# Which movie would you remake, and how? SPOILERS abound!! **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 12, 2010, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524 "2010-09-12T18:07:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Harvey\_The\_Heavy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Harvey\_The\_Heavy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harvey_The_Heavy)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 8:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/21 "2010-09-13T08:49:27Z")
_Escape From The Planet Of The Apes_ and _Conquest Of The Planet Of The Apes._ Both had really good storylines ruined by hammy acting. Edit: [Looks like they’re way ahead of me](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rise_of_the_Apes) ---
**Author:** ![Raguleader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/258eb7/32.png) [@Raguleader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raguleader)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 9:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/22 "2010-09-13T09:43:52Z")
Not because anything was wrong with the original, but I think it’d be neat to see a remake of _Casablanca_. Harrison Ford is Rick, Giancarlo Giannini is Captain Renault, the Letters of Transit are instead information stolen from the Germans, which would be quite the prize indeed for Major Strasser, who I can’t think of an actor to play, but I keep wavering between wanting an actor who can pull off a German accent, or Tim Curry because he’d make a great villain. Bonus points if Ugarte is played by Meatloaf. OK, now I’m getting carried away. Daniel Craig is Lazlo, and I’m not sure who’d play Ilsa. Definitely remake StarShip Troopers. It’s been like, two years since the last movie in that series came out? It’s ripe for a series reboot! Replace all those tired old actors (Casper Van Who?) with some hip good looking youngsters. Maybe cast Neil Patrick Harris somewhere. Also, throw in the Marauder armor. 😃 I kinda want to remake Aliens, but give the Colonial Marines the kit that the PMC’s got in Avatar. I just have this great horror scene in my head where a trooper closes the canopy on his walker just too late to keep a Face Hugger from jumping into the cockpit. Cue giant grunt-crushing walker flailing around as the poor schmuck tries to keep from getting a face full of Alien wing-wong. ---
**Author:** ![pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pseudotriton_ruber_ruber)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 10:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/23 "2010-09-13T10:09:08Z")
> [@](#): > > Er, what’s your definition of hits on? There’s a scene where Carl (Goldwyn) is visiting Molly (Moore) and intentionally spills his drink on himself as an excuse to take off his shirt. He almost succeeds in seducing her, except that Sam (Swayze) lunges and knocks over the picture of him and Molly. This is a really important scene since, aside from underlining the theme of the dead keeping an emotional hold on the living, it makes Sam realize that he has the ability to move objects. > > I love _Ghost_. It’s near the end of my “movies I would remake” list. I haven’t seen the movie in a few decades either (bits and pieces on TV when then have a GHOST-athon) but by “hits on” I mean “HITS ON” where Carl (and thanks for the characters’ names) makes a case for Molly moving on with her life, and poor lonely, unloved Molly really tries to find Carl attractive, and even poor dead Sam has to admit that he doesn’t want (on some level) Molly to go without a man for the rest of her life, but Oh, No, not with Carl, please, so she gives in to her urges and his insistence (Okay, I really wanted to see a Demi shirtless scene, I admit) but it doesn’t feel quite right, but he persists and tells her she just needs to get used to the idea of a new guy in her life, and she feels conflicted (so she takes her shirt off a few more times) while Sam is chewing the back of his dead hands of, screaming at her but no one can hear him of course… That’s what I mean by “hits on.” Maybe I just want a porno movie with a young Demi Moore… ---
**Author:** ![jackdavinci](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackdavinci/32/3259_2.png) [@jackdavinci](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackdavinci)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/24 "2010-09-13T14:18:27Z")
I would remake Sphere so that it includes rather than excludes the most important part of the novel: when we get to see the protagonist actually _inside_ the sphere. > [@Larry\_Borgia](#): > > I was rewriting the Transformers movies as I was watching them. How can you make a battle between good giant robots, evil giant robots, and the U.S. military be so goddam boring. I actually kind of liked the first one. The second one was rubbish. But I would redo it to be a little more like the cartoon - the Ark crashes on Earth in prehistoric times (including dinobots), the Matrix of Leadership would be the way it is in the cartoon, and the transformations would be more straight forward, without the millions of random parts flying everywhere. Also, nix all those shaky whizzing camera moves with split second jump cuts, so that you can actually, like, see what’s going on…The third movie in the trilogy would be a live action remake of the 1980s Transformers cartoon movie… ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/25 "2010-09-13T15:50:46Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > _Desk Set_- the Spencer Tracy-Katharine Hepburn movie about a romance between an IBM technician and the reference librarian who fears he’s there to replace her. The original movie was good and one of the best about librarianship (though the term librarian is never used) but I’d like to see it updated to a modern setting. And what? He’s there to replace the Macs with PCs? I’d redo _Citizen Kane_, this time casting it entirely with chimpanzees. ---
**Author:** ![Ronald\_C.Semone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/cc9497/32.png) [@Ronald\_C.Semone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ronald_C.Semone)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/26 "2010-09-13T16:20:57Z")
I’d like to see a lot of the movies made during the past 20 or so years remade without all the swear words. And keep off my lawn! ---
**Author:** ![Darth\_Panda](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ee7513/32.png) [@Darth\_Panda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darth_Panda)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/27 "2010-09-13T16:31:50Z")
I’d remake **The Empire Strikes Back** so that Ewoks invade Cloud City and save the day at the end of the movie. I would also give Jar-Jar’s granddaughter a key role so that we could see a neat tie-in in one the prequels. ---
**Author:** ![kasuo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8c91f0/32.png) [@kasuo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kasuo)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/28 "2010-09-13T16:32:57Z")
> [@ExTank](#): > > _Starship Troopers_. With a lot more respect for the source material. That’d be fun to see power suits jumping around cities blasting away at stuff. I’d also like to see the talking bomb in play. ---
**Author:** ![Askance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askance/32/8281_2.png) [@Askance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askance)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2010, 7:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/29 "2010-09-16T07:31:03Z")
> [@Askance](#): > > Both **Green Card** and **Four Weddings and a Funeral**. I would remake them shot for shot and actor for actor, except I’d cast Julia Roberts in place of the empty skirt that is Andie McDowell. Oh, AND **Groundhog Day**. Could there be a less worthy participant in so many otherwise good movies? Jeez. ---
**Author:** ![Martini\_Enfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/martini_enfield/32/11123_2.png) [@Martini\_Enfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martini_Enfield)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2010, 7:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/30 "2010-09-16T07:51:14Z")
I’m not sure how well this qualifies as a “Remake”, but I’d love to see _The War Of The Worlds_ set in the late 1890s, done by Simon Pegg and Nick Frost in the same vein as _Shaun of The Dead_ and _Hot Fuzz_. Otherwise, I’d remake _The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen_, (retaining Sir Sean as Alan Quatermain) with the film as more of a straight Adventure Yarn in the vein of _King Solomon’s Mines_ or a Conan-Doyle/Jules Verne story, minus the silliness. I’d probably have Michael Cera as Tom Sawyer, Jason Statham as Dr.Jekyll (who would be more of a “split personality” type rather than “actually turning into Steampunk-Hulk”), Rachel Weisz as (non-Vampire) Nina Harker, and somebody completely random like John Cleese as The Invisible Man. And the Bad Guy would be Fu Manchu, played by Chow-Yun Fat. Hey, I think it’d be awesome, at any rate! 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2010, 8:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/31 "2010-09-16T08:50:57Z")
> [@Martini\_Enfield](#): > > Otherwise, I’d remake _The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen_, (retaining Sir Sean as Alan Quatermain) with the film as more of a straight Adventure Yarn… So, even less like the morbid little Alan Moore comic! Excellent! (Really, if you found the LXG movie silly & unfaithful to the source material, I kid you not, the book whence they got the name [& superpowered Hyde] is even worse.) ---
**Author:** ![Martini\_Enfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/martini_enfield/32/11123_2.png) [@Martini\_Enfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martini_Enfield)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2010, 9:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/32 "2010-09-16T09:01:01Z")
> [@foolsguinea](#): > > > [@Martini\_Enfield](#): > > > > Otherwise, I’d remake _The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen_, (retaining Sir Sean as Alan Quatermain) with the film as more of a straight Adventure Yarn… > > So, even less like the morbid little Alan Moore comic! Excellent! > > (Really, if you found the LXG movie silly & unfaithful to the source material, I kid you not, the book whence they got the name [& superpowered Hyde] is even worse.) I’ve read the source material too and think there’s a brilliant idea in there somewhere- and the aesthetics are pretty cool, too. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Raguleader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/258eb7/32.png) [@Raguleader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raguleader)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2010, 10:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/33 "2010-09-16T10:22:19Z")
I think it would at least be interesting to see a version of Wanted with Eminem and Halle Berry, using the “League of Supervillains” premise from the comic. Dunno if it’d be a good movie though. 20,000 Leagues Below the Sea, remade as a space adventure (20,000 Parsecs Beyond the Stars? The title could use work.) Alternately, just a modern-day or early-mid 20th century version of the story. Gary Oldman would be Captain Nemo, because he’s the first person I can think of when I try to imagine an actor who could make it honestly very difficult to guess where the character is from. I’d love to see a remake of Robot Jox, with modern special effects technology. They might have to come up with a modified premise (as opposed to American and Soviet successor states fighting each other with giant robots in gladiatorial combat after the Cold War briefly went hot). Though it’d be fun to see if they could keep the iliterate masses thing going, while just upgrading all the computers to look like state-of-the-art Apple and Android interfaces, just to see if anybody watching notices.😃 Also, can we get a remake of the 2007 Transformers movie, with the entire NSA subplot either taken out or given a real purpose? Don’t get me wrong, the Aussie chick was cute, but they could have made the movie about 20 minutes leaner by cutting her character (and her comic relief friend) out entirely. That, or give their plotline something to do, cause it really felt like they had meant for a story there, but forgot to include it, like seeing an empty space for a sweet car stereo in your dashboard. ---
**Author:** ![Scougs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scougs/32/3158_2.png) [@Scougs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scougs)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2010, 11:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/34 "2010-09-16T11:16:09Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > _Pygmalion_- I would love to see this modernized and Americanized- lots of ideas for how I’d do it. Whoopi Goldberg is attached. Wasn’t that Pretty Woman? Well, without the Whoopi Goldberg bit, obviously. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2010, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/35 "2010-09-16T12:16:53Z")
Frederick Forsythe’s **the Odessa File**. I’d filmed the book in my head before the film ever came out. Some of the things they did exactly as I’d do them, but other parts they inexplicably changed – for the worse, IMHO. And this movie doesn’t _need_ a Perry Como song. **Nightfall** – there have been two screen adaptations of Isaac Asimov’s classic short story, neither of them faithful to it. I know that slavish attachment to the story isn’t the desirable goal of filmmaking, but when you buy a story for its idea and then change the idea, you’re being pretty stupid. There are plenty of examples from TV series: **Jerry was a Man** – the _Masters of Science Fiction_ series screwed the basic premise of Heinlein’s story. Heinlein never gets translated correctly into film. **Watchbird** – they took a straightforward Robert Sheckley yarn with a twist and turned it into a padded story with a pointless ending. Sheckley never gets made right, either. **Arena** – ostensibly adapted by the original series _Star Trek_, what came out isn’t Fredric Brown’s classic short story (and reportedly didn’t start out as such). This one I’d _definitely_ like to see done as a major movie, with CGI effects. In the right hands, it could be brilliant. **The Puppet Masters** – The aliens looked great, and there’s much to admire in this film version (especially having conspiracy fan Richard Belzer playing an Agent), but there’s too much that’s wrong with this story, starting with transplanting it to the modern day. I’d like to see it as a not-too-distant future story, with believable agents and motivations. And, yes, i do think you can film the scenes with a stripped-down populace. Of course, as I and others have said (even in this thread), **I, Robot** and **Starship Troopers** really need to be redone. I’d like to redo **This Island Earth** (with a Dopername like mine, I’d _have_ to). Although the book isn’t the greatest, and is dated, it’s an awful lot better than the movie, which jettisoned most of the book and substituted a story that seems to have been cobbled together by people who only know science fiction from 1940s and 1950s pulp covers. The one part of the story they’re faithful to – the beginning, with building the Interociter – they managed to screw up. As the film has it, Cal Meacham builds an Interociter from parts and a schematic the Metalunans send him, as if it’s an intergalactic Heathkit. In the story, there are no schematics – Cal has to dope out what the parts are and how they fit together from clues hidden in the catalog descriptions, and has to rebuild some of the parts. It’s supposed to be an intelligence and creativity test, after all, not a tryout for a technician’s job. They show some of the other Metalunan tests in the book, too – the one sent to the Mechanical Engineer, for instance (which he fails). There are no Metalunan Mutants (although they look so cool and are so iconic you’d _have_ to work them in somehow), the Metalunans aren’t after Earth’s atomic power or getting human scientists to come up with new ways to use it – the Metalunans have freakin’ _Starships_, after all – they don’t need to pick our brains. There is a war, but it’s not limited to one planet, and Metaluna doesn’t become a sun. Exeter’s name is Jorgasnovara, and he doesn’t crash his saucer at the end. The Metalunan ship isn’t a flying saucer, in fact. And the book explains what the title means (something the movie never does). ---
**Author:** ![mbh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2010, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/36 "2010-09-16T14:07:43Z")
About 15-20 years ago, I wanted to see a remake of _Beau Geste_, with the Baldwin brothers playing the Geste brothers. I would like to see a remake of _Ghostbusters_. Not the Bill Murray movie; the Forrest Tucker TV show. I want to see \*Buck Rogers \* done with a good script and a huge budget for sfx. The Martians would be the big villains. I see the Tiger Men and the Golden People as rival political factions, who use hair dye to advertise their political affiliations. Christian Bale as Buck Rogers. Lou Gossett, Jr. as Dr Huer. _Arsenic and Old Lace_, with Christopher Walken playing the Boris Karloff role. (Yes, I know it was Raymond Massey in the film. But it was meant for Karloff.) ---
**Author:** ![JoelUpchurch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f05b48/32.png) [@JoelUpchurch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JoelUpchurch)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2010, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/37 "2010-09-16T14:40:27Z")
> [@ExTank](#): > > _Starship Troopers_. With a lot more respect for the source material. Agree. Have John Milius do the screenplay and direct. The must have called Robert Heinlein ‘Spinning Bobby’ at the graveyard after the first one came out. ---
**Author:** ![JoelUpchurch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f05b48/32.png) [@JoelUpchurch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JoelUpchurch)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2010, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/38 "2010-09-16T15:10:00Z")
I’d like to see someone take another crack at “Gamer”. I think they actually had an interesting idea there, where you could actually run real people who would rent out their bodies to be used in games. The actual movie they made was terrible. ---
**Author:** ![BubbaDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bubbadog/32/333_2.png) [@BubbaDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BubbaDog)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2010, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/39 "2010-09-16T15:16:24Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > I think some of the classic westerns might do well now, such as the John Wayne/Maureen O’Hara team ups in McClintock and Big Jake. I can’t decide who has the charisma and machismo to take the reins from Wayne though- can’t really see Clooney in a western and Costner’s got the charisma of a can of salmon. Suggestions? [snip] Mike Rowe (Dirty Jobs Host) Yes I know he’s never done a major motion picture and he’s obviously more of a stand up comedian but the guy just looks like he could pull it off. After crawling around in sewers and shoveling poop on five continents a little trail dust wouldn’t even bother him. And in that theme, my son suggested one time that Mike Rowe and Ben Bailey (Cash Cab) would make excellent leads for a buddy-cop movie. Maybe Lethal Weapon. ---
**Author:** ![BrotherCadfael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@BrotherCadfael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrotherCadfael)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2010, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524/40 "2010-09-16T15:30:32Z")
> [@mbh](#): > > About 15-20 years ago, I wanted to see a remake of _Beau Geste_, with the Baldwin brothers playing the Geste brothers. Can’t do it. _The Last Remake of Beau Geste_ came out in 1977. > [@mbh](#): > > _Arsenic and Old Lace_, with Christopher Walken playing the Boris Karloff role. (Yes, I know it was Raymond Massey in the film. But it was meant for Karloff.) This would definitely work. George Clooney as Cary Grant? > [@JoelUpchurch](#): > > > [@ExTank](#): > > > > _Starship Troopers_. With a lot more respect for the source material. > > Agree. Have John Milius do the screenplay and direct. The must have called Robert Heinlein ‘Spinning Bobby’ at the graveyard after the first one came out. Hell, hook him up to a generator and the energy crisis is over. > [@BubbaDog](#): > > > [@Sampiro](#): > > > > I think some of the classic westerns might do well now, such as the John Wayne/Maureen O’Hara team ups in McClintock and Big Jake. I can’t decide who has the charisma and machismo to take the reins from Wayne though- can’t really see Clooney in a western and Costner’s got the charisma of a can of salmon. Suggestions? [snip] > > Mike Rowe (Dirty Jobs Host) > > Yes I know he’s never done a major motion picture and he’s obviously more of a stand up comedian but the guy just looks like he could pull it off. > > After crawling around in sewers and shoveling poop on five continents a little trail dust wouldn’t even bother him. I LIKE this idea! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/which-movie-would-you-remake-and-how-spoilers-abound/553524.md?page=3)