Former Wolverines in Red Dawn remake
Why remake a classic?
http://detnews.com/article/20091014/SPORTS0201/910140340/1131/sports/Lo…
October 14th, 2009 at 1:56 PM ^
All they make is remakes anymore, weather its an old tv show, an old movie, or a foreign film. They don't care about the quality of their product, as long as morons shell out their hard earned cash to see it, they are satisfied.
October 14th, 2009 at 7:04 PM ^
agreed, I especially hate the Rob Zombie remakes of Halloween. He completely obliterated what was a classic horror series. That's the best example of poor remakes I can think of.
EDIT: I just saw the ongoing conversation about horror movies further down. Comment still stands, though.
October 14th, 2009 at 2:01 PM ^
...would they want to remake an already perfect movie?
RIP P.Swayze
October 14th, 2009 at 2:04 PM ^
Fighter pilot colonel: "All that hate is going to burn you up inside."
Kid, carving notches on his rifle stock: "It keeps me warm."
October 14th, 2009 at 3:14 PM ^
I see two possible rationales for remakes like this one. First, the trend in pop culture is toward meta. That is, I see a lot of movies and books that have a primary purpose of commenting on some other movie, book, or the conventions and standards of the medium. Second, maybe a lot of Hollywood writers have the mentality of seventeen year-old potheads: e.g., "Wouldn't it be cool if John McClane had a twitter account?"
Probably more movies fall into the second category than the first. The worst remake I've heard rumors of is "Buffy the Vampire Slayer." Because kids today just can't relate to the cultural context of 1992.
FWIW, putting "Red Dawn" at the top of my Netflix queue.
October 14th, 2009 at 3:47 PM ^
I wouldn't mind a Buffy movie. It was an excellent TV series, but the original movie was a campy disaster. Even the creator, Joss Whedon, acknowledged this.
October 14th, 2009 at 3:47 PM ^
I also had a thing for Kirstie Swanson (Buffy) though.
October 14th, 2009 at 6:00 PM ^
The writers in Hollywood have nothing to do with this remake garbage. People with money want to use it to invest. Thus, most films are made so that they are relatively safe as far as breaking even or making profit goes. As much as everyone here would love to see good, original cinema, it is rarely the type of film that generates large sales at the box office. Investors would rather go with Transformers (Steven Spielberg being one of them) than something like Children of Men.
Besides, some remakes are quite good. The recent Star Trek remake was outstanding, very imaginative, and quite rewarding for the viewer. Remake and good film are not mutually exclusive.
October 14th, 2009 at 7:29 PM ^
I agree that these movies primarily get made because there is demand for them, which makes them an economically sound proposition.
On the flip side, Michael Bay--whom it would be a stretch to call a writer, but is nevertheless a "creative" force behind a number of these films--is an example of the type of person I was talking about. The studios give him the green light because he basically prints money with his movies, but I kind of doubt that he conceives his ideas for remakes primarily on the basis of dollar signs, even though profit no doubt enters his mental calculus.
So I guess I'm agreeing with you, but saying that the studios' motivations in greenlighting many of these turd sandwiches coexist alongside the individual motivations of the producers, directors, and writers.
October 14th, 2009 at 8:59 PM ^
Michael Bay absolutely works for the paycheck, there is no question about that. My problem was that you were generalizing "Hollywood writers" by saying waves and waves of remakes are their fault, or that they are partially responsible for them. Since these guys make films for a living, when it comes down to it, they have to do what pays the bills. I'm sure about 85% of Hollywood screenwriters and directors would love to make great films. They are generally intelligent, motivated people. However, probably 5% of greenlit films contain material that is memorable beyond the opening weekend.
Michael Bay is the exception to this rule. I have heard that he repeatedly gets his awful movies made because he consistently comes in under budget. Also, he considers his films to be advertising for the US military, so he is able to film with sweet military equipment for the cost of basically nothing. Money is a very important factor in why Bay is able to make his films
October 14th, 2009 at 3:28 PM ^
My favorite scene from the original is the dog fight "scene". Apparently not enough $$ in the budget to film some fighter jets duking it out so all we get is some canned jet noises, smoke curls and Toni looking up at the sky while moving her head around.
October 14th, 2009 at 3:37 PM ^
all creativety. They go with what has sold in the past, and aren't willing to take risks on something new and untested.
Another stupid remake.....'V', I saw this 25 years ago.
October 14th, 2009 at 3:46 PM ^
With the change in world politics, they have to change the antagonist to better fit the youth of today and the US's current propaganda strategies. It's no longer a concern about Cuban or Nicaraguans.
Russia and China are the two major geo-political powers that would pose the most threat to the US in terms of political struggles. China is becoming a growing super power economically and Russia still holds a lot of power globally despite the fall of pure-ish communism. How they treat the Middle East greatly impacts how we treat the Middle East.
October 14th, 2009 at 4:00 PM ^
I dont know, if they keep it a period piece as it was, it could still be the same antagonists. Also, iirc, the Chinese were our friends in the movie. Wasnt the line, 'i though we had a billion chinamen on our side?" "We did, but now its 10 million." or something like that.
If they make it a modern day setting, it will be interesting to see what they do.
WOLVERINES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
October 14th, 2009 at 4:04 PM ^
The said specifically in the news clip that they changed it to the Chinese and Russians. But yeah, that was the line.
October 14th, 2009 at 3:51 PM ^
I'm still interested in seeing how the update is treated. I think it could be a good popcorn movie.
October 14th, 2009 at 3:57 PM ^
All sorts of remakes going on nowadays. Like the Halloween II remake. A remake of a sequel. Now that's what I call a winning formula!
A Nightmare on Elm Street is being remade too.
October 14th, 2009 at 4:38 PM ^
Horror is my favorite genre and it truely sickens me to see what it has become. They either make shitty remakes of classics, as you have pointed out (although those movies haven't come out, they will NOT be as good as the originals) or they remake these dumb ass Japanese movies full of lame ass ghosts and creepy kids. *cringe* But what really erks me is that they now want to make these movies PG-13 to broaden the audience so they can make more money, saying "to hell with integrity". Oh, and don't even get me started on CGI. Ugh, i'm depressed now-not really, but WTF?
October 14th, 2009 at 5:57 PM ^
I used to love horror films. The Friday the 13th series is one of my all-time favorites, but I'm a sucker for camp. The most disturbing trend for me is the move toward torture porn. Don't get me wrong, I always got a kick out of Jason's most recent creative means of human disposal, but I really don't enjoy watching people get tortured for ninety minutes. The directors of more recent movies confuse torture with suspense.
The only recent horror movie that I have enjoyed was Zombieland, and it's probably a stretch to call that a horror movie. Maybe America is too cynical for the horror movies from the 70's and 80's.
October 15th, 2009 at 2:25 AM ^
There is an awesome documentary about horror films you would like called "Going To Pieces," and it's mainly about 70's and 80's slasher films. It's got all kinds of clips, plus an interview with Tom Savini, and it shows the evolution of slasher movies from Psycho on. I showed it to a cinema class I taught, and they loved it.
October 15th, 2009 at 3:00 AM ^
absolutley kicks ass. I've seen that doc on youtube, great stuff.
October 14th, 2009 at 6:45 PM ^
Check out Paranormal Activity - it's very good. One of the scariest movies I've ever seen. No half-assed ghosts, no creepy kids, rated R, and best of all, it's not a hollywood movie.
It opens nationally on Friday
October 15th, 2009 at 8:38 AM ^
Yeah the horror genre is about as close to dead as you can get. I love The Ring but every other Japanese-ish horror movie since then has been utter shit. It's all about body counts, cheap scares, and CGI. Nobody makes anything with any underlying themes or that's worth watching more than once.
October 14th, 2009 at 4:42 PM ^
real reason why they're remakeing Red Dawn.......its so we can have a video clip (and audio) of the young man screaming "Wolverine!!!!" and play it over and over on the big screen while our student section does some "woop woop" thing.
......that would be corny though wouldn't it.
October 14th, 2009 at 4:49 PM ^
Sarcasm meter is on the move.
October 14th, 2009 at 7:02 PM ^
You mean it Red Dawned on you?
October 14th, 2009 at 8:19 PM ^
A buddy of mine and fellow 1997 graduate was selected to be an extra. He's Asian American and will play the part of "Some Random Officer."
I'm not necessarily all that fired up about a Red Damn remake but it's cool for my buddy, and Detroit in general.
October 14th, 2009 at 10:47 PM ^
Get up there Danny and piss in the radiator.
October 14th, 2009 at 10:59 PM ^
Am the only person who thinks he was actually a pretty solid safety (in '07 at least)? Or has my opinion's just been skewed by the safety play the past two years?
October 14th, 2009 at 11:05 PM ^
How come I have no idea who Darnell Hood is?
October 15th, 2009 at 9:39 AM ^
don't bother me. As long as the movie is good, I couldn't care less if it's original or not. Almost every movie borrows something from movies before it.
I'm hoping the "Red Dawn" remake is good. The original is one of the most memorable movies I've ever seen, but if the remake fails, it really doesn't diminish the first movie, for me anyway.
The first film happened in Colorado, and the new one is being filmed in my backyard, literally, so there will be differences in the setting. I can't imagine that it will be "better", but I'm still curious.
As cautiously optimisitic as I am about "Red Dawn", I absolutely can't wait to see the "Boondock Saints" sequel this year.
"NOW you will receive us..."
I do have to agree with whoever said that Zombie ruined the Halloween movies. In my opinion, that series should have stopped at two and never been remade.