Re-take? No! ReMAKE!

For decades now, you haven't needed to be a movie buff like me to know Hollywood's originality pool is often totally barren. A studio makes one film with an original concept which succeeds commercially and then, whatever its critical reception, they milk it for all its worth. Now, I guess I should admit I won't mind if some franchises and brands never wane (hello, Star Wars and Disney, most of all), but taking a broad view of modern cinema even as an outsider, and one who finds himself very often hungry for a fresh and provocative moviegoing experience, there are some that I now want to drive a stake right through.

The two main ones are Pirates of the Caribbean and X-Men. Now, I actually loved all of the first three Pirates films, even At World's End which was widely criticised as bloated. On Stranger Tides, however, was an utterly humourless, derivative mess, to put it kindly. After that, when the fifth film was announced along with it being filmed in Queensland (that's my home state in Australia, for those who don't know), I had very mixed feelings about that second announcement; that's really how unbearable I found On Stranger Tides. Then we had the whole scandal with Johnny Depp bringing his dogs into Australia for the shoot without quaranting them, which the media and government stretched out like a tape measure, so that clearly helped to excite me for the movie. And in the case of X-Men, the first two were both so good not just because they had well-staged and clever action scenes, they were very sincere allegories for bigotry and fear of the unknown. Ever since the franchise to me has been an endless charade of superficiality, predictability and unintentional ridiculousness. And now we have an upcoming remake of The Magnificent Seven, which itself was a remake of Kurosawa's Seven Samurai. That must be a new personal best, Hollywood!

But now, the remake obsession isn't just at the movies. It's now in television also. In a sense I should probably be more open-minded about remakes here overall because my favourite (current) show is Homeland, which was based on the Israeli series Prisoners of War, and I also like Teen Wolf. Not to mention, TV remakes aren't really that new (what was that Korean War sitcom based on a Robert Altman film? I believe its title was also a cooking term?) But come on: in recent years we've seen new versions of Hawaii Five-O, Charlie's Angels, Beverly Hills, 90210 and Upstairs, Downstairs among them all. (That said, I'd still sooner watch any of those remakes than any “reality” TV show.) I don't agree with those who call TV the idiot box, but something tells me at this rate, before long it sure won't be the originality box.

My taste and opinions are solely mine, and you can do with them whatever you please. And I acknowledge in some cases, remakes, sequels or even retreads have improved on the original. But, dear entertainment industry, the bottom line is: without an original, you can never have any of the above.