Five Films I Dislike and How I Think They Should Be Remade 26/06/2012

So how did you make me funnier in Taxi Driver?

The Muse: Appalling attempted comedy from Albert Brooks in which a Hollywood screenwriter hires a professional muse (Sharon Stone) to cure his writer's block. Could be funny but falls flat at every gag, largely because the humour depends on your acceptance of Brooks's smugness. I just found him superior minded and hostile. He's really good in other people's movies, though, like Taxi Driver and Drive.

Remake in Japan as a magical realist psychefest with Sion Sonno directing.

There must be more more loveable Cockney filth we can spout.

Sexy Beast: Interesting confrontation between ex-gangster and toughnut from the old underworld tryig to lure him back outstays its welcome before the showdown arrives and then gets routine and duller by the second as the third act comes calling like a party guest the next morning. Waste of good performances from Ray Winstone and Ben Kingsley.

Remake in Hong Kong more or less the same but with added supernatural horror angle. Get the Pang brothers in for the job.

Oh for fuck's sake eat it, I've got a directorial gig after this.

Splice: A good idea that loses strength and steadily collapses under its increasing conventionality. By the writer/director of the wonderful Cube it seems to show that the only development in his skills are how to get Hollywood money to make a film and blank his mind to the million compromises he has to make just to get the thing made and released.

Remake in Hungary in a black and white village on the plains. Get Bela Tarr out of retirement and make him shoot on video so he can extend his ten minute takes by hours, if necessary. That would blow my mind.

I'm getting dizzy. Is that why they call them rushes?

The Rum Diary: Johnny Depp plays Hunter S. Thompson again with Withnail and I's Bruce Robinson in the chair. But it tries too hard to make the pre-gonzo Thompson into the later Duke and the W and I craziness also feels too studied. When it gets serious it gets dull, rather than hard.

Render all footage into black and white and remove all audio. Leave at drop off point in undisclosed location somewhere in the southwestern U.S. and get Craig Baldwin to edit and narrate it. I'd watch that. I'd burn the copy afterwards but I'd watch it.

You SAID I'd get a SONG in the third ACT!

The Descent: Competitive women virtually dare each other to some serious spellunking in them back hills. Oh, it's a Deliverence survival tale with a teamwork message. That would have been great. There are monsters. You see too much of them too early, giving you far too much control as a viewer when you should be terrified of the dark and any self-revealing sound. Interesting tie-in about motherhood not strong enough to suggest alternate reality.

Get Bong Joon-Ho to remake this in Korea as a found footage horror. Tired genre but he could put the zap back into it.