Movie reboots and why they struggle to match cinema classics

There are, at the last count, more than 20 movies in line for either a remake or a ‘reboot’, to use today’s Hollywood parlance.

Among them are a string of popular classics including The Birds, Mary Poppins and A Star Is Born, the latter starring Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga.

There’s nothing new about all this, of course, with Hollywood having been churning out remakes for decades. The argument has long been, no doubt with one eye on the box office receipts, that a good story is always worth re-telling and by doing so you bring it to a whole new audience.

However, there is a cluster of timeless films, including Casablanca and Apocalypse Now, deemed so uniquely brilliant that they simply can’t be improved on. At least that used to be the case. In recent years though we’ve seen remakes of a string of classics including a risible version of Get Carter, with Sylvester Stallone reprising Michael Caine’s titular role, Psycho, The Italian Job and this summer The Magnificent Seven.

Next month it’s Ben-Hur’s turn to get a 21st Century makeover. The famous 1959 version, starring Charlton Heston, not only bagged 11 Oscars, it’s seen by many as one of the greatest films not only of the fifties, but any decade.

This puts a lot of pressure on the new version. “There’s certainly a boldness in taking on a beloved classic,” says Roma Downey, one of the film’s producers. “We felt the time was right. It’s almost 60 years since the Charlton Heston film. There’s a whole generation that has never even seen the film.”

However, the remake skips the apparent gay sub-plot of the Oscar-winning epic. Suggestions of homosexual overtones in the film emerged after the late screenwriter Gore Vidal said the title character, played by Heston, and Messala, played by Stephen Boyd, were former lovers – a claim Heston dismissed.

It’s not the only remake to make noticeable changes. The new film adaptation of Swallows and Amazons, out tomorrow, caused consternation among fans of Arthur Ransome’s much-loved adventure books by swapping the name of one of the main characters from “Titty” to “Tatty”.

Sometimes, though, it’s judicious to make such changes. A script for a remake of the 1955 wartime classic The Dam Busters changed the name of the dog to “Digger” from the original N-word, for obvious reasons.

David Wilson, director of Bradford City of Film, says that while some films are “of their time” there’s no reason why they can’t be updated to reflect modern-day attitudes. “A lot of things have changed over the last 50 years and name changes and twists in the plot often just reflect how society has evolved during that time,” he says.

“Remakes don’t always work but if it’s a good story and it’s done well then it can fire the imagination of a whole new generation. So why not?”

He says that the recent Ghostbusters film is a prime example. “When it was announced it would have an all-female cast there was so much criticism on social media almost entirely from male critics. But it’s got cameos from some of the original cast and it’s a good example of a remake that stands on its own two feet.”

We’ve reached the stage now where we’re starting to see remakes of the remakes – Charlton Heston’s Ben-Hur was based on the 1925 silent film of the same name – while Lady Gaga follows in the illustrious footsteps of both Barbra Streisand and Judy Garland in A Star Is Born.

It’s been said as rough rule of thumb that the more popular the original film is, the more likely the remake is to fall flat. Which beggars the question, rather than spending all this time and money making remakes of old films, why not come up with something new? Or better still, go back and enjoy the original.