So the other night, I was reading an article saying The Crow reboot has pegged Juan Carlos Fresnadillo as it's dirtector. I was dissapointd because almost instantly in the comments below, people were saying what they always say in terms of how dare they remake such a classic. It should also be noted that reception of this reboot was the same when Stephen Norrington was attached as the original director.
Ok. How dare they? Really? How dare they? Get over it. I can not stand how dismissive some of you are without really knowing much about how this film will play out.
I'm actually pretty happy to see reboots of The Crow and RoboCop moving forward. You know why? Because I love those characters and I would hate to see them be forgotten by Hollywood and never have great stories told about them ever again. And when you think about it, these are good films that had shitty sequels so a second chance is a good thing.
I have the original graphic novel of The Crow sitting right next to me as I write this, and let me tell you while the original film did a nice job of capturing the essence of the charater, it was by no means entirely faithful. Now I have no reason to assume that Fresnadillo's take will adhere more faithfully to the graphic novel, but if he does do that, it would be interesting to see. And if its's just another interpertation of that story, well that will cool to see too.
In terms of RoboCop, I think that the selection of Jose Padilla as it's director really give them a chance of revitalising that franchise. I saw the trailers for his Elite Forces films, and i thought hmmm, I could see Padilla handling OCP and the Detroit police in a similar fashion.
Now do reboots and remakes always turn out the way a studio and fans hope they will? No. Plenty of them fall flat on their faces. But there are resons why that happens. Sometimes the studio makes bad choices. Just look at The Wolfman. While I really love that character and the film that came out in 2010, I can not deny that the film had serious flaws. The plot moved at breakneck speed and really cheated the characters of adequate development, leaving audiences cold to their portrayals. The biggest flaw though had to be how Joe Johnston was treated on that film. He was brought on board with only 3 weeks to prepare before shooting as a replacement for Mark Romanek. It's really a shame because Benicio Del Toro treated that movie as passion project and the character is iconic and a huge part of Universal's legacy. For them to squander the talents of Benicio Del Toro, Joe Johnston, and Rick Baker(because you know a transformation the way Baker does them would have made it so much sweeter)is a shame. Again, don't me wrong I liked it and was glad to see The Wolfman back on the screen, it just could have been so much more had Universal done a little less fast tracking and actually took their time with it.
Then you have the Friday the 13th reboot and A Nightmare on Elm Street. The arrogance of fans going "oh no one can replace Robert Englund or Wes Craven" or "how dare they reboot Friday" killed those movies. I mean they were really good. The Friday reboot took the best of the early movies, and crafted a great origin story. We saw the death of Jason's mom, Sack mask Jason, and finally the iconic hockey mask. In A Nightmare on Elm Street, Samuel Bayer gave us the reason why Freddy Krueger wanted those kids dead so badly and Jackie Earle Haley's performance creeped me in ways that Englund could not. And his realistic burn victom face looked way credible than the pizza face of the older films.
Now more characters are getting the chance at a new beginning. Whether they come from comic books(yes i know very few of the films mentioned in this article are CBM's) that have already been translated to celluloid, or are original ideas being pulled out of retirement after the older fims have long since finished their run, I say give them a chance. A fresh take is better than never seeing them again. I know Hollywood needs new ideas badly, but as long as these rebbots and remakes are done with care, I'm all for more. So please stop crying about your childhood is being ruined and have more of an open mind.