Just Stop Already! Issue #8: Disney Live-Action Remakes

 Just Stop Already!

 

Movies are a great art form, but Hollywood is a business, so if something translates into a financial success—whether it’s a genre or type of movie or a trend—chances are it will be exploited and repeated until people are sick of it. But, sometimes producers, writers, and/or directors want to cut corners, or are just desperate to make money, or are creatively bankrupt. All of these factors result in frustrations for the audience that take on many forms, and in this series I explore some of the tropes, trends, bad habits, and financial exploits of Hollywood films. Sometimes when it comes to movies, I feel like saying…just stop already!

 

Issue #8: Disney Live-Action Remakes

 

The big tentpole movie for the 2024 winter holiday season is Mufasa: The Lion King, which is both a prequel and a sequel to 2019’s The Lion King. Everyone knew the precursory film was a remake of the 1994 traditional hand-drawn animated original, because everyone knows (and loves) the original Lion King. The 2019 remake? Not so much love. When I saw it in theatres the summer it was released, I was blown away by the visual effects, but I also left thinking…what was the point of that? It felt like a soulless copy of the original, and the determination to make the talking animals look so realistic came off as a wasted effort.

Disney’s first photorealistic CGI film attempt was 2000’s Dinosaur, which in some ways feels like a remake of The Land Before Time—an animated film that was not produced by Disney, but was directed by Don Bluth, an animator who had worked for the company previously. Speaking of Dinosaur, I watched the crap out of my VHS tape of that movie when I was a kid, and the trailer at the beginning for 102 Dalmatians is as burned into my memory as the film itself. Looking back, 101 Dalmatians (1996) is one of the earliest examples of a Disney live-action remake, and 102 Dalmatians is the first direct sequel to one of them. Disney sequels were already a regular thing at that point, but in animated form only. Not one of them could ever compare to the original, as has become the case with the live-action sequels. Not to misjudge prematurely, but the trailers for Mufasa haven’t convinced me this one will break the pattern, but rather have reaffirmed it will follow suit. 

Live-action remakes of classic Disney films started with The Jungle Book in 1994, directed by Stephen Sommers, who would go on to direct two very successful Mummy films for Universal a few years later. The Jungle Book (1967) is one of my favourite animated Disney films, and I haven’t seen the ‘94 live-action version since I was a kid, but I don’t remember it being all that bad. I enjoyed seeing the animals portrayed by real trained animals, and they didn’t speak, which made the whole film feel more mature and serious than the original. I found it a little odd that Mowgli was a grown up, but there was another live-action Jungle Book movie I remember seeing as a kid where he wasn’t an adult, and I now realize looking back that there have been many Jungle Book films, but only some of them were from the house of mouse. The other one I saw as a kid was The Second Jungle Book: Mowgli & Baloo, a 1997 adaptation from Sony of Rudyard Kipling’s source material—material that has served as the basis for all Jungle Book films.

I really liked 2016’s The Jungle Book, which was partly a re-adaptation of Kipling’s stories and a remake of the 1967 animated film. In fact, I loved it, and that remake was the reason I saw The Lion King when it came out. Both were directed by Jon Favreau, and I was so impressed with the way The Jungle Book combined the photorealistic animals with a reworking of the same story I knew from the animated version that felt worth telling. I was sure The Lion King would do the same thing. But, it didn’t…

When I say these Disney live-action remakes should just stop already, I am not referring to the ones like The Jungle Book (either remake). I don’t hate the base concept of taking something that previously existed in animated form and trying to make it more visually realistic if it could potentially offer a new (possibly even better) moviegoing experience. The Jungle Book was perfectly acceptable to remake for a few reasons. For one, the 1967 animated version, while still entertaining to this day, is also quite simplistic and short (less than 80 minutes including credits). There was plenty of room for the story and characters to grow. Also, The Jungle Book was spawned from Kipling’s stories, which had already been adapted to film before that. The remakes that serve no purpose except to make money by capitalizing on the familiarity and previous popularity are the ones that bother me, and unfortunately, those ones are becoming far more abundant.

The live-action remake boom did not start in the late 90’s/early 2000’s. The Jungle Book and Dalmatians films were not even really prototypes for what was to come, as they primarily featured real actors and animals shot in real environments. But, I distinctly remember the somewhat off-putting CGI shots of puppies falling through the air in that 102 Dalmatians trailer, and CGI was the way of the future for remakes of this nature. It was 2010’s Alice in Wonderland that opened the floodgates. With Tim Burton as director and Johnny Depp as The Mad Hatter, it drew audiences in because it promised a weird, large-scale rejuvenation of the classic children’s tale. Like The Jungle Book that followed later, it is not a strict remake of the original animated version. Instead, it draws on Lewis Carroll’s works and continues the story from the 1951 animated flick. I didn’t hate Burton’s remake, but I didn’t really enjoy it, either. The CGI was too abundant and looked too synthetic. It didn’t matter, though, because it made over a billion dollars, which guaranteed a sequel (released in 2016: have not seen it) and a flood of similar Disney productions in the years to come.

Maleficent, Cinderella, and The Beauty and the Beast were all successful, not just in terms of box office but with critics, as well. Reviews for all three were not entirely glowing, but good enough, it seemed, to ensure more movies like them would get greenlit. There were some more interesting ones in the 2010s, though, like The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, which was spun off from Fantasia, and Christopher Robin, which acted as a continuation of previous animated Winnie the Pooh films. Then, we reached The Lion King era, and this was when creativity started to dwindle. Dumbo, which also came out in 2019, was Tim Burton’s second Disney live-action remake, and was not as praised nor as successful as his previous one. Aladdin was controversial mainly for featuring Will Smith as The Genie. Many moviegoers felt Robin Williams was irreplaceable, and they were right! Like The Lion King and Dumbo (all released the same year), the question of whether a live-action remake could be better than the original was asked, and it was a valid query. In the end, the answer to the question didn’t matter in any case, because all of them made bank. Disney took these repeated financial hits as audiences saying: “Keep ‘em coming!”

Now we’re getting to some of the weirder, more desperate examples. There was Pete’s Dragon in 2016, which was a remake of the 1977 original of the same name—a film that mixed traditional animation with live action, so the nature of that remake sort of made sense, but I don’t think it’s remembered all that fondly anymore. Mulan, Peter Pan and Wendy, and The Little Mermaid were all controversial for varying reasons, and it was clear in the marketing for all three that they were not going to offer radically different takes on the stories of the originals, which were all still great in their own rights. At least in cases like Maleficent and, later, Cruella (yet another Dalmatians attempt) those films took a slightly different approach and told the same story more from the villain’s perspective with strong actresses in those roles. Even still, it doesn’t exactly provide a great reason to do the same thing over yet again.

In 2019 there was also the Lady and the Tramp remake, with CGI dogs pushing a CGI meatball around on a CGI plate of spaghetti, and for some reason it was released straight to Disney+ without a theatrical release. The whole Disney+ situation makes me raise my eyebrows a little in relation to this topic. If all these live-action movies were just put straight on the streaming service, I probably wouldn’t care so much. That was the case with the animated sequels of the 90’s and 2000’s; they went straight to home video, so we all knew they weren’t going to be on the same level of quality as the theatrically released originals. Now, these remakes are being propped up as major movie-going events, and it’s so they can keep sustaining the insanely high budgets on which they get made. Pinocchio, which came out in 2022, was made on a 150-million-dollar budget—and yet, it was only released straight to Disney+! Why are some getting major releases and some are not, even when they all cost an arm and a leg? It might be to draw interest to the Disney streaming service, but based on reviews, I wouldn’t say Pinocchio was successful in doing that.

So, what’s next for Disney? In 2025, we’re getting Snow White and Lilo & Stitch, then the following year it’s Moana and potentially Hercules (it may be delayed to 2026), with Aristocats, Bambi, and Robin Hood all in stages of development, too. Snow White seemed the likeliest candidate for the remake treatment, given it’s a classic, but the original animated film (literally the original: the first Walt Disney animated feature) is arguably a bit dated, and like Jungle Book, rife with possibility for expansion. But Lilo & Stitch? It just doesn’t lend itself to live-action/CGI, to me, and once again, the original is so good there’s no need to redo it—except, have you seen how much Lilo & Stitch merchandise is out there? There’s probably more Stitch merch available now than when the original movie came out! I guess they have to capitalize on the baffling surge in popularity. Moana is also a befuddling choice, considering the already entirely unnecessary animated sequel just came out, and the original is 1) not old and outdated, 2) yet again, perfectly excellent and not needing a patch or an update.

It’s not just Disney who are guilty of these pointless regurgitations anymore. How to Train Your Dragon, a fantastic animated film based on the children’s book series of the same name, is getting a live-action remake next year, with the same director and at least one of the same cast members. I do not see the point when the movie is already excellent. There’s little to no chance they will be able to outdo their first attempt, but that isn’t the primary reason for remaking it, is it? I think the palpably cynical nature of these remakes is what’s starting to get to me. Ones like Bambi I guess I can understand, because that movie is so old and to just remake it in traditional animation would likely seem even more pointless than trying to use photorealistic CGI to bring the talking woodland animals to life, but even still, why not just make something different? Instead of Bambi’s mom getting shot, how about Bambi’s mom shoots the hunter? Let’s bring back the creativity that is rapidly disappearing.

With Disney owning all of Marvel except Spider-Man, plus Alien, Predator, Planet of the Apes, and much, much more, it’s extra frustrating that in addition to endless sequels (see: Pixar release slate) they are tossing out ever more inane remakes, and they aren’t going to stop as long as people keep watching them and helping them make money. It goes beyond using recognizable titles and characters; the same stories are being told over and over, adding no value and nothing new. I think eventually audiences will get sick of this trend, much like how horror movie fans got sick of the endless remakes in the 2000s, and eventually we will get back to more original Disney productions, but perhaps not until every potential animated film has been tapped for a live-action/photorealistic CGI retelling—and even then, the cycle could just start over, and we’ll be watching yet another remake of The Jungle Book in 2036…

 

Godzilla (1954): Favourite Films Series

Godzilla (1954): Favourite Films Series

 

Recently, Godzilla turned seventy years old. In his most recent film roles, he has teamed up with King Kong in Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire—the sixth American Godzilla production (fifth in the ongoing MonsterVerse series)—and even won the franchise’s first Oscar with Godzilla Minus One. Seven decades after Japan’s most famous movie star rose from the depths of the sea we are all still talking about it. The name GODZILLA is still on posters, kids still play with Godzilla toys, and the films still bring in millions of dollars at the box office. How incredible is that? Well, for this life-long fan, it’s pretty incredible.

My Godzilla Collection, circa 2018

I have written about Godzilla on this blog probably more than any of my other favourite film franchises—and yet, after thirty entries in my Favourite Films Series, I'm only now finally covering the one that started it all. On my 30^th birthday I disclosed to a large assemblage of my friends, family, and peers that Godzilla is not actually up there as one of my all-time favourite movies. This was met with total outrage, to put it lightly. “How could it not be? You’re obsessed with Godzilla! You talk about it constantly!”

Much of my Godzilla discourse, on this blog in particular, is largely happenstance. My blog started mere months before the MonsterVerse was born with 2014’s Godzilla reboot, and after that second Hollywood attempt at adapting the creature for modern American audiences proved to be a hit, Toho rebooted their own Godzilla series two years later, then the MonsterVerse continued, and Toho doled out a trilogy of animated films, an anime TV series, and yet another reboot right alongside. The quantity of new Godzilla movies and shows has never been higher. Not even when Toho was at its peak with releasing a new movie every year was there this much Godzilla content to consume. Naturally, I have checked it all out, and more often than not, had plenty to say about it.

Now it’s time to look back and reflect on the movie that launched a franchise like no other. When I say Godzilla isn’t up there as an all-time favourite, I mean that I wouldn’t put the original (or any other movie bearing the name Godzilla) in my top ten favourite movies. Were I to expand the list into the top 30 and beyond, there would definitely be a couple spots filled by Godzilla. My second Favourite Films entry was Godzilla 2000, which was the first Godzilla movie I ever saw (and a little note about this CCC blog series: I have not been covering my favourite films in any particular order). I first rented Godzilla 2000 from the video store and saw it again on TV not long after, but I had heard there were more Godzilla movies, and the video store did not represent the true breadth of the series. There was the 1998 American version, which I also rented multiple times, and one other: Godzilla 1985. That one was alright, but the tape was so worn out that our VCR actually ate the tape at the end of the movie. For those too young to know how VHS works, it’s exactly like it sounds: the tape came off the spools and got tangled around the turning heads and my mom had to fish it out with a pen. I didn’t see Godzilla 1985 again until I obtained my own (working) VHS copy in the mid-2010s, over a decade later.

I was eight years old; I knew what Godzilla was, I knew I loved it, and I wanted more, but I had no idea just how many Godzilla’s were out there. Most of them were not available in North America, though. I wanted all I could get, and as far as I could tell at the video store, the 1998 American version, which just bore the title Godzilla, was about the best there was. Oh, how I was so, so wrong. When asked what I wanted for Christmas that year, I said I wanted Godzilla, meaning the ’98 film, but what I got was a VHS tape of a different, much older film I had never heard of before. Going back to Godzilla 1985 for a minute, I learned many years after the VCR tape-eating incident that the movie I had seen was an Americanized version of the original Japanese one (more commonly known as The Return of Godzilla, which had actually come out in 1984 in Japan), and the Americanized version of the 1954 original is what I ended up getting in my stocking that Christmas I asked for Godzilla.

I guess this could technically be considered two entries in my Favourite Films Series, since Godzilla, King of the Monsters! was released in 1956 and is distinct enough from the Japanese original that it can be considered a separate film. I don’t know what percentage of footage remains the same between both versions, but the biggest change is having the whole story shifted to an American character’s point of view. It's interesting to consider from a modern perspective when that kind of thing just doesn’t happen anymore—and it's probably for the best that such a tactic is now a thing of the past. In comparison, King of the Monsters! essentially pares down the same great scenes by having Raymond Burr’s character Steve Martin, a news reporter, inserted into them, providing expository commentary for the audience. The matching of new footage to old is, admittedly, quite impressive, and as a kid, I had no clue body doubles had been used and all the new footage had been shot in just a matter of days.

Looking back, I’m glad I saw King of the Monsters! first when I was so young, because even though it waters down the Japanese version and makes it into more of what I now think of as a typical B-monster movie, it still maintains some of the dark tone and many of the haunting visuals. I didn’t mind that it was black-and-white, because it actually gave it more of a horror movie look and feel. The narration from Burr, plus his interactions with the Japanese characters, helped orient me in the story, and when Godzilla attacked Tokyo in the devastating centrepiece of the film (which remains consistent across both versions), his stressed, sweating reportage helped sell how real it all felt. Sure, some of the visual effects tricks were easy to figure out even as a kid, but I remember feeling an undeniable sense of dread in the buildup to Godzilla making landfall, and those shots of his large, staring eyes as he mercilessly tore the city apart and set it ablaze freaked me out and fascinated me in equal measure. A big part of that dread and excitement is also a byproduct of the score by Akira Ifukube.

I still enjoy the Americanized version, mainly for nostalgic reasons, but when I finally saw the original uncut Japanese version with English subtitles over a decade later, I realized what I had really been missing. It starts with only the heavy, booming footsteps of the unseen monster, the Japanese title scrolling up into the middle of the screen, then Godzilla’s uniquely chilling roar rips through the speakers, and we get the iconic “Godzilla March” music. Even though Godzilla, King of the Monsters! has a pretty similar opening with the title superimposed over a shot of the ocean (done up in a cheesy monster movie font), it doesn’t build the same kind of suspense with music and simplistic titles before opening on the ship at sea that gets hit with Godzilla’s radiation. From here, the steady build up to Godzilla’s reveal is grim, convincing, and remorseless.

King of the Monsters! transposes most of the original into a flashback narrative, which is done in an acceptable way, though doesn’t exactly enhance the story. To be clear, it’s not as if my favourite shots or favourite music queues are lost between the two versions, but the Japanese version is obviously the one the original creative team intended for all audiences to see, and it is more overtly an anti-nuclear cautionary tale. Many fans (including longtime/lifetime fans) declared Godzilla Minus One the best Godzilla movie of all-time, and I think those fans felt justified when it won that Oscar, which is fair enough. Everyone is entitled to their opinion. I am of the other less-but-still-popular opinion that Godzilla Minus One is the best Godzilla movie since the original, but not better. My reasoning is Godzilla (1954) does three things more perfectly than any other Godzilla movie in the franchise’s seventy-year history:

1) It gets the story right. This is a post-WWII-Japan that has never seen the likes of a giant, radioactive creature pulled out of prehistory and revived for the atomic age, and the way it begins as a mystery to be revealed before shifting into a full-on horror-disaster, and finally drawing to a tragic, haunting conclusion, is expertly done. It is paced perfectly, it is streamlined to such a fine point it directly hits the target of what it is trying to do and say, and there really is nothing that doesn’t work in terms of the story structure.

2) It gets the characters right. One major strength the original has over the Americanized version is the development of four characters in particular: Ogata, Emiko, Dr. Serizawa, and Emiko’s father, Dr. Yamane. In King of the Monsters!, the dynamics between them are stripped down to make room for Raymond Burr and connections are forced between him and Emiko/Serizawa. In the original, the four of them are at the center of the story, and two of them are men of science. Dr. Yamane is fascinated with Godzilla, and laments the beast’s necessary destruction, but then Dr. Serizawa is a tortured soul because he invented the Oxygen Destroyer (like Godzilla himself, this device is also something of a metaphor for the nuclear bomb) but he comes to realize he must use it to destroy the greatest threat Japan has ever faced. Ogata complicates Serizawa’s relationship with Emiko, and all of these characters are at the center of the story. It’s not Godzilla’s movie. He is the catalyst for all of these characters to go through conflicts, trials and tribulations, changes, and sacrifices.

3) It gets the tone right. No other Godzilla movie, no matter how creative the story might be, or how endearing the characters may be (rare), or how serious it may take itself (rarer), has duplicated the pitch perfect tone of the black-and-white original. I saw Godzilla, King of the Monsters! at a time when I did not realize the Godzilla series was primarily known for goofy monster battles and effects that often looked fake. All I had to go off was that one time Godzilla fought a space monster (2000), that other time he was defeated by getting knocked into a volcano (1985), and the time the more lizard-like one attacked New York City (1998 American version). Even to this day, the handful of Godzilla films I would deem “serious” have not duplicated or superseded the 1954 film’s unfaltering commitment to making something conceptually outlandish seem as believably scary as possible even with effects that are not always completely convincing. By comparison, even the movies that have tried to nail the campy, fun tone, like Godzilla: Final Wars or King Kong vs. Godzilla, did not nail their respective tones as well as Godzilla 1954 did.

I don’t think I need to reiterate what has been reiterated countless times about the metaphor Godzilla represents for nuclear fears and the lasting impact it has had on not just monster movies but Japanese cinema and the sci-fi/horror genre as a whole. What my intention for my Favourite Films Series has always been is to give my own perspective on films I consider favourites and provide something that hasn’t been said a thousand times. It’s more difficult with films like this that are so well known and have been around for so long, but what I find fascinating is to look back on my time as a Godzilla fan, from the earliest days right up to today, and see how my real love for this character was born out of watching the original (both versions). For all the hilarious, joyful, and stupefying versus films Godzilla has been in, the grittier, more meaningful films are why the character endures. I think that’s the reason Godzilla Minus One really resonated with people, because like the original, it is what Godzilla has always really been about: the way people face a singular giant monster—something so large and terrifying it defies comprehension—and the way they rise up to survive, no matter the cost. 

 

Related: Godzilla in Hollywood http://cccmovies.blogspot.com/2024/03/godzilla-in-hollywood-part-1.html