The film industry has always been a breeding spot for highly debatable opinions. These range from adoring praise to harsh critiques. However recently one of the most hotly debated topics has been the ever expanding side of the industry, movie remakes.
While remakes and reboots are inevitable and bound to occur within all forms of media and creative arts, it’s not about if they should be done but rather how, and what the finished product looks like. While many succeed in satisfying both new and old fans, many could not be further from hitting the mark.
2010’s “The Karate Kid,” looked to capitalize with a series that had proven very successful and received highly rated reviews from a wide range of viewers. Unfortunately, the new film never lived up to its predecessors and tarnished the series. A lack of compelling ideas and proper development caused this film to end up a bust.
On the contrary, 2018 brought a new spin off series “Cobra Kai.” The series takes a view from the original antagonist dojo breathing fresh life into the series. The new series finally satisfied fans of the original while also gathering huge support from a younger audience that had yet to experience the series. “The Karate Kid” was finally revitalized with new ideas and concepts that the series had yet to explore.
Both of these installments tried to take a household name for older generations and renew them to market towards a younger audience. While they may have different formats and one ended in utter failure while the other continues to be a success story, one similarity is their intent for creation. These examples outlined the difficulty in trying to introduce new ideas while also remaining faithful to the foundations built in the originals.
Capitalizing off of these film installments is the goal for all studios and it would be simply naive to disregard such. This only becomes an issue when a high ceiling for potential is not respected by studios.
For fans of these beloved films, failed remakes can often be demoralizing. Senior Wenxin Zhang addressed his feelings towards the newest “Star Wars” movies.
“I was shown the original movies as a kid by my dad who has always been a huge fan ever since he was a kid. Seeing the concluding episode IX to the series left a horrible taste on my overall admiration for the series,” Zhang said.
Recent adaptations of Disney films such as “Beauty and the Beast” have utilized this angle to its fullest potential. The movie stays mostly faithful to its animated original not altering its themes even though the original was released over 25 years prior.
I can’t knock studios for looking to maximize profits and they likely try their best to produce the best film they can. But in some instances, it is obvious that they are molding these films to fit towards a certain message.
Whether it be a political topic or social issue some films are geared too far toward pushing a message that is widely irrelevant when compared to the movie’s actual content. While controversial some decisions made just make absolutely zero sense when looking at casting and events of the story.
Oftentimes these choices lead to positive reviews from groups that push these same messages and more negative from actual fans of these series. It’s rather unfair to subject a series that has enjoyed years of positive association towards themes that don’t fit with the original adaptations.
Overall film remakes are a positive for the film industry. It’s better to have something on the market rather than nothing. However the challenge of creating remakes that are simply cash grabs or well planned quality movies will continue to influence the future of what we see appear in theatres. The only ones who can change these trends are us the viewers.
