I suppose this is my exhortation on why we need to slow down on the remakes, sequels and trilogies. Personally, I do not mind that people remake certain films. Some films are not perfect and are lacking or sometimes they adapt from a book and take too many liberties. So, based on these grounds I can understand remaking a movie. To better make a good film that was not rendered true justice in its final cut or to redo an adaptation that more closely follows the book.
Let me give an insteresting example... Hitchcock's "Psycho" is an adaptation of a book titled the same and written by Robert Bloch. The novel is (somewhat) based on actual events. The Hitchcock adaptation does not follow the book very well at all. However, Hitchcock's vision is perfect in its own right. If someone came to me saying they wanted to remake "Psycho", I'd tell them to turn to the book and forget everything Hitchcock did because his version is perfect the way it is. You cannot improve upon it. Sadly, there is a remake of "Psycho", which I refuse to watch, but the film is verbatim the same script and shots from Hitchcock's vision. With two exceptions I know of... the audience gets to see a guy's butt and it's in color. What a waste of time, I say.
I will confess, as a filmmaker, there are some movies I would love to remake. They are movies that I can truly call some of my favorites. One of them, "The Thin Man", is even to my left in my top 10. You may ask, "What's wrong with 'The Thin Man?'" I say, "NOTHING!" The adaptation of Dashiell Hammett's novel starring Willam Powell and Myrna Loy is gold. The only thing is that there are some things that were changed because of censorship and for other reasons of which I'm unsure of that I would like to see returned to the more truthful vision of Hammett's novel. Mainly the censoring of more of the more serious issues Hammett dealt with in his book (i.e., child abuse). On the other spectrum, I could probably argue that there are some things that could be done better in Hithcock's "Vertigo" but so much of it was genius and perfect there really is no point in touching it with even a 10ft. pole. Lame cliche!
When it comes to sequels and trilogies, I have a pretty straight forward opinion about it. If a movie is made without the intention of a sequel, then when the credits role the story is finished. And technically, not even just then! If you film the entire film knowing "this is it", then there is no sequel to be made. I say this, because if the story is original and there is no more to the story you can only be grasping at straws to choose to decide to continue the story. Or, if you end your movie with a "beginning" or "open ending" (which is always a nice touch), you are destroying the ending of that good movie. Any sequel that comes after the story has already been told is pure blasphemy to the original film that was loved. So, please, let's not get carried away with the money issue.
If you set out to make a movie and know there is more, that's different. If you set out to make a movie knowing full-well that this one movie isn't the entire story, that there must be more to fully resolve; then that's great. When you develop a story, you usually know how long it needs to be to get the story told. Sometimes, a story just needs to be a short film. Sometimes a commercial. A full-length film. A trilogy, a movie with a sequel, a TV mini-series and even a TV series. But please, just know before you start writing if there is more to the story or if "this is it" and stick to it. Too many times we take it too far and then we tarnish the image of the original movie.
If you set out to make a movie and know there is more, that's different. If you set out to make a movie knowing full-well that this one movie isn't the entire story, that there must be more to fully resolve; then that's great. When you develop a story, you usually know how long it needs to be to get the story told. Sometimes, a story just needs to be a short film. Sometimes a commercial. A full-length film. A trilogy, a movie with a sequel, a TV mini-series and even a TV series. But please, just know before you start writing if there is more to the story or if "this is it" and stick to it. Too many times we take it too far and then we tarnish the image of the original movie.
In closing, all these remakes, sequels and triologies are starting to drive me nuts. Usually, as soon as I hear there is a sequel to a movie I liked as it was, I become upset and avoid the sequel like the plague. Namely, though, I say we need to be coming up with our own stuff. Nobody likes to watch the same plots, characters and production techniques used over and over. Innovate and create. Have we not learned our lesson from "Citizen Kane"? Or did we just say to ourselves, "Yeah, that's cool. Let's do that"?
