NawaMan's Blog

I am a movie watcher. Watching movie is like listen to a story visually.
In my teen (which I am not anymore ) I watched movie quite very often.
But recently, I begin to get sick and tried of Hollywood movies for many
reasons. One of them is `remakes`.

Remakes are those movies that are recreated hoping to improve the old
film. Like culture or way of life have changed or a better technology
for the film making. However, in the recent years we’ve seen a lot movies
being remade just because it is not American claiming that they will not
be well received because of some cultural differences. Some claims the
originals are not well produced (but with good concept) and they need
Hollywood production to perfect it. Often, though, the remakes has no
improvement over the original or sometime ever manage to be every worse.

It is not only me that think this, many has raised concern about remakes
in movie goers forums like IMDB. Which I happen to largely agree with them.
Mostly, people do not like the idea that movies are being remade just because
it is not American. Many movies that are remade are just a few years old.
And many of them does not even have a cultural differences that Americans
or other part of the world can’t understand. The most recent one is ‘[REC]‘
a movie from Spain about TV crews and zombie attack. The move is was shown
in Nov 07 and the remade will be called ‘Quarantine’ scheduled to be shown in
the US around Oct 08. The movie has nothing uniquely Spanish (except the
language and the actors).

We feels like Hollywood tries to make a quick bucks out of the original
creators’ idea since Hollywood has much more marketing and distribution power.
Often that people do not know that those movies are remade. There is no
credit given to the original creator whatsoever (except the copy rights
money). Often, a Hollywood guy is given credit as the writer as if he come
up with the idea. Which I think it is wrong.

Then there goes another group of people complains that they don’t like when
the first group of people (which is me) complain about movies that they have
not seen just because those movies are remades. They thinks that no one
should judge the movie before they have watch it. Like, don’t just the book
by the cover, you may think.

While I agree that people should not bash a movie that they have not seen. If
the bashing is about the movie itself. For example, I should not say that
the movie is so badly acted, stupid screenplay or un-smooth editing.
Because those things need to be seen in the movie in order to make a fair
judgment.

However, I think it is very valid to hate or bash an unwatched movie if
the bashing is about the thing we can get know about it before watching
it. For instance, I hate movies that support bad behaviors like those
let-steal-things movie like Ocean 11-13, Italian jobs or Flawless. OR
those movies that glorify war. I did not hate those movies as they are badly
made arts. What I hate is the concept behind it and I can get those from
reading about them.

In this case, many of us feel that supporting remake (as for quick-bucks-
on-someone-else-idea sake) is bad and should not be supported. I for once
think that movie is a form of art and art means creative. By support
uncreative but profitable art meaning that more of these will come and what
happen to the creative art makers will not be something we want to see.

Also, I think it is very fair to make some noises to the film makers about
something we do not like as a consumer or make others aware of what we think
not good about it (so they many agree and join the movement).

Moreover, since we all human has memory. We use it to somehow predict
what might happen. In this case, many who have seen remakes recalls that
remakes (especially those that are done for quick bucks sake) are not usually
good. These are not those remake for improvement (since they really don’t
see the need of it). Why is it OK for you to avoid listening to musics of
a gene or artists you didn’t like. OR bash a restaurant because you hate a
meal you have had there. Do you need to try every single dish before
making a complain? The same is here. We have tried some and we don’t like
them. We don’t think anything else similar will be any different. After all,
not everyone of us has enough time and money to try them all.

Last but not lease, I think that there will be a better methods to watch
foreign films. Although in my opinion, subtitle is not such a bad idea.
I am from Thailand (I don’t use English at all until I came study abroad)
and we watch a lot of foreign films. Western movies are mostly subbed but
Asian ones are always dubbed. And if it is done right, they feels so natural.
If the text is put in an easy to eyes fashion. If the dialogue is well
translated and adjusted to suit your culture. And the dub team is well
experienced (perhaps they are actors too) and there is someone direct them
just like they are acting in front of camera. I don’t see why it can’t be
done. Especially in this case, the movie has nothing uniquely Spanish that
does not share with other western world. Supporting these remakes is to
agree that there is noway to watch foreign movie except remaking it. As
the result, no one will improve other techniques.

By support these kinds of remake, we support plagiarism, uncreative movie
making and block ourselves to narrow worlds of only movies in the language
we can understand. I think there are much more out there we can learn from.
And there are available with out someone else getting credit or profit they
didn’t deserve.

Just a though,
NawaMan