Surely a deal with Fox would be more appropriate…?

QUIRKY Fantastic Mr Fox director Wes Anderson is under fire this week—not for his sense of humour, which is certainly an acquired taste, or his repeated failure to produce comedies that are actually funny.
No, he’s been accused of tossing away his promise of greatness by teaming up with fast food giant McDonalds’.
Can you imagine the works of Orson Welles or Alfred Hitchcock being used to hawk fast food? Probably not, but the movie business is just that, a business, so I can’t say I’m that surprised.

Use your imagination, please…

THERE’S no word more certain to strike fear into my film-loving heart than “reimagining.”
Usually the fallback option of the creatively-stunted, this dreaded term is mainly beloved of those who don’t quite have the imagination and originality needed to come up with their own story but are too vain to plump for a straight remake.
For the worst in remakes, see Gus van Sant’s pointless shot-for-shot replica of Psycho (starring Anne Heche, left), while notable reimaginings of recent times include the equally-needless rejig of Planet of the Apes starring Mark Wahlberg.
The current version of Fame, however, probably fits into both camps, transferring the action to the X-Factor-obsessed 21st century while maintaining the same frantic sense of desperation for showbiz glory that gripped the original.
There are plenty of sacred cows that should not be touched with a cinematic bargepole—imagine if you will a Brando-less Godfather or Indiana Jones without Harrison Ford—but not all remakes or reimaginings are a total waste of time.
This is particularly the case with US remakes of the classic horror and thriller stories made by the great directors of Korea, Japan and Hong Kong.
Say what you like about The Magnificent Seven(two of them pictured left)—to those in the know, a blatant ripoff of Kurosawa’s Seven Sumarai—but it is a great film and helped bring a classic story to a larger audience.
More recently, Cantonese-language thriller Infernal Affairs was remade as The Departed and swept off with the Best Picture Oscar, while remakes of Scarface, Cape Fear and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, each enhanced by a strong lead performance, have also fared well.
Reimaginings, however, are a different kettle of fish. Remember The Stepford Wives? First time round, it was a clever black comedy but the second time, simply drivel.
There is the odd honourable exception—Peter Jackson’s King Kong, for example—but history is listed with unloved reimaginings like The Hulk and Godzilla (or are they remakes?). Time will tell if Star Trek joins this less than esteemed company.
All of which brings me to True Grit, the latest impending work from the Coen brothers. A unique duo, Joel and Ethan have put together a truly eclectic body of work crossing genres from comedy to drama to horror, often in the same film.
They have form in the remake/reimagining arena, having produced the mixed bag that was 2004’s The Ladykillers, and they’re at it again with their take on the western brought to the screen starring John Wayne in 1969.
It is reported that the versatile Matt Damon and Josh Brolin are in talks about lining up with Jeff Bridges (right)—already on board as Rooster Cogburn, the role that bagged Wayne an Oscar—and that the brothers will stick more closely to Charles Portis’ novel.
The Coens’ stuff is always worth watching, whether it be the fantastic No Country for Old Men or the lower-profile Burn After Reading so this one will be worth taking a look at when it emerges next year.
Whether it’s a triumph or a turkey only time will tell.

I’m an enemy of Frenemy

If there was an award for the most depressing greenlighting of the week, it would have to go to Frenemy Of The State.
Yet another film adapted from a graphic novel, this is the first work of actress Rashida Jones to be picked up for the silver screen treatment.
Jones, the daughter of multi-millionaire music producer Quincy, is clearly writing about what she knows, since Frenemy tells the story of a spoilt heiress.
Things apparently get “interesting” (depending on your viewpoint) when the heiress’ penchant for spying on her ex-boyfriends sees her presented with an ultimatum—go to prison or join the CIA. Yes, really.
It’s clearly aimed at teenage girls, most likely riffing on both the Agent Cody Banks films and Clueless, but I can’t think of a less appealing heroine than a spoilt little rich girl.
Hardly topical in these recession-plagued times, is it?

Naomi is so bankable!

THAT blonde bombshell, Naomi Watts, has been hailed by business bible Forbes for producing more “bang for your buck” than any other female star in Hollywood. Apparently, films starring the British-born Aussie have brought in more dosh for every dollar she has been paid than those featuring any other actress.
To elaborate, flicks with Naomi on the cast list have run up $44 at the cinema tills for every $1 going into her pocket, while Oscar winner Jennifer Connelly ($41 per dollar) and rom-com favourite Rachel McAdams ($30 per dollar) are close behind in the value for money stakes.
It’s an interesting concept ranking actresses in terms of their bankability but such number-crunching only goes so far.
For example, did millions flock to the multiplex for King Kong to see Naomi Watts (above and below right) as the damsel in distress or to watch the big ape rampaging through New York?
Did Wedding Crashers’ relative financial triumph owe more to Rachel McAdams’ winning comic talents or the chemistry between Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn?
And as for Jennifer Connelly, her Oscar proves her undoubted acting talents but she has yet to really spearhead a film by herself so can she really be counted on to boost box office takings?
Forbes itself admits that the actresses in its top ten generally don’t “carry” films on their own, so apart from getting a bit of extra publicity for the magazine, one has to wonder what the point of the study is.
The bottom line remains that the big stars still put plenty of extra bums on seats, which is why they earn the big bucks.
And you don’t need a business degree to work that much out.

Like running and screaming? You’ll love this…

I was a bit puzzled when I heard about Triangle. Why, I wondered, would anyone want to remake the mostly-forgotten and completely laughable early 1980s soap which featured Kate O’Mara endlessly taking ferries across the North Sea?
I soon learned that the Triangle in question is a horror film with a “twist”, the quirk being that it’s boat-based and set in the Bermuda Triangle.
Out today in some cinemas, it “stars” former Home and Away star Melissa George, whom I surmise spends much of the 99-minute running time being chased around the seabound vessel by scary men with guns.
Realising this premise had limited plot scope, the writers have decided to make time on the ocean liner in question loop repeatedly, Groundhog Day-style.
Judging by the clips doing the rounds this week, the dialogue’s not up to much but fans of running, screaming and scrapping should be in their element.

Even Hollywood’s finest can’t draw a crowd in Rotherham

I SPENT a happy couple of hours last Friday evening at the library.
I wasn’t catching up on reading matter but on The Reader, Stephen Daldry’s compelling Oscar-winning film tracing the story of a schoolboy’s infatuation with a former Nazi concentration camp guard.
The film, which bagged English rose Kate Winslet the Best Actress gong, was the first in a new season of screenings by Rotherham Borough Council in the Central Library & Arts Centre’s Studio theatre.
Rotherham town centre’s last remaining “cinema” was comfortable, quiet and kind on the pocket—with tickets priced just £3 for adults and a little bag of popcorn to munch on for every viewer.
Friday night film with free popcorn thrown in—so why was barely anyone there?
There were no screaming kids, snogging teenagers or nattering grannies—all pet hates of mine at the cinema. The problem was that there was hardly anyone else there either.
I did a quick head count and fell short of the 20 mark, which is a great shame.
Community groups do organise screenings in outlying areas such as Wath and Maltby but the town centre has been without a dedicated cinema for some time.
Plans for a new multiplex as part of the £2 billion Rotherham Renaissance have been outlined and are welcome, but whether they ever come to fruition remains to be seen.
In the meantime, a trip to the flicks for Rotherham folk inevitably means a journey to Meadowhall, Sheffield or Doncaster.
So any attempt to bring Hollywood’s finest to town should be embraced with open arms.
Anyone with a love of film who may have missed Star Trek or Hotel for Dogs at the multiplex and wants to catch either could do worse than get down to the library over the next couple of weeks (they’re being screened on Friday, October 23 and Saturday, October 31 respectively).
And for a trip down memory lane which doesn’t involve a DVD player, the classic Barbra Streisand musical Hello Dolly will be providing a few fireworks on Thursday, November 5.
If we don’t back screenings on our doorstep, how can we complain when there aren’t any?

Arnie takes a hard line

FURTHER to my comments in last week’s column on Roman Polanski’s arrest, it looks like the lofty Governor of California, Arnold Schwarenegger, agrees with me.
In the face of a petition of angry filmmakers and actors—including Pedro Almodovar, Stephen Frears and Monica Bellucci—expressing outrage at Polanski’s detention 31 years after he admitted having sex with a 13-year-old, and demands from the likes of Harvey Weinstein that the 76-year-old director be released, Arnie is standing firm.
Echoing my stance last week, Schwarzenegger said that the Polanski should not get special treatment because he is a “big-time movie director”.
Well said, Mr Governor. Let Polanski face the music like anyone else.

Let me out!

I GIVE up, I really do. Remakes are taking over the world. I had my rant about Fame last week, but now I learn that Swedish vampire thriller Let the Right One In is being reshot for American audiences.
Yes, that’s the same film which was released in the UK April—just six months ago—and made many US critics’ (mainly those with stronger stomachs than mine) top ten lists for 2008, having had a limited release in the States last autumn.
Hollywood has always mined foreign success stories for its own ends, notably rewriting Japanese, Mexican and Korean thrillers, but they’re quick off the mark even by their own standards this time around.
Casting on the US version, titled simply Let Me In, has already begun, with Cloverfield helmer Matt Reeves in the director’s chair.

Master of disaster is back with a bang

ROLAND Emmerich, the self-styled Master of Disaster, Roland Emmerich, is back in the spotlight with the impending release of his latest explosion-heavy epic, 2012.
From the five minutes footage screened to more than 100 million American TV viewers last week, it appears that Emmerich is out to surpass Independence Day and even big freeze movie The Day After Tomorrow with his latest.
So we have more explosions than you can shake a stick at, skyscrapers collapsing, roads giving away and tectonic plates tipping at terrifying angles.
Oh, and John Cusack and his screen family shouting “Whooooaaa!” and “Nooooo!” a lot. You know what you’re going to get with Emmerich and this looks like more of the same. Those Youtube commentators complaining that “the CGI looks fake” (and there are plenty of them) are surely missing the point—of course it looks fake, it is fake!
Where Emmerich-helmed films tend to fall down is on plotting and clunky dialogue and what remains to be seen this time around is how academic expert Cusack and his cohorts, Amanda Peet and Thandie Newton among them, will sort out this particular apocalyptic mess. Although in these post-Cloverfield days, maybe there is no happy ending…

Why I don’t want to play the Fame game…

REGULAR readers will be used to my near-relentless raging against the seemingly endless realm of the pointless – remakes, froth, brainless actioners, transparent star vehicle sitcoms and anything directed by Michael Bay.
I understand why a lot of this drivel is commissioned- there’s no accounting for taste, much of the end product is aimed at a target audience in which I have no place and, without the big bucks blockbusters, there is no cash for the smaller, quirkier films.
But can there ever have been a more pointless commission than the remake of Fame?
I admit that I’ve not seen it yet but I’m not champing at the bit to, either.
I just disappointed that it ever went beyond the initial discussion stage.
Clearly, some hotshot executive saw the success of High School Musical, American Idol, The X Factor and the like and decided the time was right to reheat the concept behind Alan Parker’s 1980 original.
I beg to differ. The X Factor and its ilk have a certain camp curiosity value and at least they’re basically free to view.
But the idea of paying almost 7 to sit through a 21st century Fame, where legwarmers have given way to mobile phones and performers are willed to wail their way, Mariah Carey-style, through musical standards, fills me with a kind of cold terror.
Equally worrying is the fact that there are millions of teenagers out there with a completely different view who are bound to set the multiplex tills ringing and unleash another monster franchise.
Fair enough, you might say, but the unstoppable march of these reheated remakes leaves little room in the multiplex for the less obvious offerings which deserve their place in the sun.