Yup, there's always gonna be some Hollywood joker who'll try to re-invent the wheel and you can't find a bigger Joker than Decaprio.
I dont mind people trying to remake movies, anime video games and stuff. I mean why not let them have a try. It is good to see something so dope back in the day brought to life today. If it sucks (which most of the remakes do) then it just sucks and the old one is still dope but if it is good then it will be a treat. I just cross my fingers and hope for the best. I would spend cash on it unless it looks really promising though....
You can't, that's why Leo is dumb for trying. Honestly, when I think about this it really makes me so bummed. Akira is so cool, and now it will be associated with this dumb thing forever!
OK, so now we have Ninja Scroll, Akira, Dragonball and apparently Evangelion slated for Hollywood remakes. I can just imagine the scene in some Hollywood executive producer's office: "Jenkins, find me another Asian horror movie to remake! All the kids like those!" "I'm sorry sir... I don't think there are any left. We've already remade them all." "What do you mean remade them all? Well, what are we supposed to do? We need something with a proven international fan base to exploit for next summer!" "Well, sir... how about some animes?" "Jenkins, you're brilliant! All the kids love animes! And we can make back half of our production costs on licensed shot glasses and underwear!" "Don't forget rereleasing the original movies and shows as special edition DVDs to coincide with the theatrical release, sir!" "ANIMES!"
That statement is massively untrue, and kind of a sore spot for me, only because I've had to hear this sentiment for what feels like a million times at work (and the work I do is on the side of the foreign film companies, not the U.S. ones doing the remakes). Talking to people about film all the time I hear this often, but all the over the top Hollywood bashing has pretty much become a parody of itself and has taken on a pretty racist, elitist tone after awhile (not meaning that specifically towards you Khanate but to the subject in general), even if it's from other Americans. Sometimes remakes suck, sometimes they are good, even great ("The Departed" comes to mind). I love foreign film and I do get bummed by it too sometimes (especially lately with word of the remake of "Let The Right One In" - which itself is based on a book), but this is not a "Hollywood" issue, it is an international one and no one seems to approach the subject with any sort of objectivity. In Japan for example, where they make some of the greatest films, a good portion of the top grossing films there are still remakes of older Japanese films, remakes of Anime, based on TV shows, based on Manga, remakes of foreign films and TV, or endless bad retreads of current film trends, just like here. Velocitron's imagining of the conversation inside of a Hollywood office could be the same at a Japanese film office, Indian film office, French film office, etc. If you watch a lot of world film, you cannot be blind to the fact that countries outside the U.S. often remake films from the U.S. and everywhere else, and a lot of times just rip-off large portions of them without acknowledgment. The difference is that American studios acknowledge and pay out the ass for remake rights. Studios for other countries pay much less if they pay at all. If you think the U.S. remake of "Oldboy" (which was itself based on a Japanese manga) will be bad (and it most likely will be) it cannot possibly hold a candle in the shit sweepstakes to the Indian ripoff of "Oldboy", "Zinda", which was almost shot for shot the same film, just much worse. At least Spielberg paid a ton for the rights to "Oldboy" which gave Park Chan Wook money to help make more films, the Indian company just blatantly ripped it off. And don't get me started on the Chinese remake of "The Host", which is shaping up to be an abysmal crap pile. And the dozens of "American Pie" rip-offs from overseas I had to sit through a few years ago (a couple of which weren't too bad actually). Why is Leonardo DiCaprio (who despite his star status is a proven legitimate actor who seems interested in making decent art) producing a remake of "Akira" any worse than Kurosawa adapting Shakespeare, or Guillermo Del Toro making movies based on a comic book, or Takashi Miike remaking tons of old films and manga? I remember a lot of people here liking Miike's "Great Yokai War", which is a remake. They do live action remakes of anime and manga all the time in Japan. A remake is a remake, right? Or is it OK just as long as the people remaking things are not Americans? It can be frustrating when you see a brilliant film get remade, but sometimes it's not so bad. In this specific case, I am actually excited by the prospect of a live action version of Akira just based on what can be done now with advancing technology because it will need tons of effects. I was more bummed by the remake of Halloween, which technology won't improve (and Rob Zombie certainly didn't). And I know we are talking specifically of remakes, but art is almost always created by someone taking influence from something else and creating their own unique art with it, sometimes with success, sometimes not. But in regards to film, unless you are George Melies I don't think anyone can claim blanket originality. The greats just either know how to hide it, take influence from more obscure sources or don't hide it at all but rub enough of their own stink on it that it's still good (Quentin Tarantino and Takashi Miike come to mind). I had a lot of thoughts on why they do this from a business perspective, but this was getting dangerously long for a rant in a forum I'll just say these remakes might suck, and they might not, but it is not a problem limited to "evil Hollywood".
I would like to see and American remake of Oldboy ... but just NOT with Will Smith... thinking about him playing the role of Dae-su... shivers. I would much rather a new actor, a no name have a shot at it.
I heard Toby Maguire is attached to Robotech. May be a nasty rumor. BTW the difference between Kurosawa doing Shakespeare and Leo doing Akira is a couple hundred years ticked by from the source material's original release. Akira is fresh and good. Japan and the context is VITAL to the story. Change that, and you got nothing.
Will Smith in Oldboy is indeed the most ridiculous casting I have ever heard. If they have to get a name actor, at least get Mickey Rourke to do it. I agree to an extent, but he's remaking it in a different format (live action vs. anime) and as you point out they are changing the setting and we have to assume they would adjust the script to make up for that change, just like Kurosawa did with his source material. We've also had decades to reflect on Kurosawa's films, but people are judging this before it has even started production. Maybe you would enjoy it as a different work? Infernal Affairs and The Departed are in some aspects very different films (a Hong Kong setting with Buddhist overtones vs. a Boston setting with Irish Catholic overtones) but they both worked and were both fantastic, in my opinion at least. And sadly, to a lot of teenagers who would go see this in 2011, an Anime from 1988 is not fresh, as lame as that may be. But anyway, my point wasn't about whether or not Akira would be good to remake, but about whether it was appropriate to frame Hollywood as some evil empire that are the only ones who do this sort of thing. In most other countries, including Japan, they are doing adaptations of things that are only a few years old or rehashing tired bullshit all the time, but no one is flipping out about that, at least not anyone I talk to. Within the context of the point I was trying to make, I think they are more similar than not.
My film buff friends laugh at The Departed because the Chinese gangsters that were dealing with Jack Nicholson couldn't speak proper Cantonese. They had very bad American Chinese accents but pretended they were hardcore Chinatown gang. When you mispronounce Chinese words they mean something else entirely different. It happens to most Hollywood films that ask Amercan Chinese actors to speak in Cantonese. It's like hearing German in an American accent. The only scene that I recall had a true accent was in Blade Runner with the Doctor working in the sub zero lab. It's just sounds disrespectful that they couldn't get something like this right from such a highly praised director especially when the original film was from Hong Kong. So I wonder what will happen to Akira and Ninja Scroll... maybe it'll be another horrid take on Japanese animation like Speed Racer...
Departed is ok, but Infernal Affairs was great! This is Leonardo and not Scorcese too, so apples and oranges if you ask me. I don't blame Hollywood, these are definite money makers. They have a built in audience it's a layup green light for any major studio. I just don't care to see them. I certainly think the source material is flawless, and that the context of that source material is as much a part of it's mystique as any other aspect. Without Neotokyo, without Kaneda, I could careless. For me it's not that Hollywood is remaking a flick from Japan. It's that someone is taking a story I really care about and changing the things I feel make it great.
If Akira sucks or not, here are some things I'm really looking forward to seeing in the live auction, hopefully this will all be in there. 1. the clowns 2. a clown getting crowbared off their bike. 3. the giant teddy bear. 4. Of course when Tetsuo becomes the massive blob.
IMO I think the art direction sucked. The directing however was good. The pacing was mediocre and left me looking at my watch a few times which I hardly ever do even for slow dramas.
Hmm, I thought it ruled. It's one of the best kid movies I have seen. If I could go back in time and take my 8 year old self to that movie, I would have wanted to become me when I grew up!
Clam, I remember the problems with the accents in The Departed, but I don't think it was disrespectful, and for a couple minutes in a 2 1/2 hour film I thought overall it was a pretty minor. I've seen worse the other way around in Hong Kong films (and worse in American films come to think of it). And I walked in biased towards Infernal Affairs, but I thought The Departed was a better film. The only way I thought I.A. was better was Tony Leung vs. Leo because Tony is the man.
"Tony is the man".. haha. Thats what my wife says too haha... Well that scene killed the movie for me. The whole cinema was laughing out loud when they started talking. True, if I compare this movie with Spy Kids. But I liked Spky Kids better.
