Film Inquiry Recommends: Great Remakes

Over at our official Facebook page, we are currently posting daily film recommendations, with each week being a different theme. This is a collection of those recommendations! This week’s theme is Great Remakes. In a world dominated by reboots, sequels and remakes, it’s important to notice the rare times where remakes are actually good, remakes which are able to develop their own voice built upon existing material. Whilst some of the best remakes include David Cronenberg’s The Fly and John Carpenter’s The Thing, we want to highlight some of the more underrated efforts.

1. The Killers (1964, Don Siegel)

Original: The Killers (1946, Robert Siodmak)

Whilst not perfect, Don Siegel’s original take on The Killers makes it one of the more interesting remakes to come out. The original narrative, based on a short story by Ernest Hemingway, was about two hitmen who assassinate ‘The Swede’ (Burt Lancaster) who willingly accepts his death. A life insurance officer (Edmond O’Brien) starts to investigate the events that lead up to his death, showing The Swede’s tragic slide from normal everyman into failed criminal. The original is considered a classic in the film noir genre, so when Don Siegel (Famous for directing Dirty Harry and Charley Varrick) had to make a TV movie reboot of the film, he decided to actually do something different with it.

In this version, the two assassins still execute The Swede at the beginning, but the investigation into his death is actually done by the 2 assassins, played by Lee Marvin and Clu Gulager. Due to the Swede’s easy acceptance of death, they start to suspect their job has something fishy behind it. The cast also features Angie Dickinson, John Cassavettes and Ronald Reagan (who regretted doing the film after his presidency, due to a scene where he slaps a woman). The only problem with the film is due to originally being made for television, the production values are quite low (especially during driving scenes, which are horribly matted), so more money invested would’ve really helped. This was the first film Lee Marvin received top billing in and there’s a lot of elements in his hitman character that would come back in his ‘Walker’ role in Point Blank.

2. The Beat My Heart Skipped (2005, Jacques Audiard)

Original: Fingers (1978, James Toback)

A rare example of a foreign country remaking an American film (as we will see today, it’s usually the other way around), which goes for a more thoughtful and emotional route than the original American film. The Beat My Heart Skipped is about Thomas Seyr (Romain Duris), a talented piano player and shady criminal who is the son of Robert, an aged businessman who is racking up debt with too many of the wrong people. Thomas is torn between a bright future in being a concert pianist and delving further into his gangster lifestyle in order to save his Dad from the debt collectors.

Whilst this film features gangster/crime elements, the film’s focus is much more on Thomas’ growth of his musical talents and his growing relationship with his piano teacher, Miao Lin, who uses music as an element to break language barriers. As Thomas is French and Lin is Chinese, they initially don’t understand each other, making the music their connection. This relationship is juxtaposed to the one with his father, a seemingly pathetic man who uses Thomas for his own selfish needs. Some stylish action scenes are dispersed throughout, making it one of the better remakes of the past ten years.

3. Criminal (2004, Gregory Jacobs)

Original: Nine Queens (2000, Fabián Bielinsky)

Criminal is an American remake which has also been remade in Bollywood and Mollywood cinema, is a film that doesn’t exactly do much new in the con-man genre, but does it an entertaining fashion bolstered by some great performances. Richard (a subdued John C Reilly), an established con-man, bumps into amateur Rodrigo (Diego Luna, in one of his first Western films) by chance and they decide to team up to con a currency collector by selling him a counterfeit copy of an extremely rare bill. When the plan starts to involve Rodrigo tossing in his entire savings, he starts to suspect Richard is up to something of a bigger con. Maggie Gyllenhaal shows up later on as Richard’s reluctant sister, who also does a great job in the film.

Overall, this is a low-key remake which focuses on the characters rather than trying to shoe-horn any excessive action scenes or unnecessary romantic subplots. This film does justice to the original Swedish film, without leaning on it too dramatically for visual cues, something which a lot of bad remakes do, when they start to feel like shot for shot re-dos, such as Kimberly Peirce’s Carrie remake. This is the directional debut of Gregory Jacobs, a frequent first assistant director for Steven Soderbergh.

4. Sorcerer (1977, William Friedkin)

Original: The Wages of Fear (1955, Henri-Georges Clouzot)

Recently brought out from obscurity thanks to an awesome Bluray release, William Friedkin’s Sorcerer is one of his best films and one that should be seen by a lot more people. To be fair, the film has only received an official DVD/BluRay release as of last year, where the previous bootleg release was criticised by Friedkin himself, who posted a negative review on the Amazon page. Sorcerer is an interesting film for quite a variety of reasons. Firstly, it was the first film Friedkin made after the huge success of The Exorcist. Secondly, because of how troubled the production was.

They shot in extreme conditions in the Dominican Republic, which lead to huge upsets between Friedkin and his crew. The movie also caused a rift between Universal Pictures and Paramount Pictures, who had partnered for the film and the ultimate critical and commercial failure was one of the big films which lead to the decline of the Hollywood New Wave movement and the shift towards more mainstream-friendly fare.

The film opened on the same weekend as Star Wars, causing the film to bomb terribly. Critics didn’t quite get the film at the time, but as time moved on, it’s been critically re-evaluated as a masterpiece and one of Friedkin’s best films. This ambitious film is about four different broke and desperate men, lead by Jackie (Roy Schneider), are forced to risk their lives to transport gallons of nitroglycerin across dangerous South American jungles in order to stop a fuel fire. Due to the sensitive nature of the nitroglycerin, any major or minor bump could lead to the trucks blowing up. The film is incredibly tense and beautifully shot, backed up with some great direction by Friedkin leading to a film which should be seen by any fan of Friedkin’s or just film in general.

5. Algiers (1938, John Cromwell)

Original: Pepe Le Moko (1937, Julien Duvivier)

An American remake of the French film Pepe Le Moko, a film which served as a big inspiration for both The Third Man and Casablanca, Algiers is a film filled with some great black and white cinematography and elements of originality, especially for its time. Pepe Le Moko (the name not changed for the remake which is surprising) is a thief who has escaped from France and currently lives in Casbah, a crowded, mazelike corner of Algiers. Due to his charm and skills, he’s seen as a form of leader within Casbah, which prevents any outside forces from trying to arrest him. But when Gaby (Hedy Lamarr) enters and Pepe falls in love, he decides it may be time to finally leave Casbah and try to escape the forces around him.

Like many classic films, this is a film which fell into public domain, so now lingers around on poorly made DVD transfers and online archives which show an aged print, which is not how the film should be viewed. It’s an unfortunate fate for a lot of films, such as It’s A Wonderful Life and The Third Man, where their status of classic is diminished as they are thrown in movie compilations mixed in with old public domain rubbish.

6. Piranha 3D (2010, Alexandre Aja)

Original: Piranha (1978 Joe Dante)

A remake in the loosest terms, Piranha 3D is a film which can be written off very quickly on face value. It’s understandable though, it came out during the boom of awful 3D films (an example being the horrible Clash of the Titans) and the advertising focused on the sexual aspects (like any good grindhouse film would), so many people didn’t understand that this film was incredibly tounge-in-cheek, playing on the tropes of standard monster movies and having fun with them. An indicator of this can be seen in the opening scene, which features Richard Dreyfuss in his costume from Jaws,  fishing by himself, humming the Jaws theme (not the most subtle parody) where he is attacked by piranhas.

The film’s inclusion of comedic actors such as Adam Scott, Christopher Lloyd and Paul Scheer also shows that the film is going for a more comedic/parody vibe, an angle the awful sequel (Piranha 3DD) totally avoided. This film is quite similar to the underrated 1980 film Alligator starring Robert Forster, another film which poked fun at the monster genre whilst being its own film.

7. Night and the City (1992, Irwin Winkler)

Original: Night and the City (1950, Jules Dassin)

Night and the City is a remake of the great Jules Dassin film of the same title, which itself is based on the 1938 Gerald Kersh novel, also of the same name. Robert De Niro plays Harry Fabian, a cheating, broke lawyer who loses a case against a famous boxer promoter. He sets up a scheme to try and get a win over him, leading towards a downward spiral where his only support is his waitress girlfriend Helen (Jessica Lange).

De Niro’s performance is quite a different one for him, playing the character in a highly energetic way, similar to his performance in Scorsese’s The King of Comedy, avoiding his typical gruff gangster style that he’s largely known for. Jessica Lange shines as the supporting waitress, making her the only sympathetic character in a world full of people who are all trying to outdo each other for cash, without a sense of humanity. The cast is round out by some great veteran actors, including Eli Wallach, Alan King and Jack Warden, who are always a joy to see.

What are some other film remakes that actually worked?

(top image: The Killers – source: Universal Pictures)