By Ryan Pendleton
I remember a while back, Disney decided to make a live action Cinderella movie. At the time, I didn’t really care about it; I found it pretty common for Disney or any film production company to simply remake a classic and probably ruin it. Disney, though, does good sometimes with its films. 2015 was the year that the House of Mouse went crazy with these live action remakes. The Jungle Book in 2016 was another massive success while in 2017, Beauty and the Beast was a smash hit! The Jungle Book (2016) made 966 million dollars and Beauty and the Beast (2017) made 1.264 billion dollars! Mickey Mouse is making bank, people; this is insane! The live action remake train, conducted by Steamboat Willie is roaring down the cinematic railroad tracks! Now with Dumbo (2019), The Lion King (2019), Aladdin (2019) and Mulan (2020), there’s apparently no stopping Disney and its outrageous conquest for more money and more fame.
Personally, in my opinion, I believe that a film studio shouldn’t remake classic movies because it ruins the franchise, ruins the initial movie by trying to capture that lightning in a bottle again and degenerates the film studio’s reputation. From Warner Bros. to Universal Pictures to Paramount Pictures, several of these companies have slowly lowered their status as respectable film production companies. The entire process of attempting to remake loved films from a previous decade is probably the dumbest and riskiest thing anyone can do. Ghostbusters, Total Recall, Ben-Hur, Psycho, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Hairspray, Planet of the Apes and The Magnificent Seven have one thing in common: they were terribly remade. There are some exceptions though such as King Kong, Little Shop of Horrors, The Fly, The Thing and The Departed.
Disney on the other hand is unstoppable apparently! Everytime they remake something, they do unbelievably good! It’s probably because they have created iconic characters and recognizable properties, but that doesn’t mean we should always make their pockets bigger than before. There are good remakes, bad remakes and terribly annoying remakes; A Star is Born has been remade over three times! That’s too many times! The concept of remaking a movie, attempting at it and succeeding with it is a terrific and amazing thing, but Hollywood needs to have more originality nowadays. Sequels aren’t that bad, but remakes, and reboots as well, can be awfully annoying beyond belief! In conclusion, I say that remakes should be limited and not overly exploited.
