People Who've Remade Their Own Work

[D'Snowth]

The recent release of Tim Burton's remake of his own work (Frankenweenie) has gotten me to realizing that there's actually a lot of people out there who actually remake their own work over the years... cases in point, as discussed in its appropriate thread in the General Discussion board, Ross Bagdasarian, Jr. & Janice Karman have been doing remakes every two years Alvin and The Chipmunks; Sid & Marty Krofft have been talking for years about remaking a lot of their old shows, but have so far only done a remake of Land of the Lost (though apparently a Lidsville remake is currently in the works with DreamWorks); and even reading through Muppet Wiki the other night, it's been suggested that Jim wanted to do a revamp of TMS, though of course he had already died by the time MT came into fruition; Frank remade one of his movies a few years after the original, only with a more American cast since the original had a more British cast; and I guess I shouldn't even get started on what George Lucas has been doing with Star Wars...

Do you wonder why exactly people do this? Speaking for myself, I can think of a few reasons... for instance, perhaps one reason was they weren't entire pleased with their work to begin with, and wanted to see if they could try to make it better... OR, maybe (might be the case with Frankenweenie), maybe they wanted to see how their work would do in a different medium than what was original done, such as one of my "in the vault" puppet sitcom concepts is actually based on a cartoon I did about ten years ago.

Just a thought.

 

[Sgt Floyd]

Speaking of Tim Burton, I would have preferred to see Vincent remade instead of Frankenweenie. The original had a campy, old horror movie feel to it. The new one just looks...I dunno. I can't judge it since I haven't seen it, but the commercials seem to be missing something that made the original cute...and funny.

 

[Drtooth]

Trailers are one to do that. I've seen trailers that just took the dumbest parts of the movie (lowest common denominator stuff), and never actually tell what the plot of the film actually is. Look at how they marketed Brave. There wasn't even a small hint of the mother daughter storyline. It almost seems like the father was disapproving of the daughter's behavior, they way they cut it together.

As for stop motion remakes. That's obvious. Stop motion Beetlejuice. or a sequel!

 

[charlietheowl]

Musically, a lot of fifties rockers, like Chuck Berry and Little Richard put out re-recorded versions of their early hits in the sixties and seventies, and it's a trend recently for washed-up artists to put out "new" versions of their classic hits. Lionel Ritchie just put out an album of "country" versions of his hits.

 

[CensoredAlso]

Why do they do it?

1. Money.
2. Money.
3. Oh yeah they are sometimes more critical of their work than the general public is and think things need to be rectified.
4. Money.

 

[Drtooth]

Oh yeah they are sometimes more critical of their work than the general public is and think things need to be rectified.

While you are right that there are those that do it for money, there is quite a bit of that as well. I CAN'T believe no one thought of a certain VERY obvious example given this fan site...

Now, granted... the song wasn't Henson's to begin with, but he was the one who came up with the 2 characters singing in harmony being interrupted aspect.

and I guess I shouldn't even get started on what George Lucas has been doing with Star Wars...

It's not so much he's remaking those movies as he's adding things and changing things he thinks he wants changed. And it isn't a matter of money in that case so much as it's old man perfectionism. It isn't money, that is, because having the original films unaltered as they were, only with the obligatory clean up to preserve the film's audio/visual integrity would arguably make more money.

And...oh... Star Wars wasn't exactly all his

 

[CensoredAlso]

And it isn't a matter of money in that case so much as it's old man perfectionism.

Well it becomes about money when changes like that become excuses for the next DVD or Blu Ray.

Not to sound jaded, but money is pretty much always in the picture somewhere. That doesn't make them all bad people, that's just the way the business goes.

 

[mr3urious]

It's not so much he's remaking those movies as he's adding things and changing things he thinks he wants changed. And it isn't a matter of money in that case so much as it's old man perfectionism. It isn't money, that is, because having the original films unaltered as they were, only with the obligatory clean up to preserve the film's audio/visual integrity would arguably make more money.

And...oh... Star Wars wasn't exactly all his

Amazingly, one guy is actually giving a proper remastering of the OT that even includes changes to correct technical and continuity problems, as well as to make it fall more in line with the prequels (which will be almost entirely unrecognizable themselves). He's also producing "purist" versions with almost none of those changes.

http://swrevisited.wordpress.com/anhr-change-list/

 

[CensoredAlso]

as well as to make it fall more in line with the prequels

It should be the other way around, hehe.

 

[D'Snowth]

Well, in the case of Mahna Mahna, is that really so much remaking it as it is trying it out for different productions?