True that. I've recently watched RoboCop a couple of times for the first time in years, and I thought it was a fantastic film, an ultra-violent, multi-layered classic. Exactly the wrong kind of film to remake. Generally, a good remake should only be made if the first one had a great idea that was shoddily executed. Although I don't technically consider it a remake, as it has little to do with the Stallone original other than its source material, this is why I'm looking forward to the new Dredd movie - bar one or two dodgy signs, so far it has a lot going for it, and I'm expecting it to be a much better translation of the source material than what we got before, with a brand new story to tell. RoboCop? What else is there to say? They've not only done sequels, they've done family tv series, there's really not much to tell.
There are exceptions, though. Scorsese's remake of Infernal Affairs, The Departed, is a pretty darn good gangster film, despite being more similar to the original film than he admitted. (I distinctly remember how he claimed that he had only taken the "idea" of Infernal Affairs, of two moles, one in the police, one in a gang, trying to find out who the other one is before one of them gets arrested/killed, but he took a lot more plotwise than that. Still, like I said, not a bad film overall.) Fincher's version of Dragon Tattoo was also a more faithful and multi-layered film than the original Swedish adaptation, although I've heard the extended cut of the latter is supposed to be better. With these exceptions though, it really comes down to the director, someone who can make something new out of something old. If a decent RoboCop film is to work, then fuck the cast, fuck the scriptwriter, it has to have a seriously fucking great director out there, not someone they just picked at random. Anyone know who the new director is, cause I've heard plenty about the cast, but fuck all about him, and that's not an encouraging sign.
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