Pre 50's films that should get remakes.

[dommie]

Originally Posted by Phillip c. Niethe

While I am an enormous fan of Cinema through the ages, most people refuse to watch black and white films. One of my favorites is Casablanca, which I believe does not need a remake ever...however admittedly I would watch one. some films from days gone by would do well as remakes such as The Treasure of the Sierra Madre and The Big Sleep.

I don't see any reason to mess with perfection. "Treasure" and "Sleep" are perfection and if you can't improve upon that, why bother. They tried to remake The Big Sleep in the late 70's with Robert Mitchum. It was a disaster. They tried to bring 70's culture and relocating it to England made the remake a joke. It was lacking everything that made the original work so well. One of the main reasons that makes these pre-50's films so great on their own is because they exist in the time period, and culture, in which they were made. They were stories told in a certain way for their time.

I would also argue that many modern films, while they may not be direct remakes, do in a sense, reflect an inspiration in their effort to older films that came before. One of my favorite films of all time is Chinatown. While Chinatown is not a direct remake of The Big Sleep, I think you can draw direct parallels from a film like The Big Sleep to the inspiration for Chinatown; and that's just one example of many that could be cited.