大象传媒

People can be very sniffy about movie remakes. Some see them as lazy cash-ins, because it’s easier to redo something successful than have an original idea. Their frequent criticism, though, can be unfair. There are many great remakes giving a new spin on the original idea.

Take, for example, A Star Is Born. The first version, released in 1937, was the story of a fading movie star who mentors a young actress, whose fame quickly surpasses his. It’s been remade three times and each has added a new take on that central relationship. The latest, starring Bradley Cooper (who also directs) and Lady Gaga, makes the mentor a drug-addicted country singer and his protégé/lover a rising popstar.

As Antonia Quirke speaks to Bradley Cooper about his critically-lauded film on The Film Programme, we take a look at some of the films Hollywood can’t stop remaking. N.B. We’re only counting remakes of original movies, not adaptations of books/plays, because then the whole list would be taken up by Shakespeare and Charles Dickens.

Seven Samurai

Samurai: Akira Kurosawa鈥檚 film about the Japanese warriors spawned a diverse set of remakes.

A perfect example of remakes twisting the original idea. Akira Kurosawa’s classic about a group of warriors defending a village from bandits has been reimagined several times, as a cheapo space saga in Battle Beyond The Stars, a western in The Magnificent Seven and, somewhat loosely, as an insect comedy in Pixar’s A Bug’s Life. The Magnificent Seven was itself remade in 2016, the rare case of a remake of a remake.

King Kong

The repeated remakes of this, the story of a giant ape and his relationship with a human woman, seem to be driven in large part by the advance of technology. In its day, the 1933 stop-motion Kong was at the cutting edge of special effects (it’s still very charming now), but the, largely dreadful, 1976 version showed how far practical effects had come in 40 years. The 2005 version and 2017’s very loose reworking, Kong: Skull Island, realised Kong in dazzling CGI.

Godzilla

Like Kong, Godzilla is catnip to movie studios because it's about a big monster who can squash things and an excuse for lots of whizzy special effects. The original Japanese version, Gojira, with its man-in-a-costume simplicity and its message about the dangers of nuclear weapons, has inspired an enormous number of sequels and a couple of Hollywood movies of varying quality. The 1998 Roland Emmerich version is famous for excellent effects and a horrible script. The 2014 version had more in common with the original, albeit with the addition of CGI, and will get a sequel next year.

Bedtime Story

It’s possible you won’t recognise the name of this one, because the remake is much more famous than the original. This 1964 Marlon Brando/David Niven movie about two conmen trying to do a wealthy woman out of her riches was remade as the 1988 comedy Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, starring Michael Caine and Steve Martin. It’s being remade again as The Hustle, due in 2019, with Anne Hathaway and Rebel Wilson taking the lead roles and The Thick of It’s Chris Addison directing. Perhaps the repeated name change is because con artists don’t like to leave a trail?

Miracle on 34th Street

A good Christmas movie, like a good Christmas pop song, is a licence to print cash. People will keep coming back to them year after year. The 1947 original, about a department store Father Christmas who insists he’s the real thing, inspired a beloved 1994 film, and also three television movies. A raging battle continues over whether the original or the 90s remake is the better version. We wouldn’t like to take sides. Not at Christmas.

The Mystery of the Wax Museum

Robin Hood: Filmmakers can't resist the folk tale

Michael Curtiz’s 1933 mystery thriller (based on a short story, but an unpublished one, so it counts as original), was a whodunnit about a murderer turning dead bodies into waxworks. The reworkings of 1953 and 2005, notably starring Paris Hilton, turned the idea into a more overt horror. Despite none of the versions being considered classics of the genre, the story has been remade more than just about any horror movie not based on an existing story.

Robin Hood

‘But that’s based on an existing story!’ you may say. 15th Century ballads sung by travelling minstrels don’t count, we’d say. The 1922 Douglas Fairbanks and the 1938 Errol Flynn versions of Robin Hood set so many of the ‘rules’ of the Robin Hood story that those that follow can be considered at least partial remakes. There have been too many Robin Hood movies to list here, but they include the 1991 version with a distinctly American Robin (Kevin Costner), a Disney fox-based animation, Ridley Scott’s grubby 2010 reworking and another starring Taron Egerton set for release in November 2018.