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Hey guys, I was wondering what you think some of the best and worst remakes and sequels/prequels are. Here's mine.
Best Remake- Dawn of the Dead- This is what remakes should be. It took the basic premise of the original and expanded on it in just about every way.
Worst Remake- The Fog- This is what a remake "shouldn't" be. PG-13!? You've gotta be kidding me. And what the hell was up with the weak-ass ending? This movie is trash.
Best Sequel- Friday the 13th: Part 2- In my opinion this is the only sequel that is better than the original. More laughes, more suspense, and more gore! (I should also note that this is my favorite film)
Worst Sequel- The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2- What... the... fuck... Director Tobe Hooper thought he could make a scary black comedy, but all we laughed at was how bad the horror aspect of the film was.
Best Remake: The Fly - What can I say? It's perfect. Seriously though, The Fly utilizes the best (and what should probably be the only) formula for a remake: take a bad/mediocre movie, keep/expand upon what's good, and lose the rest.
Worst Remake: Either Halloween or The Wicker Man. Halloween was basically every horror movie/serial killer cliche in the book. The Wicker Man remake was destined to fail if only for the sake that the original is so esoteric and required just the right approach to make it work. Honestly, I can't decide.
Best Sequel: Day Of The Dead but that's simply because it's my favorite of the Dead trilogy (that's right, trilogy. It has nothing to do with its predecessors so it's basically a sequel in name only. For the sake of this thread, I'll say Aliens. It took the series to a whole new level without taking away from the first film and also developed Ripley better than any of the other films.
Worst Sequel: Saw IV. Completely incoherent. I couldn't tell you what happened in it if you asked me. Also, piss poor direction in regards to technical aspects but the Saw series has always had that problem if you ask me.
Worst Sequel -Saw IV. One of the only movies I just can't sit through. It's like watching the dumbest person in the world play a video game. Every stupid scenario you can think of is on display.
(Honorable Mentions: The Ring Two, Batman Forever, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, The Grudge 2, The Hills Have Eyes II, Shrek 2, and any DTV sequel you can possibly think of)
Best Remake: John Carpenter's The Thing Worst Remake: The Hitcher Best Sequel: Halloween 2 Worst Sequel: A Nightmare on Elm Street part 2
I have to say that I do not mind the remake genre at all. In fact, you amy say that I am getting used to the fact that every other week, we will expect a remake of a movie. As long as they either: Remake a horrible movie and make it better (The Thing) or Remake a good movie and not screw it up (Halloween Remake was awful, that's what I DON'T want to see)
Best remake: Dawn of the Dead (mostly because the original is pretty bland). The Thing is a very close second.
Worst remake: Psycho
Best sequel: Aliens
Worst sequel: I was gonna say Rocky V but then I remember the most agonizing movie experience of all time: Battle Royale II: Requiem. Holy shit. Most incoherent movie ever made. Also movie with most elaborate death speeches. And the ending. Oh my God. The movie is 3 hours long and then it ends 22 times, each time worse than before.
"The Flux capacitor. It's what makes time travel possible."
Yes. Battle Royal 2 was pretty awful. And I really loved Aliens and that is in my top 50. I forgot all about the PSycho remake or I would have said that one.
Worst Remake: Psycho (I know, let's take a film of absolute genius and remake it shot for shot with worse actors and director.) The Omen is joint first for exactly the same reasons.
Why does everyone hate the 1998 version of Psycho so much? Its not great by any means. But it IS the same film as the original. Does the original suck? No. A remake that DOES suck is 'The Fog'. Has anyone here seen it? If not... don't!
Why does everyone hate the 1998 version of Psycho so much? Its not great by any means. But it IS the same film as the original. Does the original suck? No. A remake that DOES suck is 'The Fog'. Has anyone here seen it? If not... don't!
~Zack~
Ah yes, the Fog. That was a horrible remake and sjould have never been thought of. The reason I hate the Psycho remake is for that exact reason, it's a shot by shot remake of the origional. They could have "spiced the story up" a bit and made it a little diffrent with a diffrent ending. I didn't want to know what happened next, but unfortunately, Sant ruined his shot at making a remake as Good as "The Thing" or "Scarface" or even "The Fly". The Psycho remake was just as bad as the Halloween, the fog, the hitcher and the omen remake.
Why does everyone hate the 1998 version of Psycho so much? Its not great by any means. But it IS the same film as the original. Does the original suck? No. A remake that DOES suck is 'The Fog'. Has anyone here seen it? If not... don't!
~Zack~
It's definitely not the same film. It might've tried to recreate the film shot for shot, but it simply and utterly fails. It fails in atmosphere, it fails in cinematopgraphy and it fuckin crashes and burns in casting. Vince Vaughn is close to being the most miscast person ever. It basically comes off as pastiche instead of homage. It knows all the words, but misses every note.
That being said, I usually don't go see remakes that get abysmal reviews so I haven't seen The Wicker Man or any of the more recent catastrophes.
"The Flux capacitor. It's what makes time travel possible."
Best Remake : I'd say John Carpenter's The Thing, which is a masterpiece of horror and paranoia, but it's more a version of the novella than a remake of the Hawks film. So I'll have to go with Cronenberg's The Fly - just superb on every level
Worst Remake: Rob Zombie's version of Halloween - also is in the running for one of the worst horror movies ever.
Best Sequel: Tied between Godfather Part 2 and The Empire Strikes Back Worst Sequel: so many to choose... will have to decide on this later.
13 feature scripts, 2 short subjects. One sale, 4 options. Nothing filmed. Damn.
Currently rewriting another writer's SciFi script for an indie producer in L.A.
Best Remake: Dawn of the Dead (running zombies are the shit! Plus, it's the movie that got me hooked on zombies)
Worst Remake: Halloween (Please, it's nice to know what Michael Myers was like as a kid, but come on, in the original, the killer was supposed to be mysterious. Looking at the background of him just made it bad and now you know why he's on the spree...sort of...)
Best Sequel: Aliens/Day of the Dead (I'm going with the people here, Aliens was pretty awesome, especially with the return of Ripley and the introduction to the Queen. Plus more aliens. Day of the Dead was just about the best one in the whole Dead series. It is, by far, the creepiest one at that)
Worst Sequel: The Grudge 2/The Ring 2 (Do I need an explanation? Besides, most sequels suck, but these two are by far the worst)