American Remakes!

Karl Hungus

Well... After the cinematic abortion that was The Ring raked in big, it's no wonder that Hollywood is snapping up the rights to just about ever Asian movie made in the last few years. Probably old news to some people, but currently there's quite a lot of Asian movies lined up to be butchered, so forgive my for going out on a rant here.

The remake of Dark Water seems well on its way. I'm sure everyone knows about the remake of The Grudge now. I've not yet seen the original myself, but I'll try to catch it soon. There's also going to be a remake of Infernal affairs and The Eye. Word has it that Dreamworks has gotten the rights to remake A Tale Of Two Sisters. Not to mention constant talk of a Battle Royale remake. Urgh.

Feck sake! Honest to god, this is getting freakin' ridiculous! And don't think I'm just annoyed about the remakes of Asain films either, I'd still like to twist a broken bottle in Stallone's face for Get Carter, and I've pretty much been avoiding The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Dawn Of The Dead remakes.

Now, I know that fundamentally, the concept of a remake isn't a fundamentally bad thing, and I'm sure to have people mention The Thing as a remake that improves on the original, but try and imagine if John Carpenter's film was remade today? Nasty thought, isn't it? I'm sure any fan here wouldn't like the idea of a CGI fest remake with Owen Wilson directed by someone who's only previous experience was of kids films or romantic comedies(Gore Verbinski directed Mouse Hunt and The Mexican proir to The Ring, so there's obviously not much experience needed when doing a horror film, is there?).

Lets hope that proposed remake of The Wicker Man never happens either.

mike65

For years Hollywood "remade" French comedies and this may explain some of the bad feeling between the two countries, then the British got the treatment so I guess it was only a matter of time before asian cinema was
targeted and all the while perfectly good US pic of yore are getting mugged
as the "machine" gives up on promoting new writing or even talent spotting decent hacks from network TV. It'll all end in tears, as the demographic gets older and tires of being treated like juvenile drones who are expected to turn out to be amazed and awed by the new $150 million shlockbuster.

Mike.

herobear

ah dont get me f***ing started on remakes :mad:
i think they're bloody disgraceful way to make money ughhhhh!
as for the infernal affairs(one of my favourite ever movies) remake, when i first heard that brad pitt was attached i was actually kinda happy, since he could pull off a good ming, but apparently he's only producing it now -_- and guess who's lined to play the two main characters, leonardo dicaprio and matt damon as yan and ming -_-
what a crap duo, they dont suit their roles at all!!!!!! its gonna be set in boston(of all places) with leonardo dicaprio infiltrating some non-descript gang(the whole point of IA was the triads) and if you know the plot of the original film, you'll know dicaprio will be used in a way not unlike another crapfest blockbuster film that he was in a while back

jill_valentine

Well, after my failed (but valiant ) attempt to defend The Ringmake, I'll comment briefly... with the sole potential exception of Ghost in Translation/The Grudge remake (Which even the folks at theringworld.com are excited about) all involved in remaking the above films should be forced to listen to Avril Lavigne 'til their brains dribble out of their nostrils...What the hell? At least have the decency to plagarise with dignity!

Whats the betting there'll be an ever so slight adjustment to the end of IA...? Hang on, BOSTON?!?!? Good lord...

And just to get really killed.... the DOTD remake, while it may as well have been called "Dancing Bus Stop Hootenanny" for all the relation it bore to the original (WTF? Did they not know it was gonna be called DOTD til the last minute?!?!) wasn't a bad movie. It paced nicely, and was refrshingly nasty for a modern American horror movie. By no means a classic of modern cinema, and it certainly suffered from comparisions to the Dawn of the Dead we know, but nonetheless, it's a surprisingly decent modern gore flick. . In fact, if they'd just called it Resident Evil, I think there's a whole bunch of DOTD fans, and at least one Resident Evil fan who'd be a whole lot happier...

elvis2002

Well I thought the ring remake was a joke, it was nowhere near as exiting or scary as the original. The original just creates a better atmosphere for me. I find it quite amazing also that most people are totally unaware that the movie was remade and they believe it be a new movie from hollywood.

Internal Affairs with Leo and Matt. Oh my god, what a waste of one of the greatest scripts ever. That will turn the film into a joke. They dont even look hard. Andy Lau and Tony leung look the part in internal affairs, its impossible to even think of these jokers in a remake.

I wonder whats next, remake of Hero and maybe Ichi The Killer along with Dead Or Alive starring Ben Affleck.

herobear

jill_valentine wrote:

Whats the betting there'll be an ever so slight adjustment to the end of IA...?

personally(without getting into details) i think they will keep it, turn leo into a hearthrob/hero for the femal demographic. not unlike another crapfest blockbuster which he was in a while ago(if i name it, im more or less spoiling the end for people who havent seen IA)

elvis2002 wrote:

Internal Affairs with Leo and Matt. Oh my god, what a waste of one of the greatest scripts ever. That will turn the film into a joke. They dont even look hard. Andy Lau and Tony leung look the part in internal affairs, its impossible to even think of these jokers in a remake.

i hear ya! these roles seem made for Lau and Leung, one of my favourite scenes in the film NAY the trilogy(yan taking the cocaine) will no doubt be canned -_-.

i've stayed as far away from the ring,dotd and texas chainsaw remakes as i can, i have absolutely no interest in seeing them

mentalimplosion

if there are remakes made of the wicker man and battle royale, i... i... i won't know what to do....

iasc

i dont see whats the problem, its not like your not aloud watch the orginals any more

BlitzKrieg

but its still offensive to the originals in many cases.


Its like someone going out and re writing a classic novel or play and adding on all these stupid little tad bits which in many cases are unnecasery or in others

DiscoStu

wait until they start on bollywood.

BlitzKrieg

on a battle royale remake...How? the film is banned in america (when i last checked it was anyway) and the content can never sit well with the general public...


Unless they change the concept completely...if they do then god help hollywood...


can see it now replace kids with action stars and the school system with arab terrorists...

*cries*

CuLT

Battle Royale: The Remake

• No longer high school kids - 27 year old's playing the role of highschool kids.
  
• Takes place in LA, which has been turned into a maximum security prison.
  
• Kawada is played by Sylvester Stallone, Kiriyama is now a masked Willem Dafoe.
  
• Kitano is played by Micheal Caine.
  
• A Nuclear Warhead is added to the random weapons.
  
• All the other annoying/evil characters are played by Arabs.

herobear

there will never be an american BR remake(thankfully) no u.s. distributor would go near it, i could maybe see an inspired type movie from hollywood, but it would still get alot of flak, and would be unlikely to be released regardless. in the sense of BR being banned in the u.s, technically its not(afaik, banned movies can still be released on unrated dvd) just no u.s distributor would go anywhere near it, in fear of the media backlash(the film still does have quite a large cult following in the u.s from fans who bought the imports/bootleg of it though, the novel and the manga have been released over there no problem)


in regards to the infernal affairs remake, heres a good informative page about it, contains spoilers for original and some outdated information near the beggining but still good info http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0407887/board/flat/8212535

ixoy

Well y'know I didn't think The Ring was a bad remake. And let's pause a second here - isn't The Ring 2 being directed by Hideo Nakata? Doesn't that say that maybe there's hope for it even you die-hard original fans? And let's not forget that, as appalling as the idea of SMG in a remake is, the Grudge is being directed by Takashi Shimizu, who did the originals. Some leniency on such movies, especially when you've not seen them might be good.

And, by all accounts, the forthcoming Manchurian Candidate remake (just released in the US) shows remakes can actually be done well...

Karl Hungus

iasc wrote:

i dont see whats the problem, its not like your not aloud watch the orginals any more

Actually, you're quite wrong there.
Hollywood quite literaly block the release of many Asain movies in the states (Hero still hasn't been released there, despite Jet Li being considerably popular, and Shaolin Soccer has only just been released this year, but in heavily cut status), and the only chance you'd get to see any Kung Fu for example, would be an American production where Jackie Chan gets teamed up with an oh-so unlikely partner with 'hilarious' results! Not to mention other such films along the same vein, Bulletproof Monk for example.

Lets not forget about Miramax in the US buying up the rights to many films, and either holding back the release indefinetly, or completely re-editing the film altogether. So technically, NO, you can't see the original anymore whe that's concerned. Now, I know we do generally have it better in europe for asian films (Anyone seen the US trailer for Zatoichi?), but the state of things in the US basically tries to keep any and all monopoly on movies to the point of denying cinema releases, and in the case of Miramax, DVD releases of such films.

So while it's not impossible for you to see the original films, hollywood is trying to snub everything else out in the most disrespectfull fashion imaginable, and it's just getting worse.

iasc

yeah but we're not american are we, and anyone who wants to see the film can buy it on dvd imports anyway

Makaveli

ixoy wrote:

And let's pause a second here - isn't The Ring 2 being directed by Hideo Nakata? Doesn't that say that maybe there's hope for it even you die-hard original fans?

Ring 2 isn't even that good in the first place. So the remake will probably be crap.

D-Generate

One of the main problems that I see with the American Remakes is that the average cinema goer will not realise that it is the Asians who are giving the breath of originality to todays films. They will be content with what the US Production companies give them and not go out and seek new films.

If Brad Pitt had been in Infernal Affairs then I think I would of not been too upset because he is a good actor. Such an amazing film and I will be uber pissed off if they mess it up because then the majority of people will be turned off watching the original because they will think it is just crap like the American one is.

Karl Hungus

Makaveli wrote:

Ring 2 isn't even that good in the first place. So the remake will probably be crap.

Well as far as I know, The Ring 2 is going to be a completely new story altogether, so it's not really a remake. But of course Ring 2 was naff to begin with as you mention, so just having Hideo Nakata's name attatched isn't going to save the film.

Perhaps while I'm ranting about remakes, I should rant about naff sequals too?

iasc

D-Generate wrote:

One of the main problems that I see with the American Remakes is that the average cinema goer will not realise that it is the Asians who are giving the breath of originality to todays films. They will be content with what the US Production companies give them and not go out and seek new films.

If Brad Pitt had been in Infernal Affairs then I think I would of not been too upset because he is a good actor. Such an amazing film and I will be uber pissed off if they mess it up because then the majority of people will be turned off watching the original because they will think it is just crap like the American one is.

i think the people who are into films will see the original asian movies no matter what the remake is like, those who arent would probabaly not be into subtitled movies, so the average american who liked the ring, probaably wouldnt have bothered to watch ringu

CuLT

Here's a Godawful Japanese film (which promised to be good) for you:

Battle Royale 2

fizzynicenice

now thats the jayzus truth. BRII looked promising, i was sooo excited at the Jameson film festival, and low and behold it was rather shíte, but an AMERICAN battle royale, hells no! they probabably wont touch it with a ten foot pole but if they do ::shakes fist in general direction of America::
What can you expect though? sure the magnificen seven was just a remake of 'Seven Samurai'

monkeyfudge

Has anyone else seen the Korean remake of The Ring, it's called the Ring Virus. It's really not that great, but it sticks alot closer to the book than the Japanese version. But it was very poor at delivering the scares...

I found the american remake to be a very competent film, it was just missing the whole sense of dread that is present in the Japanese version. I was certainly expecting something a hell of a lot worse than what we got.

The Dark Water remake might be okay as well, Jennifer Connelly should do a good job in the part. The other planned remakes don't sound like they'll be particularly good though.

I'd love to get my hands on the Gay Porn version of the Ring, it sounds great... you watch the video and in 7 days you turn gay.

jill_valentine

Its called the Hole, not to be confused with the Thora Birch/Keira Knightley thingy. I learned the hard way, trust me.

koneko

Ring Virus was (IIRC) a Japanese/Korean collaboration that was made after the original Ring. It stuck closer to the book in some parts, blatantly copied Ringu in others, but overall was very weak.

I've made my feelings on the Ring remake clear before, I think it failed where the original succeeded.

monkeyfudge

But the American remake is still probably about the 3rd best film out of the 6 films based on the Ring.

Only the original and Ring 0 are superior.

After Ring USA, it would be Ring 2, then Ring Virus, then the muck that is Rasen... I hope they never try to film the 3rd book.. things seem to get really silly by then.

Is there no Bollywood version yet? I'd love to see that...

Karl Hungus

DAMNIT! Will hollywood not leave classics alone for 2 minutes nowadays!?!

Just saw that they're remaking Logan's Run! Probably old news now, but damned annoying!

Here's a Godawful Japanese film (which promised to be good) for you:

Battle Royale 2

I think that fits snuggly into the "Naff Sequal" category, as I mentioned earlier:

Perhaps while I'm ranting about remakes, I should rant about naff sequals too?

Makaveli

monkeyfudge wrote:

But the American remake is still probably about the 3rd best film out of the 6 films based on the Ring.

Only the original and Ring 0 are superior.

After Ring USA, it would be Ring 2, then Ring Virus, then the muck that is Rasen... I hope they never try to film the 3rd book.. things seem to get really silly by then.

I thought Ring 2 was better than the remake. Ok, it wasn't very good compared to Ringu, and some of it was a bit silly, but it had a few scares. The remake had no scares that I can think of really. Ring 2 also managed to build tension like Ringu, the remake just doesn't do it, for me anyway.

Ring 0 is good for back story, but it's pretty boring. I'd have to watch it again, but from memory I think I enjoyed the remake more than 0.

Haven't seen Rasen or Ring Virus, so I can't comment on them.


The thing about Ringu and The Ring is, people tend to prefer the one they saw first. I know a lot of people that were really freaked out and scared by The Ring that then watched Ringu and thought it was boring. Where as I know people that saw Ringu first and think that's great and they think The Ring is crap.
I fall into the latter. Although it's not entirely crap as a film, as a remake I think it is.
The whole series is being flogged a bit too much though.

In_Diana_Jones

herobear wrote:

ah dont get me f***ing started on remakes :mad:
i think they're bloody disgraceful way to make money ughhhhh!
as for the infernal affairs(one of my favourite ever movies) remake, when i first heard that brad pitt was attached i was actually kinda happy, since he could pull off a good ming, but apparently he's only producing it now -_- and guess who's lined to play the two main characters, leonardo dicaprio and matt damon as yan and ming -_-
what a crap duo, they dont suit their roles at all!!!!!! its gonna be set in boston(of all places) with leonardo dicaprio infiltrating some non-descript gang(the whole point of IA was the triads) and if you know the plot of the original film, you'll know dicaprio will be used in a way not unlike another crapfest blockbuster film that he was in a while back

A non-descript gang?? Or the Irish Mafia...which is what Scorsese has suggested.

I personally thought IA was shocking, appalling even. So, hopefully a director with the qualities of Scorsese will make a good (although inevitably predictable) film from the basic storyline.

herobear

In_Diana_Jones wrote:

A non-descript gang?? Or the Irish Mafia...which is what Scorsese has suggested.

irish mafia ??? fair enough i havent heard that one, but still bring on the irish cliches why dont we -_- you know its inevitable to happen =/. at least the triads were represented in a respectable manner in the original trilogy(especially the 2nd one), with the character of "sam" being written out of the remake, you know the respectability factor is gonna go out the window, mainstream hollywood has problems with "villians"(again in the originals, the triads werent evil) presented in a respectable manner. and i personally dont see this being any different

I personally thought IA was shocking, appalling even. So, hopefully a director with the qualities of Scorsese will make a good (although inevitably predictable) film from the basic storyline.

shockingly, appallingingly bad ???? if you disliked the original so much, why do you think you'll like the remake ? all it'll be is a re-hashed storyline with a few things changed here and there. personally, im not a fan of scorsese, but thats your personal opinion.
ignoring everything else, this film just WONT work without the inclusion of sp wong and sam, they're in many ways(in all 3 films) just as important as ming and yan.
if you thought that infernal affairs was predictable, you really didnt understand the ending properly, but then you'll have to see IA3 to see what i mean

nadir

yes it really is a disgrace they way they butcher films, just for a few bucks.
Asian movies have been ripped off more than any other imo, even way back with kurasawa. Its a pity they cant just release foreign movies properly, I mean they did it with Hidden Tiger, why not the same with 'hero' and all the other great asian movies, im sure western audiences (european at least) would be just as happy to go see a good asian film instead of the usual hollywood blockbuster tripe.
At least then people would be able to see what a tarintino 'tribute' really is ...

BlitzKrieg

on a side note...


another annoying aspect of all the remakes they seem to be making are of the asain horror films only. Its a tad annoying cause people who do know they are based of asain originals will assume asain films are only good for horror films.

also the market is getting over congested with asain horrors at the moment as it is...

(example coming out in UGC over the next month or two: The Grudge. Tale of Two Sisters, The Phone. The lake) thats alot in the space of a month or two.

jill_valentine

4 Asian horror films is overcongested? I think, long term, it'll be good for movies, at the very least horror. Even if the rest of the remakes suck, at least there will have been a new flavour added to the mediocrity stew that is modern horror. And hey, the more slow burn the better...

Karl Hungus

BlitzKrieg wrote:

also the market is getting over congested with asain horrors at the moment as it is...

(example coming out in UGC over the next month or two: The Grudge. Tale of Two Sisters, The Phone. The lake) thats alot in the space of a month or two.

I can agree with you there altogether.
The whole thing screams 'CASH-IN' as much as any hollywood remake, or naff sequal.

Although with that said, I'm really looking farward to seeing A Tale Of Two Sisters, it looks amazing from what I've seen. But my sources say The Phone is one to avoid altogether.

ixoy

BlitzKrieg wrote:

also the market is getting over congested with asain horrors at the moment as it is...

You lot are never happy are you It's either too little or too much! I wouldn't have described "Gozu" as a horror and UGC are also providing "Infernal Affairs II" shortly. As to the martial arts flick... well there was Zatoichi, which I throughly enjoyed. I suppose one question you need to ask yourself is how are these movies performing? Are they getting an audience? CTHD shouldn't be used as an example as it was made by an already established Hollywood director (and it wasn't even that good anyway). Do audiences want to see these movies or is it just a select few cult movie goers? I mean I'd love some some diversity, and will probably catch most of the Asia Extreme series but that doesn't mean these movies are in the cinema's best interest - you forget how many people just want something dumb for escapism... it's why Hollywood does what it does and box office receipts continue to increase, with occasional Momento abberations aside.
So does anyone have concrete info on how these movies perfom?

Grimlock

They're remaking TAXI now!!!!!!!
Plotline:
""Chicago’s" Queen Latifah and "Saturday Night Live’s" Jimmy Fallon team up in this non-stop action-comedy. Latifah is New York’s fastest cabbie whose skills behind the wheel and souped-up car help an overeager undercover cop (Fallon) pursue a gang of female bank robbers."

In other words, fat african american quick-talking cabbie helps out skinny happless jewish guy........yawn! :rolleyes:

Sounds too bad to be true!

Trailer if ya doubt me! (right click and save as)
http://tinyurl.com/4t5u4

Sleipnir

Karl Hungus wrote:

Lets hope that proposed remake of The Wicker Man never happens either.

pleas tell me that was a joke.

ixoy

Sleipnir wrote:

pleas tell me that was a joke.

Nope, they've been planning it for a while. Having said that, I think the original is more in the cult classic zone, and not actually all that great of a movie so it's not the most offensive remake proposal that I've heard.

jill_valentine

I think half the strength of the original was the pretty shocking ending... having seen it, I'd imagine I'd be equally underwhelmed either if they changed the ending or retread it. That's me, never happy. I'll keep an eye out for it though, if only to see if they incorporate the barmy wall slapping singing bit...

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar

anyone heard anything more on the american live action versions of evangelion/akira/dragonball Z ?

the evangelion one is the only one i've heard anything about, and what I heard was not good

laurelhedare

I missed this remakes post, I've got a new thread up about the remake of The Manchurian Candidate. Haven't seen the 1960's version yet, but I'm planning to see it this weekend.

By the way, anyone watch Jon Stewart on The Daily Show. I just found this site with these different election vignettes from his Indecision 2004 series. So hilarious. Check em out. http://195.172.204.132/imredirect.cfm?Ref=Indecision&VID=2278&CID=1&TID=415&UID=20

Karl Hungus

Right, well while I'm ranting about remakes and sequels, I think I might aswell rant about the double-negative that is The Ring 2 which is being directed by Hideo Nakata...

And not only that, but he's now set to direct a remake of The Entity!

Will the remakes ever stop being churned out!?