Why is Hollywood obsessed with Simulacra ?
This paper will focus on
Hollywood’s
growing trend towards simulacrum, the remakes that have come to dominate the
cinema. It is the aim of this paper to understand this tendency
by semiotic review and
conclude with certain recommendations .
INTRODUCTION
Film Director John Huston
once said: “There is a willful
lemming-like persistence in remaking past successes time after time. They can’t
make them as good as they are in our memories, but they go on doing them and
each time it’s a disaster. Why don’t we remake some of our bad pictures … and
make them good?” (Valdez)
Our cultural memories of films, the way we remember them,
is under threat by the distant storm clouds of consumerism, by the way
simulacrum itself is replicating another strain of adaptation, spawned from the
many heads of the Hollywood Hydra. The common pattern within the mechanism of
this hydra is to replicate as much as possible. The blockbuster age of the
sequel has now taken another evolutionary step: The remake or re-imagining
assimilates what ever the original was felt to commercially lack, such as
subtle expositions and re-packages them for the Hollywood
vision of eye candy.
The compulsion to tag on action scenes which the original
simply didn’t need is also prevalent: Just compare the two endings of any
original and its contemporary remake and you will get the general idea. As
these writings come to print, Back To the
Future (1985) director Robert Zemeckis will be in talks with Disney about
re-making Yellow Submarine in CGI, Added to this confusion, Spielberg will be in
talks with Universal about re-making E.T.
The Extra Terrestrial (1982). Google any film from Citizen Kane to Gone With the
Wind and somebody somewhere is in a office in Hollywood, in talks about
what’s ‘hot’ for a remake. Hollywood has this tendency for simulacrum, for copying formulas and
reworking them for maximum profit within a block buster format.
It is apparent that the Hollywood
remake has become the new sequel, replacing the age of Rambo III, Rocky IV,
Friday the 13th part VIII and so on. Invariably one has only to step
back and see that the remake is not merely a random occurrence within the Hollywood sphere and that the success of any remade series
or film is not totally dependent on blind luck but in essence : simulacrum.
There is a reason for why
so many remakes are being made and there is a pattern to which they falter.
What is more, is its blandenising effect on the film industry by perpetual
remakes or other simulacrum in order to keep the cash mill turning. Hollywood, like all
businesses, is out there to make profit: writer Oliver James argues that, we live in the age of selfish capitalism and
so it is no surprise that quantity ultimately over comes quality. For this is
the age of disposability, rather than sustainability, corporatocracy rather than
family run business’s, marketing strategies rather than the peoples choice. It
is almost as if Raymond Williams fears of American colonialism have made us in
the Uk, subject to the branding of American globalisation, for even our Tv
sitcoms, such as The Office have
become remade in the guise of the American image. In Europe and as far as Japan, Hollywood
has reached out and adapted films and Tv serials into an American format. On
the one hand many American remakes have improved on the original but then again
Americanizing a French film is another aspect entirely, a trend Hollywood went through
quite vivaciously in the 1990’s and in post 911.Acceptance
that the Hollywood
remake has now become the new sequel, is not enough: One must also take into
account where the franchise for a movie or Tv series has reached its optimum
limit and the executive decision is made to re-imagine
it for blockbusting maximum profit. The main arsenal within this campaign is
the rhetoric for nowness, an aspect that this dissertation will focus on,
baring in mind that nowness is also the commonality within all films. The idea
of nowness in films is also the problem: a question that arose during this
investigation would ponder over whether there were other elements that
constituted the remake other than nowness and if so what where they?
Was a
remake simply the makeup of a poor adaptation? Why was a film such as Peter
Jackson’s King Kong (2005) so close
to the 1933 original? How did Jackson
understand the mechanisms of the adaptation that enabled him to enjoy the
success of the Lord of the Rings Trilogy?
Another question arose concerning Spielberg’s remake of The War
of the Worlds: what was the aim of
this remake other than to imitate the 1953 version, why has this story evaded a
return to the source material. How did Jackson
succeed with King Kong that was not achieved with Spielberg’s War of the Worlds?
It is in the recognition of simulacrum in
these remakes which this essay will address and though its detailed
investigation, will try to grasp what it is about the remake that makes it so
prevalent in the cinema going experience. The scope of this enquiry will not
just confine itself to the silver screen but also look at the consumerism angle
that cannot be ignored. Ultimately this enquiry wishes to understand the
concept of the remake and answer the question as to why is Hollywood obsessed with Simulacrum?
During
this investigation, a selection of relevant literature was reviewed which
identified certain common key features, which shall be disclosed within the
methodology and its relationships discussed.
Literature review
The literature review will be divided into two sections: In
the first section we shall briefly look at general literature such as news paper articles and internet blogs before
moving on towards the observations of writers such as Druxman, Mandiburg, Eberwien and Verevis. In section 2 we
shall review more centralised literature such as the various critics regarding
the remakes and adaptations of: The War
of the Worlds and King Kong, and
how the Hollywood mechanism is understood by
,Jim Hillier Benjamin M Compaine and Douglas Gomery. The semiotic theory
regarding film as viewed by Dorsky, Barthes and Williams will also be observed,
in order to ascertain a specialist viewpoint of the remake and understand the
mechanisms of the remake from a semiotic point of view.
Section One – What the
papers say
In this section we shall review the source material at hand
that enabled to build up a
case for this dissertation. Looking at various blogs on the
internet, the general consensus appeared to be the same: Simon Brew’s blog on
the D en of Geek website mentioned at
least 38 remakes being planned by Hollywood, among them are: Katsuhiro Otomo’s Akira (1988), Kinji Fukasaku’s adaptation of Battle Royal (2000),
Sam Peckinpah’s Straw Dogs (1971)
based on Gordon Williams 1969 novel, The Siege of Trencher's Farm and
Hitchcock’s The Birds (1963) by
Daphne du
Maurier. Moving onto
journals and magazine supplements, Sam Leith of the arts section in The Guardian, correlates the general
disgruntle for the disdain of remakes:
“…To
be fair, most remakes are interested in what was so distinctive about the
original-even if they go on to expunge those very elements...’The Day the Earth
Stood Still’, strikingly filmed, was too black- and-white, ‘Fame’ too
legwarmery; ‘The Office’ too British; ‘The Vanishing’ and ‘The Ring’ too foreign...”
At first glance this may seem fairly
self explanatory to the reader, who no doubt has some gripe themselves about a
classic film remade into a Hollywood blockbuster, to which this paper is
concerned. Other newspapers such as the Sunday Times Culture supplement
headlines offered :
“…IT’S THE 1980’S ALL OVER AGAIN…”
Reporter Stephen
Armstrong of that supplement, reeled off a list of remakes as long as this
dissertation: From Karate Kid with
Jackie Chan to the return of Freddy Krugar in a Nightmare on Elm St, the appeal of the remake stems from
nostalgia: “…Take Warner’s (Brothers) Batman…” noted
one Hollywood executive, in this article
“…it goes from little kid comic to television series, then a series of big
screen features that were huge money-makers…then Chris Nolan’s Batman
Begins…ends up one of the highest grossing films of all time…”
It is quite undeniable that this is merely a
product of the Hollywood mechanism. If it is
easier to sell an established idea, then it becomes the dominant force for
making money. “…if you can make more money than you could possibly imagine by
doing a sequel to a film that was itself a reboot of an old film series after
it was a Tv Show, how would that experience possibly persuade any studio chief
that people want something new and different?...” So, where does this insatiable compulsion for
the remake stem from. Perhaps, as the various blogs and journalists have
observed, Hollywood
has truly run out of ideas and is using the sure fire box office success of its
own back catalogue as a way to generate new revenue.
Notes On Druxman
It could be said that it is up the discretion of the
director to acknowledge his film is a remake or not, however in the case of
Druxman’s survey on movie remakes, he found the correlation of
what was a remake became more and more diluted as he went along. An example of
this would be the loose similarities of any two films set against totally
different genres but at the same time sharing very similar characteristics when
compared.
Notes on Eberwien:
Critics such as Robert Eberwien argued that any remake
suggested a contested homage, by its
director and cited other writers works such as Harvey Greenberg that
directors such as Spielberg had Oedipal
inflections . Eberwien also took into account that the
remake is a re-reading of the original. As in so much as to say that the remake
must consider that nostalgia of the period that the original film was made, is
just as important when applying this to the remake .
Notes on Verevis:
As suggested by Constantine Verevis, who noted Tino Balios
concerns on Hollywood source acquisition methods, he stated that (Hollywood) had huge offices dotted around the U.S. and Europe
with the sole purpose of acquiring ideas cheaply. Verevis also noted Druxman’s observations on the fact that
established literary works such as Jekyll
and Hyde were easier to adapt into films, that books released into the
public domain were by far cheaper and a vehicle to promote new technologies.
Section 2
Central Literature
This section will now look at the more academic side of the
literature review
Regarding Dorsky,
Barthes and other academic sources of research,
Certain remakes will be reviewed, particularly regarding
the remakes of War of the Worlds and King Kong.
Notes on reviews
of HG Wells The War of the Worlds
In order to understand certain remakes such as Spielberg’s
remake of War of the Worlds , it was
necessary to source information regarding how Hg Wells’s novel was interpreted
and how this transposed to the big screen. Baxter interprets the meaning
of H.G Well’s novel about alien invasion
in a compilation of essays titled: Enduring Mythos of Mars (2005) – on p.183
he regards Wells position on
anti-colonialism: “…Wells tale derives authority from the
contemporary paradigm of Mars as a failing
abode for life, and draws its power from allegory: Wells was pricking
the complacency of the late Victorian English by giving them a taste of being
on the receiving end of a hostile colonization…” a statement re-enforced by
Silverberg introduction to The War of the Worlds: Fresh Perspectives (2005)
in which Silverberg notes Wells contempt for the British establishment on page
7; even citing this extract from War of the Worlds novel:
“…At most terrestrial men fancied there might
be other men upon mars ,
perhaps
inferior to themselves and ready to welcome a missionary enterprise.
Yet across the gulf of space, minds
that are to our minds as ours are to the
Beasts that perish, intellects vast
and cool and unsympathetic, regarded this
Earth
with envious eyes and slowly and surely drew their plans against us…”
On page eight, Silverberg notes that British Colonialism in 1897
represented “…the darker corners of the
world… full of England’s valiant missionaries, carrying the message of the
Gospels to the savage heathens of far-off lands; but who would have dared
suggest that we ourselves might seem to others every bit as savage and ignorant
as those “natives” did to the missionaries of Queen Victoria’s day…?”
In Hickman’s The
films of George Pal (1977) he suggests that the 1953 version of War of the Worlds was updated from the
novel in order to reflect the cold war
while on p158 of Friedmans
Citizen Spielberg,(2006) it is suggested that Spielberg’s remake was addressing
‘Post 911 issues…’ – in reviewing
both films - the latter’s us vrs them
mentality is strikingly similar to the 1953 version.
Notes on Dorsky
and Nowness
Nathaniel Dorsky regards the need for nowness in his book Devotional Cinema, reflected by its
importance as time or “…absolute time…the eternal now…”(p33) what Dorsky refers
to as the moment or as R.E. Spiller put it, ‘a study of the pastness of the present and...of the presentness of the
past’
For, Dorsky, as film editor and observer, his
nowness is in relationship to the long take: Dorsky as artist and editor shows
us the privileged of nowness, to see the scene with minimal editing or cuts
that would other wise cheat time.(p36) On the other hand, Dorsky as Observer
appreciates the drawbacks of how nowness can overbear everything else, an
observation he connects with mundane conversations, which, much like the
Hollywood remake have their drawbacks.
Of such mundainity Dorsky noted:
“…Conversation can often be an exhausting
exchange of self confirming, pre-digested concepts with no real exploration:
everything is already ‘known’ and is motivated by a need to maintain the status
quo of oneself in relation to the other person...Nowness is tainted by the need
to accomplish something, to stay in control… ” (p34)
Within the movie making
business, Dorsky appreciates the problems of nowness in as much that its
excessive temporality often leaves the observer “…shallow and used…” but as opposed to being in relation to
pastiche and nostalgia Dorsky refers to the vertical and horizontalness of
nowness. Where the horizontal is the overbearing continuity of nowness and the
vertical is the absolute lack of it.
(Dorsky , p35) Ultimately
what Dorsky is saying is that nowness is like too much salt in ones diet: We
all need the sodium chloride in salt to maintain a balance within our bodies:
it is an essential part of our existence, however too much salt if used in
excess, can lead to health problems. Nowness is much the same, like salt, it
has “…the potential to be balanced or
imbalanced…”(p35)
Dorsky, N. Devotional Cinema (2005) Revised Second
Edition Tuumba Press
Notes on Emilia Barna and nowness, pastiche and nostalgia .
Institute of Popular Music, University of Liverpool, Uk
These three elements are not only confined to the moving
image but that of the popular music scene as well: Emilia Barna considered the
nowness, pastiche and nostlagia of the 1960s against the popular culture
surrounding the Beatles at the forefront of the media interest. In particular
she cited other observers accounts in regard to nowness , such as Ian McDonald
who applied ‘post Christian newness’ to the Beatles work, maintaining their
song writing style was being “…governed
by a present-time mentality…”. Barna presented the link between the media
hype, the music of popular culture and the element of nowness, within her
comments on McDonalds observations: “…this
simultaneity and ‘nowness’, however, is only one side of the coin, as far
as either the Beatles or rock music in
general is concerned...”. With regard to nostalgia, Barna reflected on
popular culture as a means of escape for the general public, caught within the
civil unrest of the cold war and growing hostilities between the United States and the USSR. Her observations of
nostalgia noted the depiction of cultural
memory within certain Beatles songs such as Penny
Lane and Strawberry Fields.
Barna
hoped to prove the following argument that “…using
the tools of the mass media, certain songs of the Beatles and the Kinks
transmitted and reinforced, or a least commented on values that had become
threatened or repressed by the emerging globalising effects of the mass media
themselves…” and referred to “…the
past and to locality within a strong and inherent connection and interaction
between the two notions…” Digging
further into her argument, she regarded the pastiche of the Beatles in close
regard to the music of their contemporaries, citing Andy Bennetts observations
on the representations of ‘Britishness’ in popular music, such as the Kinks and the Small Faces ; “..The album
‘The Kinks Are the Village Green Presentation Society’ applies pastiche as a
technique; Gelbart refers to this as a ‘Kaleidoscopic play of topoi’…” Which
Barna later elaborates within her endnotes as
“…Topos in a
literary analysis usually refers to a recurring motif or image – something
common place…”
Notes on
Mandiburg
Mandiburg highlights three elements, prevalent in remakes,
particularly that of world cinema: fidelity,
fertility and localization, in order to explain how the Hollywood mechanism works in order to transpose the
medium of films made by other countries.
Mandiburg argues that fidelity should be faithful to the
original but this faithfulness is also inhibited by the aspect of fertility due
to the inherent problems of pure translation from one language to another, thus
the localization of language takes precedence.
This precedence, relates to the dominant language:
Mandiburg observes this as being “..inseparable from the intersections of power, domination
and translation methodology …” forcing the translator to take sides with
the two modes of fidelity.
These two modes of fidelity regard interpreting a
translation word for word or by adaptation of the words within the sense of the
words, where by the purity is lost by one mode and the understanding is gained
by the other. Mandiburg suggests that such an attempt for direct translation
using the first mode, might result in confusion but by translating the meaning
using the second mode at least gets the idea across to the recipient. Ultimately
the idea of translation in any remake boils down to a case of interpretation,
whether a movie is adapted from a novel, an older film or a motion picture made
overseas.
Notes on Rubio,
Nostalgia and King Kong
Steven Rubio is a English Professor at the American River
College USA, on regarding remakes, he noted in King Kong is back (Brin 2005) that nostalgia was an important part
of the remake and used Dino De Laurentis 1976 version as an example.
He also cited Pauline Kael of New Yorker, on the birth of
blockbusters, particularly Star Wars: “the
excitement of those who call it the film of the year goes way past nostalgia to
the feeling that now is the time to return to childhood…” In
An Open Letter to Universal and Dino De
Laurentiis - Mandell,P had similar
reservations: On page 128 of this article featured in King Kong Cometh. 2005 and title Dino Kong, Mandell explores the 1976 version and its many
predecessors such as the films made by Toho films. In Paul A Woods compilation of King Kong
remakes: King Kong Cometh,(2005) dozens of Kong inspired films are
reviewed, but particular interest is again focused on Dino De Laurentiis and his crazy idea of a 42 foot tall robot Kong, which cost 3 million dollars and like
Spielberg’s robot shark in Jaws – it never really worked. On reflection for the
1933 version writer Ester M Friesner regarded Kong’s Beauty
and the Beast parallels in Give Beast
a Chance on p159 of Habers: Kong Unbound (2005) and praise for Peter
Jackson’s 2005 remake is abundant throughout the rest of these books.
____________
Kael 234,230 as quoted by Steven Rubio (2005)
P 27 in Brin . D - King Kong is back
Benbella Books, Dallas, Texas.
Notes on Jim Hillier
In order to understand the Hollywood
mechanism better, reference has been made to
Hollywood’s capitalism on movie remakes and its focus for profit
based on the ‘no brainer’ attitude inherent in the studio system. In Jim
Hillier’s book: The New Hollywood,(1992) this disdain is made apparent :
He cites Amy Jones’s observations on the Hollywood
mechanism as thus “…most people at the
studios do not even pretend to know what movies work and go only on who is
‘hot’…”(p94)
Notes on Benjamin
M Compaine and Douglas Gomery :
Who Owns the Media?
In their third edition published in 2000 Compaine and
Gomery reviewed Monopoly’s and Oligopoly (p511 – 519) the umbrella of effect of
corporate America and how
this was reflected in Hollywood
by various forms. These forms covered the competition between Betamax and VHS
in the 1980’s (p411-414) Spielberg and
Dreamworks attempt to match the Big Six Hollywood studios p397, Star Wars Phantom Menace ( p359,) and a scandal that involved
the Department of Justice (p425-426).
Concerning George Lucas’s Phantom Menace
film in 1999, its distributor 20th Century Fox became entangled by
the Department of Justice, spurred by the films released to only selective
cinemas willing to pay a minimum fee for showing it. By and large this practice is recognised as vertical integration Compaine and Gomery were interested in how the
media shapes society : (p538) how The Big Six
came about (p368- 372) how
the MGM merger failed ( p370) and the Hollywood Oligopoly (p380,
p422). Compaine and Gomery regarded the mechanisms of Hollywood in terms
of tv network control: the Vertical integration – defined on p213 as : where prime time Tv productions are
made by the Tv networks who are essentially owned by the Hollywood Studios or
vice versa : CNN for example is owned by Time Warner, Rupert Murdoch is CEO of
News Corporation which owns 20th Century Fox and so on. This is
expanded on p548. The focus of this book was to find evidence of Lucas and
Spielburg effected Hollywood
and the remake. – The answer is
suggested on
p367 where Compaine and Gomery disclose Spielberg and Lucas
had the top ten grossing rental films of all time, this fact is also
highlighted on how Star Wars was in top ten video rentals on p 417, 418
Compaine and Gomery concluded on p 576 that the media “… is owned by thousands of large and small firms and organizations …”
under the umbrella of an Oligopoly.
Notes on Roland
Barthes and consumerism
Barthes observed the rhetoric within the still and moving
image.(p40) within this rhetoric, he observed the mechanisms of the press,
cartoons and advertising, recognising the subtext of image as a form of
connotation, where as stated : “…Anchorage is the most frequent function of the
linguistic message and is commonly found in press photographs and
advertisements…” (p41) Barthes regarded this as a form of control: purporting
that the more invariably clichéd the imagery of advertising worked then the
more likely the consumer would adopt a submissive posture and comply to its
demands. Barthes suggested that “…when
the text has the diegetic value of relay the information is more costly ,
requiring as it does the learning of a digital code ( the system of language);
when it has a substitute value (anchorage, control) , it is the image which
detains the informational charge and, the image being analogical, the
information is then ‘lazier’…” (Barthes, p41)
Notes on Cultural Memory
Roger
Silverstone noted his fears regarding the dwindling of cultural memory within
our society, in his book Why study the
Media ?(1999) he maintained “…the
past, like the present is fractured by division and difference..” and drew
the parallel of the media sphere to late night Tv, blaming both these and
Hollywood for drawing “… its sting…”
into the fragility of our recollection’s of past events. (Silverstone, Chapter
14 ‘memory’) Silversone was not alone in these fears as observed by Andreas
Huyssen: “…there is a deepening sense of
crisis often articulated in the reproach that our culture is terminally ill
with amnesia…”
Notes on Simulacra
In his short book titled Simulations(1983) Jean Baudrillard referred to simulation and
simulacra and noted the four phases of repetition among symbols within
society: These phases were maintained
from their initial stages as a faithful
image or copy represented in a “…reflection
of a profound reality…”( Baudrillard, p 6). From this followed more copies
that become a perversion of reality, unfaithful to the original, followed again
by the imitation which attained to mask the absence of a profound reality by
pretending to be a faithful representation of the source. By the fourth and
final stage of this cycle, Baudrillard referred to simulacra in which any
imitation has no bearing on reality that can be identified. Baudrillard argued
that society’s reliance towards simulacra, has undermined its connections to
the real world.
Methodology
The
problem of repetition
In this section we will integrate the research material
into addressing the problem of
remakes as a semiotic analysis, by understanding how
nowness, pastiche and nostalgia are suppose to work . This will regard the
brief history of older films adapted from novels such as Mary Shelleys Frankenstein and the effect this has had on the
remake, sequel and adaptation, from the Golem
in 1920, to The Thing from Another World
in 1951. With the literature review underway, it was necessary to review as
many films using a semiotic approach in understanding, this led back to the
original hypothesis regarding Hollywood
remakes and their relationship to nowness, pastiche and Nostalgia.
DEFINITIONS:
Nowness, Pastiche and Nostalgia
So what is ‘nowness’ and how does this apply to the film
remake. From the research based on Dorsky into films and the reviews of the
Beatles music by Emilia Barna, nowness
in a semiotic or as a general term, is of the moment. However in the Hollywood sense it is has become the absolute, the bottom
line in cool, the ‘pizzaz’ spark integral to the marketing stratagem of the Hollywood mechanism. It is the latest fashion, the need
for updating, the latest craze, the reason to warrant Yellow Submarine in CGI because nowness will undoubtedly make it
better, in the eyes of Hollywood
at least. The term refers to a multitude of media orientated objectives that
supposedly would secure a films box office success:
In effect it has become a
syndrome, a condition that has left filmmakers and critics perplexed. Think about nostalgia and then think about James Whales
1931 version of Frankenstein, (1931).Since
Mary Shelly’s publication of this Modern Prometheusin
January 1818, there have been countless
versions of her story, via stage plays, alternative children’s books
and in particular: Film. Boris Karlof as the
Golem like creature in James Whales version: A portrayal both sympathetic and
terrifying at the same time, Jack Pierce, responsible for Karloff’s make up created the iconic monster
look for the next 20 years, even morphing into other movies such as the
original Thing from another world. (
1956)
Like the ripple effect caused by Lucas and Spielberg, the
Karlof monster ‘look’ crossed all boundaries, from The Thing to the robot Gort in Day
the Earth Stood Still (1951) a film we shall look at later. Nearly every
other monster movie had a lumbering Karloff flat top description, right up
until the British film industry created Hammer Horror and took the idea in an
entirely different direction. None the less, after countless remakes, James
Whales version (along with its sequels) are over 78 years old and are still by
far the best adaptations and the most memorable to date. So there must be
something in the idea of nostalgia that allows such an icon as Whales Frankenstein monster to be preserved, in
terms of the remake, sequel and series. It was perhaps this iconic look that
Hollywood saw an as Goose laying golden eggs: Universal Studios apparently
could not resist the idea of the remake or ‘sequels’ such as Frankenstein vs.
the Wolfman vs. Dracula vs. and so
on. By the time all the Universal monsters had teamed up against Abbott and
Costello, the lines between sequel and remake had become blurred beyond identity,
neither acknowledging any sort of relation to the original nor maintaining any
distance from it.
THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL
“…In the remake envisioned by your humble
correspondent, Klaatu, starring Yours Truly, would land in Hollywood and threaten to have Gort destroy
all the studios unless the producers quit making lousy movie remakes with
leftwing themes…”
(P.J. Gladnick,)
Posters from the 2008
remake (left) and the 1951 original (Right)
Robert Wises production of ‘The Day the Earth Stood Still’
(1951) reflected a world at the height
of its nuclear capability, brought to its knees by one Alien ambassador and his
faithful robot Gort: a kind of
indestructible robot policeman. In Scott Derrickson’s 2008 remake
expectations were deflated by Keanu Reeves lack of actingand
an equally unconvincing CGI Gort, which was rarely seen, almost as if the
nostalgic Frankensteiness of Gort was not ‘now’ enough for today’s audiences.
Findings
Remakes are the least
path of resistance.
Nowness pastiche
and nostalgia refer to one aspect of the
problems regarding remakes the other problems being that the Hollywood
attitude towards profit is to go on the
least path of resistance, which the remake, like the sequel offers in abundance.
This section will elaborate on the success of Star Wars (1977) and Jaws (1975) and review
George Lucas and Steven Spielberg’s effect on Hollywood
trends.
Robert Bookbinders book The
Films of the Seventies (1982) noted certain accusations made against George
Lucas with regard to copy write infringement by using ideas from old Flash
Gordon serials of the 1930’s –a nostalgia in itself. Bookbinder supports the
theory that the blockbuster format can be attributed to the success of Jaws and
the popularity of Star Wars,the latter
of which ironically was made because Lucas could not afford the rights to
remake the Flash Gordon Series of the 1930’s.
In 1977, the idea of the lucrative remake was still in its
infancy but the success of Lucas and Spielberg
across the globe effected almost every film makers approach to western film
making , even on a sub conscious level. If it wasn’t for the success of films
such as Planet of the Apes, 20th
Century fox would not have considered
putting a film such as Star Wars
into production.
This ethos returns back to writer Jim Hillier’s stand on
the Hollywood mechanism of going with what ever is ‘hot’. (Hillier p94) Another example of this can be found at great length
throughout Benjamin M Compaine and Douglas Gomery’s research into media monopoly:
Their research covered all aspects of media manipulation up until the year 2000
in the book Who Owns the Media. They
noted that the current state of affaires within Hollywood around this time suggested a heavy
trend towards a stock market mentality.
20th Century Fox for example, was owned by the News paper consortium represented by Rupert Murdoch of The News Corporation Ltd, and in 1997
Murdoch collected the bets on Cameron’s
Titanic(1997) after it became a huge
hit - this was the result of a cooperative venture between 20th
Century Fox and Paramount. This brief partnership is merely part of the Big Six Oligopoly that ultimately work
in friendly contest with each other, so long as a common profit margin is
resolved. Consisting of innumerate auxiliary’s and other franchises, Time Warner, like 20th
Century Fox is another big player: It owns CNN. The Big Six are generally
recognised as Paramount Pictures, 20th Century Fox, Warner Bros,
Sony, Universal and Disney. As Compaine and Gomery have observed, these major
players have fluctuated in size over the 20th Century: At one point
there was the Big Three: RKO, Warner, Disney, Then RKO, Warner, 20th
Century Fox, MGM, Disney became the Big Five: In order to survive, the minor
companies such as Universal, Columbia and United Artists, merged with the rest
and became the Big Eight, while still competing for maximum profit. The advent
of Television put MGM essentially out of business, despite merging with United
Artists thus this general morphing and merging of companies is continuous and
forever expanding, in order that the Hollywood Oligopoly remains intact.
(Compaine, Gomery, 2000) This
Oligopoly maintains the status quo, where not just one monopoly retains the
profit margin but where all the major companies utilize their subsidiaries
to combat, merge, dissolve, re-emerge
and so on to essentially remain in power. (Compaine, Gomery, 2000) When reviewing Compaine and
Gomery’s Stats Tables for the‘All-Time
Top 25 Films at the U.S. Box Offices’ on page 367, it is interesting to
note that at least 10 of them were, either directed or produced by Steven
Spielberg or George Lucas.
With the same token Compaine and Gomery also suggest, that
in effect, movie rentals alone succeeded in vast amounts of profit, in the case
of Lucas’s original Star Wars Trilogy and subsequent prequels: “…Star Wars stood in 1999 as a multibillion dollar property,
fully amortised with billions more expected in the future from
re-releases…”. p367
However, if it wasn’t for the fact Lucas insured the rights
to the merchandising of his films, he would most likely have not received a
penny of royalties from 20th Century Fox - a detail highlighted by
Compaine and Gomery which raises concern for corporate scruples:
“…With
all the monies generated from a film over the course of its life, the true cost
of a film is rarely known….the Big Six were skilled at making sure that they
paid out as little as possible...”
Concerning
George Lucas’s Phantom Menace film in
1999, its distributor 20th Century Fox became entangled by the
Department of Justice, spurred by the films released to only selective cinemas
willing to pay a minimum fee for showing it. By and large this practice is recognised as vertical integration, a term Compaine
and Gomery used to describe the monopoly employed by the merger of Cineplex and
Loew’s Inc, a parent company of what was formally known as MGM.
This monopoly
is essentially a corporate strangle hold on independent cinema in general,
putting smaller businesses out of business. With the advent of video tape in
the 1980’s and the repeatability of the
video rental format, Hollywood discovered that repetition of ideas never seemed
more lucrative in terms of re-releasing well known films to video and accruing
the profits from the rental stores in order to further perpetuate the Hollywood
Oligopoly for the Big Six studios.
Time Warner alone had many fingers in many
pies: Warner Bros. wanted to match Disney’s success with its $45 Million
profits from product placing Toy Story
(1995) with Burger King food outlets in 1995. (Compaine, Gomery, 2000) Warner Brothers sealed many
lucrative deals by utilizing their back catalogue and tapping into Looney Tunes
cartoons merchandizing, much like Lucas had achieved with the success of Star
Wars toys. Owners of Warner Brothers, Time Warner proceeded to exploit product
placement, repeatedly using the AOL logo within such remakes as You’ve Got Mail,(1998) starring Tom
Hanks and Meg Ryan, a re-working of a film called The Shop Around
the Corner (1949). According to Compaine and Gomery, Star
Wars was the top number one rented video in 1996, simply because it was so
accessible to children; who by and large “drive
the market” for the Big Six, aware of the parental issues. In the 1990’s
The Big Six took full advantage of the situation that affords bringing up a
child, something that Compaine and Gomery observed as the sell through market, where by sequels to films go straight to video
and are then seen repeatedly. The upshot of which is the idea that the parents,
keep the kids busy with films they know they will watch on a repeated basis,
keeping them occupied, while freeing up the parents to do other things.
Evaluation
In Light of Compaine and Gomery’s research in 2000, this
suggests that Hollywood
had already completely shifted focus as a film making business, as opposed to
crafting films for entertainment trends tended towards making products for the
consumer.
Another area of interest which Compaine and Gomery noted,
was the statistical fickleness of
consumers, who usually have no idea what films they wished to rent and thus the
simple poster or large cardboard advertisement was enough to sway them.
This rational is also supported within the semiotic field,
by theorists such as Roland Barthes who regarded advertisements as a means of
anchoring the consumer to a certain pattern. Barthes outlines this in his book Image Music Text ,(1977). Between consumer and product, this in effect
relates to Compaine and Gomery’s whole argument: That a simple poster in a Blockbusters store, beholding all the
blockbuster traits of nowness, indicated another example of Hollywoods path of least resistance. If the
outlet for profit is made cheaper, the huge cinematic add campaign soon falls
short of equalling this distribution tactic. According to online sources : The video industry's 1998 shift toward
revenue sharing with film studios, allowing video stores to stock more titles
at lower up-front costs, helped lift industry-wide revenues out of their
mid-1990s doldrums. According to widely cited figures from Paul Kagan
Associates, rental revenue in 1998 totalled $8 billion and sell-through sales
reached $9 billion, bringing industry revenues to $17 billion for the year.
Though estimates vary, this translated into somewhere between three and four
billion videos rented and some 676 million sold.*
* http://www.referenceforbusiness.com/industries/Service/Videotape-Rental.html
It would perhaps be fair to say that this
practice has now passed onto
the Dvd
market with even more success than the VHS format could possibly afford to
offer. Ultimately what Benjamin M
Compaine and Douglas Gomery concluded was that, in terms of ‘who
ownes the media’ was ultimately an ever changing state of play, that their
overwhelming compilation of facts was at best a snap shot within “… a continually changing landscape..”
Discussion
We shall now discuss the effect the Hollywood
remake has had on cultural memory, by regarding the effect of Spielberg’s War of the Worlds(2005) remake and Peter
Jackson’s King Kong (2005) and their
relationship to Nowness, Pastiche and
Nostalgia.
The War Of The Worlds
Where a return to the source material has never been so imperative
“...War of the Worlds in its day was as
exciting as Close Encounters of the Third Kind or Star Wars today…” (Adamson, 1984) Byron
Haskin, director of the 1953 movie version. Looking back at the period of 1897
when HG Wells first published The War of
the Worlds in magazine form, contemporary writers such as Silverberg, and
Baxter commended Wells on unlocking the doors of science fiction and turning
British colonialism on its head. Baxter in particular remarks that; “…Wells
tale derives authority from the contemporary paradigm of Mars as a
failing abode for life, and draws its
power from allegory: Wells was pricking the complacency of the late Victorian
English by giving them a taste of being on the receiving end of a hostile
colonization…” In this respect any attempt today to acknowledge this in a
film would also have been quite interesting.
Other contemporary writers such as Pamela Sargent reflected on the films
that have attempted to adapt H G Wells novel:
“…There’s an unfortunate tendency of some people, many of them in the
entertainment industry, many of them Americans, to believe that one must
“identify” with the central characters in a story especially in a movie, and
that transplanting a story from its original time and place to contemporary
times will make it far more appealing to a mass audience as well as save money
on set design and costumes…” (Sargent,2005)
When
regarding Spielberg’s remake of The War
of the Worlds, one must first
acknowledge that A: It is a remake and B: There have been numerous adaptations
of HG Wells 1898 novel. These adaptations range from other books such as
Sherlock Holmes vrs the Martians, Orsen Welles 1938 radio play, George Pals
1953 movie, various Tv serial incarnations, graphic novels and so on. In Britain,
perhaps the most memorable of theses incarnations was the Jeff Wayne musical
version,(1977) In terms of the most
recent, let us address the version directed by Steven Spielberg by comparing it
to the success of the 1953 version against the original novel. Produced by
George Pal and directed by Byron Haskin, the 1953 version received the academy
award for best special effects and secured Pal and Haskins reputations in Hollywood as successful
entrepreneurs of filmmaking.
It is interesting to note that shortly before his
death on 16th April 1984,(Adamson, 1984) Byron
Haskin reflected on the success of his original by comparing it to the
blockbuster Hits of the 1970’s, particularly Lucas and Spielberg. In an
interview for the Directors Guild of
America Oral History, Haskin put it like this: “…now you can’t tell me that a picture which has in it, credibly, the destruction of Los Angeles, along with
the rest of the world, by invasion from outer space, etc., could not have been
hyped into something as big as Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Star
Wars. It was that important in its day. There was nothing in competition with
it at the time it was made, and it did have a terrific impact in the theatres
where it was run…It had great audience identification. That’s the one thing
that made it big, that this could be happening to people in the audience”
(Adamson, 1984)
According to Haskins interview, Paramount pictures did
little to publicize the original film, unsure where it would lay in the
marketing strategy of things, where as Joe Adamson, (Haskins interviewer)
pointed out, 20th Century Fox publicized Star Wars nearly a year
before the film reached the theatres.
(Adamson, 1984) In review of the 1953
version and Spielberg’s remake, the latter appears to pay homage to the former,
both in style and content and wavers very little from this in terms of its
contemporary settings, there is also very little reference to the book itself. The lack of reference to the novel by
Spielberg could reflect a need for nostalgia for George Pal but on the other
hand it could also be construed as merely further evidence of the cashing in,
on the success of the original movie
using formulaic stratagem. In the case of the 1953 version, HG Wells novel was
updated for contemporary audiences, a decision Haskin made in early production
of his version (Adamson,
1984) and merely copied by Spielberg
for his remake as prescribed subterfuge. The need to update the book in the
1953 version, worked around three arguments; Primarily, being that by the
1950’s HG Wells was an old man and regarded his book was out of date with the
times, secondly, many attempts to get the film off the ground had failed and
thirdly by 1953, the story was now very relevant to the cold war.(Adamson, 1984)
Above all else, Orson Welles had proved
in his 1938 radio play, that the story, could be updated to contemporary times,
so much so that when it was broadcast, “…everybody
ran for the hills…”(Adamson, 1984) Another interesting point of fact about
the 1953 version was that the whole of the third act was to be shot in 3-D. (Adamson, 1984) As observed in Gail
Morgan Hickman’s book, The films of
George Pal, Hickman elaborated on Pal’s enthusiasm for this technique which
was vetoed by the studio. (Hickman,p68) It
is unfortunate that this process was not employed, for Hickman believed it
would have made the films climax ‘even
more visually stunning’ (Adamson, 1984) and in that respect perhaps today’s 3-D would
not rely so heavily upon films such as
James Cameron’s Avatar (2010) in
order to wow us today.
However concerning the story’s origins were completely
ignored in Spielberg’s remake, it is surprising that he did not employ 3-D as
means if any, to justify his remake. With this in mind, perhaps the truest
version that retained a similar impact to George Pals version whilst retaining
a straight adaptation of the novel was the musical version by Jeff Wayne.
Released in 1977, Jeff Wayne’s musical
version of War of the Worlds was an
instant hit, sticking closely to the original story and settings of the 1900’s,
while updating the narrative using progressive rock and orchestral themes.
Writing most of the score himself, Wayne turned Wells’s novel into an
orchestral rock extravaganza which featured the narrative voices of David
Essex, Julie Covington, Phil Lynott and
Richard Burton.
In the 1970’s, to adapt old themes or political issues to a
musical adaptation was a popular business: Jesus
Christ Superstar,The Phantom of the Opera or Hair, all followed these trends. It is perhaps in light of Jeff
Wayne’s musical version of War of the
Worlds that it was now feasible to adapt HG Wells appropriately. The
popularity of several lavish British period dramas such as Jack the Ripper (1988) with Michael Cain, served as ample example
that a return to Wells original period setting was indeed feasible. Coupled
with Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy,
also adapted very closely to JRR Tolkien’s
books and not to mention
Jackson’s return to the original 1933 King Kong, we see a pattern in the remake
to return as faithfully as possible to the source. Yet as much as this yearning
for faithful representations of source material begins to become popular, the
expectations for a direct film adaptation of Hg Wells The War of the Worlds would be among that literary line of thought.
However, after seeing Spielberg’s version, one has to wonder at what point was
a direct adaptation of the book even considered and rejected. In line with the
amount of remakes now being churned out by Hollywood, even The War of the Worlds has unfortunately had to pay reliance on
homage to Pal’s 1953 version and it is perhaps this nostalgia, that Hollywood
uses as an obstacle that a director must
somehow over come. However, despite the opportunity here for Spielberg’s remake
to retain the themes and settings of the original novel, these were completely
overlooked and Wells original message of anti-colonialism(Baxter,
Silverburg, 2005)were merely replaced by Tom Cruise’s Americanisms and
Spielberg’s post-911’ isms. (Friedman,
2006) However, Spielberg maintained his version went back to the
isolation of the main protagonist featured in the book but in reality what is
seen on screen is essentially the 50’s version with all the interesting
elements removed in favour of CGI nowness.
This observation is inadvertently
supported by the appraisals of Warren Buckland’s examination into the
filmmaking practices by Spielberg, maintaining the director’s talent for
cinematic showmanship but also ignores the directors remake tactics. (Buckland,
2006) In as much, that although Buckland acknowledges the certain
inconsistencies in the film, such as the burning question of why did those Martians bury their tripods for thousands of years, (p.220)
He negates to explore this query by passing
it off as mere plot device. Indeed it is fair to say that, there is little
build up beyond establishing Tom Cruise’s character and perhaps Spielberg
wished to by pass the laborious building of Tripods in favour of CGI nowness in order to get
straight to the point of his ‘post-911 isms’. (Friedman, p158) Such isms have surrounded this story from the
beginning of its inception. The disdain for colonialism is the backbone of the
original 1898 book, which, as the
years went by, morphed into the ever changing trends of hostilities across the
planet: Freidman observed this as a trend throughout the course of the 20th
century, the narrative structure of War
of the Worlds reflected Nazism, Communism and eventual Terrorism.
This
trend is mirrored by Orson Welles radio play reflecting Americas fear of
Nazism, George Pals 1953 film reflected Americas fear of Communism and so it
would seem to follow that Spielberg was attempting to follow this trend in post
911.However to follow this line of thought along this line of isms, as Freidman observed, only served to show
Spielberg’s personal desire to reflect his remake as a post 911 film but ignored the fact that Terrorism was very
different from Communism in that : “the
geopolitical map is vastly different than in 1898,1938, or 1953. Most Americans
don’t fear an attack by a highly mechanized force commanded by a ruthless
dictator…”(Friedman,p158) Friedman
also observed that the U.S. is ultimately the major super power on the planet,
with little to rival it, other than the unpredictable and individual acts of
terrorism, whose blame ultimately rested in the hands of the American
Government itself. (Joseph, etal 2007)
Friedman appreciated the complexities of Spielberg’s remake, in as much that,
viewed as a post 911 film, it is interesting to see what it must have been like
from the Iraqis point of view. However in retrospect, particularly here in England, many cinema goers perhaps felt a little
disconcerted by the prospect of seeing what is predominantly a classic English
novel turned into more of Americas
problems. At least in the 1950’s version, we have a sense of the world, a point
that is made clear in Byron Haskins argument about updating the book as merely
to attune it with the period of history that Haskin was enveloped in: “…in lieu of what happened afterwards, the
success of the nostalgic period in ‘Around the World in 80 days’, - War of the
Worlds might have had an impact leaving it in the 1890’s of H.G.Wells version…” For Haskin, the decision to update the story
solved a multitude of problems in pre-production, as it certainly had for Orson
Welles radio version. (Adamson, 1984) Haskin had read Orson Welles transcript for
his radio play of War of the Worlds
and noted how well the young Mercury theatre presenter had mixed realism with
fiction but ultimately what Haskin had in mind was a contemporary story
reflecting the atomic age. “…at the time
we were preparing it…” noted Haskin,
“… we had to consider the atomic bomb and the impact of that technology in the
world…”(Adamson, 1984) In this respect it is understandable why updating the
story was a necessity to perhaps escape the domestication of Wells writing
style, Haskin also talks about the avoidance of such problems of adapting the
books “…English vicars and old British
Gardeners…an antiquated machine…frightening a cast directly out of Agatha Christie…”. (Adamson, 1984) However
in Jeff Wayne’s musical version, the opinion was quite the opposite and Wayne’s nostalgia for
retaining the Agatha Christie-ness of
the original book is made obvious when looking thru the colourful 1900’s style
artwork that accompanied this vinyl double album on its original release. In
this respect, we shall now see how a remake, can work if the elements of Nowness, Pastiche and Nostalgia are in balance…
King Kong:
2nd Time Right ?
The King Kong
film of 1933 has become almost a sort of legacy in terms of re-making: a sequel
to this original called Son of Kong,
(1933) was also remake of a much older, lost film called The Enchanted Island, (Peary, p96). Of the many versions of this
film, we will regard in particular the 1976 remake by Dino De Laurentiis
against the more successful remake by Peter Jackson in 2005.
In review of this and regarding the films it talked about,
specific interest centred around the two major remakes that followed the 1933
original: That of Jackson’s aforementioned remake and that of the Dino De
Laurentiis remake of 1976.
We shall now look at some excerpts: Indeed some critics in
the Woods document noted the public hysteria and the many anxieties surrounding
producer Dino De Laurentiis 1976 remake of the 1933 version of King Kong. Particularly since De
Laurentiis had insisted on moving away from the nostalgic and practical
applications of stop motion photography in favour of insisting that Paramount
Pictures build him a colossal robot.(Glut, 2005) Costing nearly
three million dollars and standing nearly 42 feet in height, this mechanical
wonder however, despite having over 70 hydraulic levers in order to operate its
arms and legs, never really worked.(Glut, 2005)
The idea of a
mechanized monster is not too dissimilar to Spielberg’s approach in his film
Jaws (1975) where the mechanical shark required days of maintenance and despite
mans best efforts, also never really worked. As a fail safe renowned make up
artist Rick Baker ended up donning the monkey suite but because of the huge
publicity spun by De Laurentiis and his giant robot, Baker received little
recognition for saving the films main character. (Glut, 2005)
It was only under pressure from
the Academy Of Motion Pictures Arts and
Sciences that De Laurentiis finally admitted that Baker had in fact played
Kong as opposed to the robot and Baker received an Academy Award for his
troubles. (Glut, 2005)
The controversy over the
ridiculous tribulations of Hollywood publicity
surrounding the King Kong remake of
1976 is probably worthy of making into a film within itself, for who would
imagine Spielberg’s robot shark being out-matched by a robot Kong. The god like
superiority that Dino De Laurentiis wielded during its production did not end
there and subsequently he tried to sue other Kong remakes in production around
the same time, despite the story had fallen into the public domain. (Glut,
2005)
Indeed there seemed to be little left of the original Kong once Dino De
Laurentiis had finished his remake, all expectations of for a stop frame
animation extravaganza were dashed in favour of a guy in a monkey suite. In Karen Haber’s book Kong Unbound (2005)
Writer Ray Bradbury,
a long time fan of the original had this to say about it: “…When Dino De Laurentii’s man in the ape suit appeared, my rage could
not be concealed. Instead of a virgin beauty , they depicted an unclad lady of
the night with not a single virtue as cover-up. I dubbed it “The Turkey That Attacked New York…”.
(Haber, 2005) Around the time of Peter Jackson’s version being
released, Steven Rubio an English Professor at American River College USA
noted Pauline Kael’s review on the 1976 version emphasising her thoughts on remakes had to be different from the original
because “we know what’s coming...” (Rubio, 2005)
With Rubio’s particular
observations on Kong, this investigation was aided by his belief in nostalgia
as being an important component that enabled a remake to work. In light of
Rubio, the possible failure of why Hollywood
is unable to present remakes in a way
that pleases audiences points more towards the imbalance of nowness as opposed to nostalgia. Rubio observed the 1976
version of King Kong, was not what the fans of the original were looking for
and in his opinion, audiences wanted a faithful reproduction of the original,
updated but nostalgic. (Rubio, 2005)
With the documents at hand, the evidence
pointing towards Peter Jackson’s 2005 version suggests a balance within the
elements of Nowness, Pastiche and
Nostalgia. In this respect it is perhaps worth looking at extracts from the
book Kong Unbound (Haber, 2005)
To
give us some insight into how Kong has remained an appealing and yet difficult film
to remake successfully. This book was compiled and edited by Karen Haber. It is
noted in this book that George Lucas advocateAlan Dean Forster remembers the
utter selfish motivations of the original films characters such as the movie
director Carl Denham “...forever placing
his own men in danger in the hopes of satisfying his own egotistical needs…”
This is a strong character trait that
features in all three official movie versions of King Long. In another
chapter, Ester M Friesner’s view on the original Kong is more casual and
perhaps the most comical to relate to and stated“…Gentlemen and giant prehistoric apes prefer blonds…” she
also pointed out that the origins of the film owe heavily to
the influence of the Beauty and the Beast story and this idea
works on many parallels: In one particular aspect the original films
relationship between Kong and Fay Wray’s character remains unwavered, the
beauty and the Beast love aspect remains solid throughout the film, Friesner’s
outlook reminds us that this is a love story. Later on in the book however Pat Cadigan’s
interpretation of the film is more along the lines of Sigmund Freud, regarding
beauty and the Beast love aspect of the film is more in tune with pubescent
first dates by young school girls:
“… The first ever
date makes you the golden woman in unknown and dangerous territory, about to
come face to face with something so big that nothing will ever be the same
afterwards…”(Haber,
2005) using the ‘ monster from the id’ to paraphrase her
interpretation, she utilises these ideas to present the fantasy rape
connotations, where as Friesner argues that Kong’s relationship with ‘beauty’
has more to do with that fact she smells of soap and not food.
Conclusions
From
the observations within this critique, so far we have learned that the remake,
like the sequel or series has that lucrative dollar incentive attached to it,
the idea of the remake is a no brainer: The Audience generally knows already
what is about to happen. Hollywood may have
distributed Star Wars (1977) and Jaws (1975) but its film makers where very
much of the independent sector and as soon as the block buster was recognised
as a viable option, Hollywood trends attempted
to remake this success by formula only. During this investigation it was also
recognised that three distinct elements constituted the success and failure of
remakes: Nowness, Pastiche and Nostalgia: Nowness represents the updating of
the remake, Pastiche represents the re-imagined remake and Nostalgia
representing the need and appeal of the remake.
We
have learned that Hollywood
will follow the paths of least resistance, copying film directors such as
Spielberg or Lucas’s blockbuster patterns within the framework of the remake. In
this respect Nowness is a subtle tool to be aware of , like a errant child it
must be tamed into submission in order to make way for nostalgia, the success
of Star Wars and Jaws gave birth to the block buster but this very concept is
plagued with nowness. However we have also learned from the relationship of
Peter Jackson’s King Kong (2005) and
Dino De Laurentiis remake in 1976 that if nowness is tempered correctly within
a structure, it can be weighed against the elements of pastiche and nostalgia
and work as a remake. Ultimately Jackson’s
King Kong shows how these three
elements can maintain balance.
Recommendations
In
recognising Nowness, Pastiche and
Nostalgia within the remake, the research here suggested further
investigations should be carried out, particularly in the field of semiotics in
relation to explaining the mechanism of remakes to the laymen. Drawing upon the
notes laid down in this paper, a semiotic model was constructed representing
the three elements in balance as thus :
With regard to this model, further examination would be
recommended, in terms of its use as a learning tool for film students and
perhaps applied to other fields such as music theory.
Word Count: 9850
words
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Retrieved
14:47 -26/02/10
AMERICAN IN ENGLAND
a study of the
pastness of the present and...of the presentness of the past
By R. E. SPILLER
P.J.
Gladnick
December
13, 2008 - 09:00 ET
Actor,
Matthew Broderick,
Retrieved
24-10-09 21:37pm
Stepford
Wives Creepily Perfect quote
Retrieved
24-10-09 9pm
ThisDistracted Globe.com
Image:
Retrieved 31/3/10 -14:28
On line Journal and PDF References
Verevis,C (2004) Film Studies,
Issue 4, Pages 87-103, www.manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk/uploads/docs/040087.pdf
Jeffrey Blair Latta, by Steven Rubio
(2005) P 30 in King Kong is back
Benbella Books, Dallas, Texas.
Not the Movie : King Kong'76 by Steven Rubio2005
in "King Kong is back!" Edited by David Brin with Leah Wilson.
2005 Benbella Books
Barna, E . (2010) ‘There are places I’ll remember…’:A sense
of past and locality in the Songs of the Beatles and the Kinks’, in Hassan and
Tessler (ed) Sounds of the Overground:
Selected papers from a postgraduate colloquium on ubiquitous music in everyday
life. Turku, Finland: International Institute
for Popular Culture 2120
(available as an e-book at
http://iipc.utu.fi/publications.html
P.J.
Gladnick, December 13, 2008 - 09:00 ET
IMAGES USED
Roller ball
Poster (2007)
Retrieved 31/3/10
-14:28
Roller ball
Poster (1975)
Retrieved 31/3/10
-14:44
Day the Earth
Stood Still (1951)
Retrieved 31/3/10
-14:19
Day the Earth
Stood Still (2008)
Retrieved 31/3/10
-14:20
Star Wars Poster
(1977)
Retrieved 31/3/10
-14:22
Jaws Poster
(1975)
Retrieved 31/3/10
-14:22
King Kong Image
(1933)
Retrieved 31/3/10
-14:27
King Kong Poster
(1976)
Retrieved 31/3/10
-14:28
King Kong Poster
(2005)
Retrieved 31/3/10
-14:28
Appendices A
The following documents cover an initial inquiry into
whether the model had any application to film theory, by means of a
questionnaire that included some
explanatory notes on the models function. This questionnaire was then
e-mailed to a cross section of laymen/ film student/ film theorists in order to
get a general idea of the models potential as a learning aid.
By Jayson Scott Adams
Please answer the questions on
Page 4 - in relation to the following:
Why
did Spielberg turn War or the Worlds
(2005) into a post 911 film? What is the point of re-making Yellow
Submarine in CGI? Why do Hollywood
remakes suck? As writers such as Druxman observed way back in 1975, remakes are
the no brainer for Hollywood.
With the subsequent influx of general Hollywood sequels in the 80's, 90's and
00's; it is apparent how remakes have now become the new sequel, with too much
emphasis on Nowness (Dorsky 2005), which in my mind is very much a 1980’s
invention much like Yuppies, shoulder pads and Simon Cowell.
During
my research I realised that a successful remake had to have a balance for it to
work, such as Peter Jackson’s remake of King
Kong, which had a lot of expectations to live up to considering the 1976
version was such a huge disappointment to fans of the original 1933 film(Rubio,
2005). I saw a balance utilising the semiotic theory (Barthes, et al.) of
reading signs and interpretation of films to ascertain what made a remake work.
Due to
my dyslexia, I found the semiotic theory explaining the remake became too
bogged down in abstractions. However I saw that a simplified abstraction might
illustrate how remakes function, based on the principles of Nowness, Pastiche and Nostalgia – such
as the illustration above based on a triple scale theory…
What is Nowness, Pastiche and
Nostalgia ?
In terms of the re-make :
Nowness = the moment, the update, the latest
fashion (eg: pointless CGI scenes). Nowness
in the remake should respect the original, update the idea appropriately using
the latest technologies in a manor that does not distract from the narrative.
To assume that an original films failing was its shoddy special effects is to
ignore the films strengths, such as a strong idea or theme. To ignore the
originals strengths is disastrous for the remake.
Pastiche
= the interpretation, (such as Shaun of the Dead’s take on Romero’s
work). Pastiche in the remake is the
signifier telling the viewer that this is the interpretation; it should
maintain the remakes authenticity to its source material (the book or movie
etc) and reflect the original meaning of the author’s ideas.
Nostalgia = cultural memory, (McDonald, 2006) i.e. remembering the original, something Spielberg does a lot
(Greenburg, 1998). Above all Nostalgia
reflects the want for the remake based on the source material. It is the drive
for making the film work because it refers to the communal buzz that the
original movie offered, it is where Nowness
ends (the moment the film becomes dated) and the original films fondness and
impact (nostalgia) takes precedence in our memories.(McDonald, 2006).
This
is why Hollywood remakes often fail, because
too much assumption is made on what sells, rather than what is actually any
good…
The
model below shows how the remake becomes swamped in marketing strategy -
ultimately the remake becomes a vehicle for product placement and the film
sucks as a result.
In
terms of this model, Nowness outweighs the other two
elements: there is too much emphasis on trying to update the story by using the
latest trends in technology, turning the film into a sellable product
(Eberwien, 1998) as opposed to even considering if the remake was a wise
choice. The choice of remaking the original is made on the basis that the interest lies in the originals
distinctiveness (Lieth, 2009) thus the Hollywood
rational follows: our remake will
be even better because the nostalgia
for the original was so strong… However, because the $ incentive of nostalgia is so strong, the pastiche for the
original is almost lost in translation – what is left is an ‘echo’ of the
original idea, re-named, re-packaged and ultimately re-written.
This
sort of remake has no balance what so ever. Now that this model has been
constructed, it would be interesting to test this theory by feedback from other
enthusiasts of film. Go on-line and check out any movie and you will most
likely find that it is being re-made. Think about the remakes you have seen
over the last 10 years and then answer the following. The questions do not have
to apply to the same films.
QUESTIONS
A - In terms of Nowness does the update of the original seem better with tons of
CGI explosions and hot chicks and quick inter-cutting ? Was the original so old
it needed a total re-vamp ?
B - In terms of Pastiche, is the remake a direct copy
and if not, why not ? Does it work as an adaptation of the source material ?
C - In terms of Nostalgia, does this remake actually
re-kindle the memories you had for the original and if not, why ?
D - If you were to
hypothetically remake that film, Tv serial or song, with the unlimited
resources of Hollywood
at your disposal – what would it be and which would be more important ? Nowness,
Pastiche, Nostalgia or all three?
Explain your answers in relation to whether
this model works or not. Does the triple scale model help clarify how remakes
work ?
Thank you for your time.
Bibliography
Barthes, R. (1984) Camera
Lucida. London: Fontana, pp.22—32.
Dorsky,
N. Devotional Cinema (2005) Revised
Second Edition Tuumba Press
Druxman,
M (1975) Make It Again, Sam. (p20) London: Thomas Yoseloff Ltd
Eberwien,
R, (1998) Remakes and Cultural Studies in
Horton and McDougal’s Play it Again Sam,
University of California Press, Chapter One p-15-19.
Friedman
L.D. p158, Citizen Spielberg, (2006)
University if Illinois
Press.
(Post
911 issues in remakes)
Greenburg,
H,R, (1998) Raiders of the Lost Text:
Remaking as Contested Homage in ‘Always’ Studies in Horton and McDougal’s Play it Again Sam, University of California
Press, Chapter Seven p.115-17.
Lieth, Sam, (5/10/09) Why is it the great movies that get
remade-and not dross like Howard the Duck ? in G2 supplement, The Guardian,
p22
Mandell,P. Dino
Kong, p128 An Open Letter to
Universal and Dino De Laurentiis
. in King Kong Cometh. 2005 Plexus Publishing
Ltd
McDonald,
M. in Screen 47:3 Autumn 2006, Performing
memory in Television: documentary and the 1960’s Oxford University Press
Rubio,
S. p28 in King Kong is back (2005) Benbella
Books, Dallas,
Texas
Filmography
Dawn Of The Dead (George A Romero, 1978, USA)
Dawn Of The Dead (Zack Snyder ,
2004, USA)
King Kong (Dino De Laurentiss, 1976 USA)
King Kong (Peter Jackson, 2005 USA)
Shaun Of the Dead (Edgar Wright ,2004, USA)
The War of the Worlds (
Byron Haskin, George Pal,1953, USA)
War of the Worlds (Steven
Spielberg, 2005, USA)
Appendices B
This section is the responses by a cross section of
individuals in regard to the model suggested in last section.
QUESTIONS:
A - In terms of
Nowness does the update of the original seem better with tons
of CGI explosions and hot chicks and quick inter-cutting? Was the original so
old it needed a total re-vamp?
B - In terms
of Pastiche, is the remake a direct copy and if not, why not?
Does it work as an adaptation of the source material?
C - In terms
of Nostalgia, does this remake actually re-kindle the memories you
had for the original and if not, why?
D - If you
were to hypothetically remake that film, Tv serial or song, with the unlimited
resources of Hollywood
at your disposal – what would it be and which would be more important ?
Nowness, Pastiche, Nostalgia or all three?
Explain
your answers in relation to whether this model works or not. Does the triple
scale model help clarify how remakes work?
Thank
you for your time.
ANSWERS:
Re: Dissertation Questionair
From:
|
 John Perkins
(johnyperks@yahoo.co.uk)
|
Sent:
|
24 May 2010 15:47:40
|
To:
|
Jayson Scott Adams (jaysonscottadams@hotmail.co.uk)
|
Hi Jay
I got your email about the questions I went to the link and it was to much to
read plays nuts with my dyslexia on the computer.
I'm surprised you didn't put this in the DFV email user group. You might have
got more responses. Although i liked reading the email address; "Julian Lamp Dude on my
course <gokurakumaru@hotmail.co.uk>" lol
I originally was thinking about squeals, that is what i thought you were
writing about. I was getting confused between sequels and remakes. I probably
didn't listen right.
Have you written about Oceans 11 (2001) remake of the 1960 original which might
be an example of a good remake. i remember the director or producer saying that
when they made it originally know one really cared about it. I think he was
meaning at that time studios were still just churning films out. although they
had good people in it. It was a Warner brothers Pictures and the remake is
Warner Brothers.
Good Luck
John
(Student, London)
From:
nancygirl18@hotmail.com
To: jaysonscottadams@hotmail.co.uk
Subject: RE: Dissertation Questionair
Date: Sun, 23 May 2010 11:28:36 +0100
hi Jay,
IU'm not really sure what you want me to do...do you want me to critique or to
opinionate or do you just want me to say if i understand it?
I've read it and there is some spelling and grammer errors i can see, i will
fix them for you if you send me a word document because its a pdf i can't alter
anything.
im not really sure what you are trying to say, its a little confused to me...i
get the impression that remakes often try and recapture the original but also
have their own take on how it should be reproduced. remaking films to me
seems pointless because the original film is always better in most
repects, remaking films in modern day should only be about improving special
effects in my opinion. rehashing old stories is just a mark of how stilted and
hackneyed the film writers have become that they cannot come up with
original ideas and have to steal others. In that respect i think i agree with
your model...:S
hope that helps?
lils
(Student, Southampton)
Re: Dissertation Questionair
From:
|
Marie-Catherine Ehuy
(marieehuy@googlemail.com)
|
Sent:
|
23 May 2010 23:29:48
|
To:
|
Jayson Scott Adams (jaysonscottadams@hotmail.co.uk)
|
|
|
I think it makes sense to me, haven't had the
time to do the questionnaire but it all sounds very clever and I'm no good with
academic stuff so I don't know how much that means!
Just a quick note, quotation marks are missing
for your quotes and don't forget to do a space after the writers name i.e
(Dunnage, 2002)
Also, i will be away but i will still be
checking my emails and updating the screenshots/ blurbs page. Please take a
look at the logos attached and let me know what you think.
Good luck with your dissertation!
Marie
(Student, London)
RE: Dissertation Questionair
From:
|
Julian Dobrev
(gokurakumaru@hotmail.co.uk)
|
Sent:
|
24 May 2010 14:25:55
|
To:
|
Jayson Adams (jaysonscottadams@hotmail.co.uk)
|
|
|
Hey
Jayson,
Here's my answers to your questionnaire. Interesting material to read I'm sure
it'll be a great Dissertation.
Good luck with finishing it off.
All The Best,
Julian
(Student, London)
Julian Answers to Jays Questionnaire!
ANSWERS:
A – Very rarely does an update of an
originally good film seem better with tons of CGI and modernised editing
techniques. Although ‘hot chicks’ when used wisely can actually – ahem!…
anyway. Even if the film was black and white I still do not think it can be
classified as ‘so old it needs a total re-vamp’.
B – In terms of Pastiche a
remake is not a direct copy because it is an alternate retelling of the
original material. For example a movie that is not re-making any of its
predecessors on film can perhaps be adapting other source material. In this
sense Pastiche is not a remake but an adaptation of original material
into film—or as you’ve said, ‘to re-interpret in a new perspective (Adams, 2010:4)’.
C –
Use of Nostalgia is definitely an attempt at trying to re-kindle
memories of the original. Peter Jackson’s King Kong for example
recaptures the ever-lovable Kong (brother of Donkey and Hong ^o^).
D – Nowness, Pastiche and Nostalgia
all have something distinct to offer so perhaps finding a balance between
all three.
Does the triple scale model help clarify
how remakes work?
Yes.
Bibliography
Adams, J. S. (2010) Triple Scale
Theory of Remakes. London:
Jayson Scott Adams Publishing. JJJ
Re: Dissertation Questionair
From:
|
Karen
Lee Street (karenleestreet@mac.com)
|
Sent:
|
24 May 2010 14:01:21
|
To:
|
Jayson Scott Adams (jaysonscottadams@hotmail.co.uk)
|
Hi Jayson,
Interesting idea. I think you have something with the theoretical
model, but also think your definitions could be clearer maybe.
Anyway, I will
try to answer your questions.
QUESTIONS
A - In terms of Nowness does the update of the original seem better
with tons of CGI explosions and
hot chicks and quick inter-cutting ? Was the original so old it needed
a total re-vamp ?
NO
B - In terms of Pastiche, is the remake a direct copy and if not, why
not ? Does it work as an adaptation
of the source material ?
I just watched The Invasion so... it does add a new element (the
virus) I prefer the original, despite it's kitsch factor because it's
definitely scarier, but I didn't hate The Invasion bcause I did think
the virus bit had potential. (I missed the beginning.) It was flat,
however. I THINK the 70s remake with Donald Sutherland was more true
to original story? That was better than newest version.
3:10 to Yuma is
more of a direct copy... but I think the father/ son
relationship is developed more. I liked it alot. Might like it more
than original due to psychological angle/ depth.
C - In terms of
Nostalgia, does this remake actually re-kindle the
memories you had for the original
and if not, why ?
nostalgia: tends to be more negative comparisons for me if the
original film was good. Normally I'd rather see the original or a
more radical remake. Remakes that work for me tend to be culturally
specific remakes -- not so much Europe to Hollywood,
but maybe
Hollywood to Europe!
Example: Seven Samurai.
Also, I think of "nostalgia films" as films with kids or teens as the
lead, so nostalgia is a loaded term for me. I think there's a
difference between nostalgia films that make the audience think back
to being a kid or a teen as opposed to family films designed for kids
to watch. But this is just me thinking of your term in a specific way.
D - If you were to hypothetically remake that film, Tv serial or song,
with the unlimited resources of
Hollywood at
your disposal – what would it be and which would be more
important ? Nowness,
Pastiche, Nostalgia or all three?
If by pastiche you mean bringing an original angle while paying an
homage to the original work, then that would be motivating factor;
nostalgia -- yes, if that is connected to respect to original work
(like doing a new interpretation of a play) "Nowness" can be
interesting, but it's icing on the cake, not the cake itself.
Karen
(Teacher, London)
RE: Questionair on film remakes
From:
|
tristan casey
(caseybigfoot@hotmail.com)
|
Sent:
|
24 May 2010 14:04:32
|
To:
|
jaysonscottadams@hotmail.co.uk
|
in reply to question 3
when i watch remakes or adaptations i usually
find myself daydreaming about the source material or original screen text.
mostly i think about why it was cool for the very reasons they have remade it
and the opposition in that fact. there is the occasional rekindling of my
feelings for the original but mostly i just think remakes are rubbish. but
then, im not watching this material with fresh eyes, im not a child any more. i
end up saying what most people say when they see a remake, 'WHAAAT? why have
they done that, the orginal was much better'
question 4
all three elements are extremly important in
thier own rights. each one however must have the right balance. you MUST honour
the original for its glories otherwise the the entire film becomes a defunct
cash in with little more purpose than box office results and usually wont do
well.
i think its important to keep the nostalgia but
there are certain types to which i would adhere. firstly i wouldnt do something
just because the original did it. unless of course it serves the story and
theme of the film. these can of course be updated to serve modern themes
but theres an old saying which i think hollywood ignores outright these days
and that is 'if it aint broke, dont fix it!'.
i hate nowness! fashion, CGI all that shit is
just a way to make audiences relate. but its a cheap way. if you cant make your
audience relate with you theme and story then no amount of nowness is going to
do you any good. you can stick as much product placement and contemporary
jargon in there as you like, but if people dont relate to your characters and
themes then your film is lost!
hope this helps mate. i think your onto a
winner there
all the best
casey
Film
Student, Southampton
RE: Questionair on film remakes
From:
|
lilian france
(france_lilian@hotmail.com)
|
Sent:
|
24 May 2010 14:20:45
|
To:
|
jason adams
(jaysonscottadams@hotmail.co.uk)
|
|
|
hope this helps
i have answered in attached file
lily
Brighton
A - In terms of Nowness does the
update of the original seem better with tons of CGI explosions and
hot chicks and quick
inter-cutting ? Was the original so old it needed a total re-vamp?
Lord of the rings-
this is one of my favourites, the original unfinished version was good dark and
interesting....but its remark is a great achievement....and was a needed
re-mark as the original fell into too many pit falls due to the lack of CGI and
other modern editing technology.
B - In terms of Pastiche, is the
remake a direct copy and if not, why not? Does it work as an adaptation of the
source material ?
No it is not a direct
copy....obvious the original version did not work...
C - In terms of Nostalgia,
does this remake actually re-kindle the memories you had for the original
and if not, why ?
No because the
original was incomplete, the re make set out to go where the original could not
go....making it not nostalgic for the original film, but for the original text.
D - If you were to hypothetically remake that film, Tv
serial or song, with the unlimited resources of
Hollywood at your disposal – what would it be and which would
be more important? Nowness,
Pastiche, Nostalgia or all three?
I suppose all three have their place, but nostalgia and pastiche
are only relevant if you audience have seen the original film, if they have not
then your audience with have no reference point to the original. Which is
probably why there is probably a good 15 years between original and remake...a
generation gap of this time space may help to bring the re make into an era of
its own thus owing more to its newness than to anything else....
Dear Jason
I hope this is helpful.
Lily xxx
Re: Dissertation Questionair
From:
|
ezgzpz@googlemail.com
|
Sent:
|
23 May 2010 23:15:01
|
To:
|
Jayson Scott Adams (jaysonscottadams@hotmail.co.uk)
|
.
QUESTIONS
A - In terms of Nowness does the update of the original seem better with tons
of CGI explosions and
hot chicks and quick inter-cutting ? Was the original so old it needed a total
re-vamp ?
... it can be argued that there are very few , new original ideas ( whether in film
music science or anything ) so nothing wrong with repeating the good ones ,
with continuing relevance ( the prevalence of hero myths in storytelling for
example ). The thing is whether it SEEMS better or actually IS better....
chances are it seems better now , especially to a younger trendy audience , but
whether it is or not is harder to define.
i think that the new star trek movie was AWESOME.... it had a good balance of
your 3 parameters.
B - In terms of Pastiche, is the remake a direct copy and if not, why not ?
Does it work as an adaptation
of the source material ?
.
.....in case of star trek , no it is not a direct copy , but a successful
pastiche of the elements of the original... the plot is original , though the
integrity of the pastiche is very good. it has a knowledgeable ,sympathetic ,
but not slavish devotion to its source....indeed it respects the original to
the degree that a pure pastiche with no imagination would seem disrespectful to
it's imaginative premise.
C - In terms of Nostalgia, does this remake actually re-kindle the memories you
had for the original
and if not, why ?
...yes , especially with the overall updated visual design, but also in a more
subtle way , by playing on ingrained sympathies with the familiar characters .
D - If you were to hypothetically remake that film, Tv serial or song, with the
unlimited resources of
Hollywood at
your disposal – what would it be and which would be more important ? Nowness,
Pastiche, Nostalgia or all three?
.....I would make a sequel to it , not remake it...if it was made as well as
the first with the same balanced approach to the 3 parameters then the film
would be AWESOME
If I was going to remake anything , where the original is really really good ,
then it would have to be FORBIDDEN PLANET..( ironically a remake of
Shakespeare's the tempest )..
......in the case of Forbidden Planet , nowness initially seems most important
, as relatively few people ( compared to star trek ) will know it well enough
to feel nostalgia ( except for a general nostalgia for 50's b movies ) and it's
relative obscurity makes pastiche less important , except in its maintaining of
a meaningful adaptation of the primary source material ( the tempest ).
I still think that the 3 elements would have to be well , though not
necessarily evenly balanced for the film to be a success.
Gareth
Brighton
Re: Dissertation Questionair
From:
|
Roy Hanney (royhanney@yahoo.co.uk)
|
Sent:
|
23 May 2010 11:56:20
|
To:
|
Jayson Scott Adams (jaysonscottadams@hotmail.co.uk)
|
If you want to email me a doc version I am happy to add
corrections and feedback (obviously you are dyslexic from your writing and am
happy to offer some constructive critique as well as grammatical feedback).
meanwhile here are my answers:
QUESTIONS
A - In terms of Nowness does the update of the original seem better with
tons of CGI explosions and
hot chicks and quick inter-cutting ? Was the original so old it needed a total
re-vamp ?
Generally I do not enjoy remakes and tend to avoid watching them however there
have been some films that have benfitted.... Nowness can be a good reason to
update a film and place it in a relevant modern context though I can not think
of any off the top of my head. It doesnt have to be about utilising modern film
production techniques; steadycam; bullet time; cgi etc... the context of a
story can change - for example Batman as a movie reinvents the character in a
way that is closer to the orginal comic in terms of the emotional narrative as
opposed to the slapstick of the orginal TV series. On the other hand the first
Batman films attempt to connote a 'realness' that then undermines the film. If
they had remade Batman now.. with the state of the art approach that SIn City
et al utlised they would probably had more success but there again... they had
to start somewhere and the first Batman movie opend the door... In conclusion
NOWNESS is certainly a good reason to remake a film but it has to be for
narrative reasons not cause you can blow things up better.
B - In terms of Pastiche, is the remake a direct copy and if not, why not ?
Does it work as an adaptation
of the source material ?
Yes of course though in the case of the Pink Panther it seems rather silly to
attempt to pastiche a pastiche and all feels a little too pintlesly post modern
to be worth while and consequently I did not bother to see it. I can not think
of an example but yes pastiche can work but generally audiences might find it
all a bit to clever and not enough explosions.
C - In terms of Nostalgia, does this remake actually re-kindle the memories you
had for the original
and if not, why ?
I have certainly gone back to the orginal after watching remakes and enjoyed
that even more often though I fiond I prefer the orginal as it always seems to
carry something unique and special about it that is lost in the
adaption/remake. Whish I could think of some examples.
D - If you were to hypothetically remake that film, Tv serial or song, with the
unlimited resources of
Hollywood at
your disposal – what would it be and which would be more important ? Nowness,
Pastiche, Nostalgia or all three?
Dr Who is an interesting example of a remake as it seems to work with all three
and quite succesfully. Wierdly the nowness is connoted in the new series with a
rather STEAM PUNK tardis and a disnticnt nostagia for the DR by the Dr and it
certainly pastichees itself it wouldnt work if it did not. Perhaps that is the
essence of a timelord Pastiche, Nostalgia and Nowness all rolled up into one
character... nice....
Roy Hanney
Lecturer
Chichester
Mr Randolph: Harold, an impoverished pensioner, devises a cunning
plan to escape from penury with the assistance of his faithful friend.
SUPPORT US - http://www.indiegogo.com/Mr-Randolph
Mobile: 07850 384 021
Tel: 02392 734 334
36 Darlington Road
Southsea
PO4 0NF
myspace.com/royhanney
athousnadplateuas.ning.com
dvmission.co.uk
kino-kult.co.uk
Re: Questionair on film remakes
From:
|
Johannes Schaff
(johannesschaff@googlemail.com)
|
Sent:
|
25 May 2010 14:20:38
|
To:
|
Jayson Scott Adams (jaysonscottadams@hotmail.co.uk)
|
Hey buddy, i am vefry busy so didnt have much
time. I like the scales allot!
hope this makes sense.
x
j.
A - In terms of Nowness does the update
of the original seem better with tons of CGI explosions and
hot chicks and quick inter-cutting ? Was the
original so old it needed a total re-vamp ?
Depends on the original, and the time passed.
Some Very old films do seem to have problems to translate to a present time
audiences, due to techniques and pacing that; though skill full, artistic and
beautiful; are alien to modern audiences. Certain special effects might seem
uneccesary dated and thus fail to dazzle but rather amuse the modern / average
viewer.
Your mentioned example King kong strikes as a
succesful example. (note king kong is a novel so technically Peter
Jackson's version isn't a remake but a re-imagening of the same story.
Then there is The departed. Here the nowness is
european culture where the original is set in Thailand? somewhere east anyway. I
think the departed is a good example of a failed remake. it discards all the
cinematic style of the first one, and puts the story in a western setting so a
western audience feels at home. It sucked.
But then there is reservoir dogs itself a
reshaped remake of a hong kong film. I guess it does the same thing, but it dos
innovate in filmic terms of sound and cinematography. reservoir dogs comes out
trumps.
B - In terms of Pastiche, is the remake a
direct copy and if not, why not ? Does it work as an adaptation
of the source material ?
I am not sure about this question. Funny games
is a very direct copy. Shot for shot by the same director. The only reason here
is to have the advantage of language over the distraction of english subtitles
in the german original. but it isnt pastiche, Psycho is supposed to be
pastiche, but it is just boring lacking any innovation.
C - In terms of Nostalgia, does this remake
actually re-kindle the memories you had for the original
and if not, why?
I think it usually fails, because for me alien
/ outdated techniques are part of nostalgia. I like stop motion for being
funny, and cgi is usually quiet sleek and thus cold.
D - If you were to hypothetically remake that
film, Tv serial or song, with the unlimited resources of
Hollywood at your disposal –
what would it be and which would be more important ? Nowness,
Pastiche, Nostalgia or all three?
I have no plans of doing any remakes. but i
could see myself doing a re imagening of an allready filmed novel like
frankenstein or dracula.
Johannes
Freelance filmmaker, London
