Ask the Critic: Carina Chocano

Question: Hollywood remakes of old and foreign films just keep on coming. Are there any that make you want to forget the original?

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Chocano: I can’t think of any remakes that would make me want to forget the original, unless I were willing to sacrifice the original just to spare us the remake. As far as I can tell, Hollywood remakes old and foreign movies for several bad reasons that may have made sense individually at some point but collapse under the weight of their own contradiction when combined.

Foreign movies are remade in Hollywood because, apparently, some people think that American audiences (a) won’t be interested in seeing foreign movies they’ve already shown interest in seeing; or (b) prefer their movies stripped of historical or national context.

The lamentable “Alfie” is a good example of an old and foreign film that gained nothing and lost its reason for existing in the remake. (The original was about the class system in Britain and the sexual revolution. I’m still not sure what the remake was about. Maybe Chanel.) Which leads to the question of why anybody in Hollywood thinks it’s a good idea to remake old movies their target demographic has never heard of -- and if they have, they’re guaranteed to despise.

If one were optimistic, one would think that such movies as “The Manchurian Candidate” and “The Stepford Wives” were remade because of parallels between the current political climate and the eras when those movies were made. Which proves only that one should never be optimistic.

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