kierthos | More rants

Well, I was supposed to do a rant on toilet paper for

cutedeadgirl, but I can't think of anything on that yet. It's hard to rant on something so inherently useful. I still might come up with something though.

For

tribalwynds, I'm going to rant on remakes. (Hey, you never responded, so it's remakes instead of "The Hills Have Eyes", which again, I have never seen.)

Remakes. The very word conjures up certain images. Crappy movies being reworked in even crappier modern version. Blonde ditzes singing songs that weren't that great to begin with, or lackluster bands singing updated versions of older songs.

Frankly, remakes suck. I'll go out on a limb here and say, that with very few exceptions, no remakes of songs or movies need to be done. I don't know that anyone has ever remade a TV show, but in most cases, those would suck too. Would it still be Hill Street Blues if you didn't have Bruce Weitz playing Sgt. Belker? No. Yet the "fine, upstanding" (drug riddled, plastic surgeried to Barbie-like style) execs in the music and movie biz seem to think that remakes are not only a good thing, but the best thing. I mean, hey, someone's already written the song, or the movie. It's much easier to re-do it, and who really cares if it actually needed to be done anyway?

I mean, let's look at a few music remakes (usually known as covering a song, but also known as crapola):

The Ataris, covering Don Henley's "Boys of Summer". Crap. Crap that will, if there is a just and kind God, will lead to the death of the Ataris at the hands of Don Henley, with back-up support from Henry Rollins.

Korn, covering Pink Floyd's "Another Brick in the Wall, pt. 2". What the fuck? WHAT. THE. FUCK? Someone fetch me my shooting iron.

Limp Bizkit, covering The Who's "Behind Blue Eyes". You are a dead man, Fred Durst. Dead, buried in lime, and forgotten. You just don't know it yet.

Britney Spears, covering Bobby Brown's "My Perogative". O_o Ooookay. Actually, if this leads to Britney getting fucked up on drugs, slapping around Whitney Houston and entering rehab, it's worth it.

Movie remakes are much the same way. Most of these movies that are remade don't deserve sequels, much less remakes. But it's a cheap-ass way to do a movie because there's already a movie done to look at. There's already a basic script. Sure, it may require some re-writing and crapping it up to suit a modern audience, but who cares about that? Obviously not Hollywood. And what's with "modern" versions? Who the fuck really wants to see a version of Romeo and Juliet set in modern times? Part of the attraction of the movie is the setting, and it does not work with drive-by shootings. Plus, Shakespearian prose and 9 mm pistols do not mix. (I swear, it's like someone thought West Side Story was originally written by the Bard.)

House of Wax. What? They're redoing a great Vincent Price movie and fucking it up, you say? Well, that's Hollywood for you. What I can't understand (behind why they're choosing to remake House of Wax) is why Paris Hilton is in this movie. I can only hope she dies in the movie (and then hopefully soon in real life), and that the entire goddamn audience cheers when she bites it.

The reason some movies do so well, or are considered classics is because of who was in it when the movie was made. Casablanca would not be the same if made today. Nor would most movies. I shudder to think about the state of movies 20 years from now, when some asshat in Hollywood thinks about remaking Saving Private Ryan, or Lucas' crack-riddled, necromantically animated corpse proposes yet another re-imaging of Star Wars. (Dear Lucas. Fuck you. Han shot first.)

I realize that it may be hard for the movie and music industry out in wacky-land to grasp this, but if you do new things, they might just sell. Sure, they might not, but that's the risk you take. Foisting off a new version of an old song or movie is not the way to do things.

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

Kojak.

The new one is on USA and stars Ving Rhames.

Yes, instead of a bald white guy with a lollypop, they've got a bald black guy with a lollypop.

Tho, the two episodes I've seen so far have been decent.

Oh yeah, and Han shot first.

*applause*
Thank you that was wonderful :)

Yep, Han shot first

I completely forgot about the remake of Kojak. Normally, I'm against switching the race of a character just so there is a minority presence in a TV show or movie, but I've seen a couple of episodes, and damn me if doesn't seem to work pretty well here. Mind you, ratings-wise, I don't think it has anything on The Shield, but who cares? Ving Rhames is the man.

More rants

TV Show remade...

no subject

Re: TV Show remade...