Eastern Promise

Intense, brutal, menacing

A couple of years ago, it emerged that Will Smith (at the time an actor whose star was shining a little brighter than it is today) had signed on to star in a mystery thriller under the guidance of Hollywood's only no-risk, dollar printer himself, Steven Spielberg. It promised to be a taut, dramatic affair, tracing one man's journey from isolated imprisonment to a horrific denouement where the truth would emerge to be the most brutal punishment of all.

The Fresh Prince

This, by anyone's standards, was as a close as you get to a cinematic sure thing. So why was there a lack of excitement? Why, indeed was there an online petition to stop this film from going ahead at all? Because this was to be a re-make of Park Chan-Wook's brutally brilliant 'Oldboy'. I was amongst those who intially spouted with rage and railed against this American re-imagining/heating/gurgitating of a modern classic, simply to pander to those who couldn't be arsed to watch something with subtitles and without anyone regularly featured in the 'Spotted' pages of 'Heat'.

Spotted! Park Chan-Wook at Nando's Wood Green

Eventually, this project died a death, although how much this had to with fan power is unclear to me. So the recent news that the American 'Oldboy' is back on, perhaps under the title 'Olboiiii' to appeal to contemporary tastes. This time, Spike Lee will direct, with Josh Brolin in as protagonist. I want to hate the concept, and sometimes I wish Lee would shove his 'joints' into his own retinas (retini?)

But I don't. In fact, I'm looking forward to it. Of course, it's always going to be seen as a kind of sacrilege to remake a picture which, despite only being released 8 years ago, has almost out-stripped it's 'cult' beginnings to land somewhere close to the outers of the mainstream.

Of course, this doesn't mean the Lee/Brolin version will be any good. In all probability, it won't get close to the original, while the always the chance it will be as entertaining as cress. But there is hope..........

"She's behind you"!!! With massive fuck-off teeth

By all accounts, Matt Reeves' recent 'Let Me In' had it enough of it's own beats to enjoy whilst sticking closely to the core ingredients that made 'Let The Right One In' such a twisted joy, where it could have easily, and predictably, fallen flat on it's face.

This example also highlights how Hollywood is showing signs of moving away from simply remaking Asian horror, a staple of the early parts of this decade. Of course, there will always be a conveyor belt of slippery turds to endure. Exhibit A: Keifer Sutherland's 'Mirrors', a horror film so bad you would take 7 years bad luck over having to watch it. Then there's junk such as 'The Eye' and 'One Missed Call', examples of a lazy Hollywood devoid of imagination or pupose, essentially just replacing subtitles with Sarah Michelle-Gellar or someone who looks/screams like her.

But there's also the good stuff, some of it we don't even realise we almost missed. 'The Departed' may not be Scorcese's best, but it's still better than good, and wouldn't be here had the film makers not adapted Hong Kong's 'Infernal Affairs' from a decade or so ago.

'The Ring' was the first of the raft of Asian horror stream to occupy the Western pschye, and whilst it doesn't have the tension of the original, it's certainly not a bad film. In the same vein, 'The Grudge' remake retains most of the scares of the original, and is perhaps even on a par with it's predecessor. By the same, Norway's 1997 thriller 'Insomnia' didn't make much of a splash, until it was re-made with Pacino in 2002 and gave Christopher Nolan a platform to show he can do cat-and-mouse as well as anyone.



"I'm just not sure the colour is quite........me"



But perhaps the most interesting by-product of the remake trend is it's ironic capability to empower the viewer, to show them something they wouldn't otherwise seek out, or even be privy to. Let's be honest, if you're a subtitle-averse film viewer, no amount of film praise is ever really going to make you scout out a copy of 'Yojimbo'.



But if Hollywood can retain the essence of the original, without resorting to duplication, then the benefits are 2-fold. It can provoke the viewer into seeking out the original, even if it's for as trivial a reason as comparison, which certainly cona't hurt other markets. Secondly, it gives the audience something they wouldn't otherwise get, and it's surely better to see second best than nothing at all.

So whilst remakes will usually be inferior, and invariably lighter fare, they do have the capacity to surprise, and indeed push an original to a far bigger audience that it could have hoped for. Still though........Spike Lee?!