Quality is Job 1, and yet ...

VARIETY’S venerable Peter Bart didn’t like my Friday posting -- published in Saturday’s Calendar -- about John Lesher running Paramount Vantage into the ground, calling it a shrill “rant,” his way of saying that I lack the smooth, world-weary cynicism that colors Bart’s own writing. He was also clearly peeved that I had the temerity to point out how Bart’s trade paper, never one to ever step on any studio toes, had managed to cover the firing of 60 Vantage staffers in true accept-the-press-release style, failing to note that the staffers were taking the fall for Vantage’s inability to make any money (while Lesher whooshed off to become Paramount’s head of production).

I admit that I was hoping Bart would write an open letter to me, like he does to everyone else in Hollywood. But he did manage to willfully misrepresent what I wrote, claiming I had criticized Variety for failing to report the dismissal of Amy Israel, Vantage’s talented acquisitions executive. My complaint wasn’t that Variety didn’t report her firing, but that it didn’t report what her firing meant -- that Vantage is being transformed from a specialty film division to a genre film division, a la Screen Gems or Rogue Pictures. Bart claims otherwise, saying he has been assured so by Lesher himself. Having been assured by studio execs over the years of the impending success of hundreds of films that turned out to be dogs, I would advise a little more caution.

Bart defends Lesher, asking the question: “Should the press also clobber guys like Lesher who may have been overambitious about some of his art films? The public, at least, got some terrific movies out of the venture.” If Bart had read my piece more carefully, he might have noted that I praised Lesher for the quality of his films. The problem was that Vantage lost money on most of those movies. Because of its lack of fiscal responsibility, Vantage won’t have a chance to make many more of them. That’s the real issue here. You can make the greatest movies in the world, but if you can’t find a way to pay for them, the bean counters are going to show up some day and padlock your doors.

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Make it again, (and again) Sam

Is anyone doing anything original in Hollywood anymore? Apparently not. What’s even worse, it used to largely be Pat Hobby-style hacks who took jobs doing retreads. Now it’s the top talent in town.

Just take a look at recent news: The trades have reported that Darren Aronofsky has signed on with MGM to do a remake of “RoboCop,” the Paul Verhoeven film that has already spawned two inferior sequels. The film is being written by David Self, who’s hot off scripting a remake of “The Wolfman” for Universal.

Meanwhile, New Line has announced that it’s doing a second sequel in the “Harold & Kumar” series. Always hilariously respectful, Variety noted that the “storyline is being kept under wraps.” Translated from Variety-ese, that really means no one has written a word -- they’re just greenlighting the movie because the sequel made a lot of dough earlier this year.

Down in San Diego at Comic-Con last weekend, remake mania was also in full bloom. Robert Rodriguez was at one panel, talking about his upcoming remake of “Red Sonja,” which he’ll produce with gal-pal Rose McGowan playing the lead role. Another panel was devoted to a new version of “The Day the Earth Stood Still,” which stars Keanu Reeves and is due this Christmas from Fox. The original was a landmark sci-fi film directed by Robert Wise, who got his start editing “Citizen Kane.” The new version is directed by Scott Derrickson, who got his start directing “Hellraiser: Inferno.”

Who says Hollywood movies aren’t getting better all the time?

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This item and others can be found on the Big Picture blog (latimes.com/thebigpicture)