Hot Topic: Remakes, Reimaginings and Sequels - Are they good for the industry?

I’m completely baffled by The Smurfs. At last check, the movie has grossed $519 million worldwide, with another glut of income anticipated from cable, DVD and VOD sales. In total I’d estimate a total gross of around $700 million for the film, making a net of around $220 million. That’s damn good business.

And yet it’s not a good movie, rather it’s cashing in on the nostalgia of Generation X, and it’s not the only one. One glance at the production board for 2012-2014 sounds like a schedule ripped from a page of an old TV Guide: 21 Jump Street, Arrested Development, Thundercats, 24, Entourage, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and I found that there is indeed a Jetsons movie in the works, rendering my nightmare vision of that film a distant, macabre possibility. And here I thought I was joking.

And we haven’t even gone into the sequels: Ghostbusters 3, The Fast and the Furious 6, Jurassic Park 4, Terminator 5, Austin Powers 4, Bad Boys 3, Scary Movie 5, National Treasure 3, Toy Story 4, Avatar 2, Pirates of the Caribbean 5, The Hangover 3, Zoolander 2 and yes, The Smurfs 2.

And we still have the remakes / reimaginings of old movies, including Footloose, Dirty Dancing, Red Dawn, Robocop, Mortal Kombat, Oldboy, Logan’s Run, Red Sonja, The Karate Kid, The Crow, and Short Circuit. There’s even an Angry Birds movie in development.

It works only as a commercial.

I know, I know. It’s just business. I’m not here to question the decisions made by studio executives, but as a filmmaker and audience member, I do wonder why we the public are so willing to pay the highest ticket prices for films we have already seen? Did we not learn our lessons from the multitude of Star Wars redoes? Did we all not agree that Indiana Jones 4 was completely unnecessary? Didn’t we collectively scratch our heads when classic films like Straw Dogs (and soon another Peckinpah film will get butchered, the immortal Wild Bunch) and Psycho get remade for no good reason? Why remake a film that is already great? What more can be done to it?

We have to remember that all of these sequels and remakes started with an original film with an original screenplay - and by original I’m saying as a work with no precedence or a work adapted from a book, article or event. Without the embracing of original ideas, today’s remakes are a complete impossibility. Sequels were generally relegated to a trilogy, and the rarely has the third chapter shown any kind of promise - the only cases I can think of is Toy Story 3 and both the Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter series, which are weak examples because they are based on a series of books . Films are being made with open endings not because the filmmaker wanted to leave things ambiguous, they’re being left open because studios want to leave the option of having a sequel.

I think we’re treading on very dangerous territory here. Right now the only way an original script will see the light of day is with a star attachment, and even with that star those films will see limited resources. Case in point is Nicholas Winding Refn’s Drive with Ryan Gosling. It’s a magnificent piece of filmmaking, and could only be made with the involvement of Gosling. And even with him, the producers could only muster up a $13 million production budget for the film, a far cry from the average star vehicle. The film has performed poorly due to limited exposure and a smaller distribution P&A budget. The same can be said for Brad Pitt’s Moneyball, an original film that could only see the light of day because of Pitt’s involvement. Both films provide little to zero possibilities of sequels or remakes.

Studios want franchises, and they want them rightfully because franchises make a shitload of money. But they also cost a lot of money to make and distribute. It’s just like running a McDonalds, franchising and churning out ho-hum product. But what would happen if we ran the film industry like an In-N-Out burger, where we focus on quality instead of quantity. I’ve been reading Stacy Perman’s book about the founding of In-N-Out, and was struck by founder Harry Snyder’s overriding philosophy, which was to “keep it simple, do one thing, and do it the best you can.”

Snyder was defiant of what McDonalds and other chains were doing to gain business, which was throwing gimmicks (remember the McDLT?) at customers while serving them consistently inferior product. Those chains also added other products to the basic hamburger, like fish sandwiches, salads, and pizzas, all of which were still inferior, and which also added logistical costs to the franchises, which had to now handle twenty different types of food. Snyder, in the face of this billion dollar shitstorm of fast food competition, decided to stay true to his original vision - just make really really good hamburgers, and keep the customer happy with the best quality product possible. I think Chik-Fil-A follows the same principle, and both chains are amongst the most successful businesses in the country, and are growing steadily without compromise to product.

The film industry has to look at its product in the same way. All of these gimmicks - remakes, reimaginings in 3D and sequels - are just a dilution of the core product, which is compelling, original screenplay. Give the people what they want, at a consistently high quality level.

One can argue that the studios are making billions off sequels and remakes, and so too is McDonalds wildly successful, as they open one new restaurant every day on this planet. Sure, these companies are successful, but we have to ask if there is such a thing as too much success, of a toxic success that serves to kill the fundamentals of commerce and industry. Look at the maelstrom that is happening in the global markets and banking industry. The ultra wealthy corporations have pillaged the economic landscape, ridding the consumer of choice and making the barriers to entry impenetrable. Competitors are cut out either by pricing or legislation, supported by lawmakers who have placed all eggs in one basket, counting on these ultra-successful corporations to support the nation’s economy. All this while small business cannot compete and new ideas can only flourish under the wing and financing of larger conglomerates. When a company like Goldman Sachs controls the fate of every major economy (via markets) on the planet, we should call that a dictatorship, and not a success of capitalism. Sure, Goldman Sachs became that successful through hard work and long hours, but then so did the Gestapo. That’s indeed hyperbole, but we have to absolutely wonder if too much growth is toxic, like a cancer.

I support the ‘Occupy Wall Street’ movement, and will be there next week.

The film industry was built on original work, and now it has turned its back on it. Original work must be funded and nurtured independently, which is a shrinking window. Major festivals and smaller distributors, to hedge their risk in a turbulent market, are seeking movie stars just as much as major studios. Like small businesses, the original works must build and persevere in the face of oligarchies, who continue to play a game of smoke and mirrors with the consumer, because the consumer has little to no access to the alternative.

The remake and sequel are gimmicks, taking something that was one original and bleeding it dry, a complete scheme for studios to capture a built-in audience and save money on marketing. And yet we’re paying for it. Ultimately, the success of remakes and sequels is our fault because we support it. Let’s be honest and vocal about what we want - we don’t want another Ghostbusters, we want something just as funny and original as the first one, something that sparked our imagination as much as that first one. There’s an original script out there about paranormal hunters that’s just as funny, and I want to see that. I don’t want to see something that I’ve already seen a million times. I want something new, like Drive, like Another Earth, like Bellflower, like Moneyball, like Midnight in Paris, like There Will Be Blood. I will pay for that, because I get something back from it.