage isn't the best actor and you can tell in this movie, but I will admit that I do like The National Treasure series, which really has absolutely nothing to do with The Wicker Man. The one liners are hilarious and I'm almost positive that none of the scenes add up to anything important.  But watch these clips and tell me that this movie is scary and try your best not to laugh.

5. Halloween 2007- I saw this last year as a matter of fact. Can someone please explain to me why remakes need to always add a stupid backstory to make the plot more intense? Really I am curious. However I will never accept the fact that Dr. Loomis is a jerk and a media whore! I will also not accept that fact that Meyer's had a reason behind his killings and is a "real human" with "emotions" or whatever it was they tried to pull off. In my opinion in any horror movie, the more we know about the crazy killer, the less scary they are. Meyer's does not need a backstory to kill you. 

6. Get Carter- Stallone is not Michael Cane, Stallone is Rocky and Rambo. Therefore making this movie a complete failure. 


7. One Missed Call- Dear Lord this IS the worst Japanese horror remake I have ever had to experience, it was so bad it was hilarious. If you plan to see this don't expect horror, expect hilariousness. At least in the original version you could tell the director had a clever plot! 

8. Black Christmas- This is one of those movies that should not have had any business being remade. The original wasn't that great but the 2006 version was a disgrace. I swear nobody in this remake had any personality and they took out the police subplot that gave the earlier film some depth and added in  a dumber than hell backstory about the mother and Billy. The one good thing I can say about this movie is that it displays what NOT to do if you know a killer is nearby. 

The Good

1. The Karate Kid- It had the same heart as the original and I can appreciate that. Sure, it's not THE Karate Kid but I still liked it.

2. The Parent Trap- Back when Lindsay was completely loony, this version is somewhat of a modernized take on the original but it works.

3. Man of Fire- I'm not sure if it's because I saw the Denzel version first or what, but I thought the 2004 version was just as good if not better than the original.

4. King Kong- Yeah, it was a long film, nearly twice as long as the original but that doesn't make it any less fantastic. Sure, there are some bad casting choices, but compared to the original this was a hit.

5. A Star Is Born- I love both the Barbara and Judy films equally.

6. The Producers- Again, loved both of the films equally. The 1968 one had Gene Wilder, but I liked Springtime for Hitler better in the new one.



Overall it really depends on the director,cast, and script to either make or break a remake/re-imagination of a movie. Nevertheless, if Gone With The Wind ever get's signed for a remake, I will personally go to wherever it is being filmed and burn the entire set to the ground just like Atlanta.