As a child of the 80′s you can imagine how gut wrenchingly, vomit inducing, wall poundingly frustrated I was to read this morning that not only were ‘sources’ talking of remaking Back to the Future, but that the roll was going to be offered to Justin Bieber.
We just had to put up with a nine year old Karate Kid, a 100 year old Indiana Jones, Clash of CGI Titans and Rambo the Undying, not mention the films that are just around the corner. Tron, Conan the Barbarian, Meatballs, Short Circuit, Footloose, The Thing and The Dark Crystal are all lined up for sequeals or remakes (or Prequeals in the case of The Thing). This is not mentioned the often rumoured, but likely to never get off the ground films Ghostbusters 3, Goonies 2 and Gremlins 3.
So what is the obsession with 80s cinema, why do the studio bosses insist on looking back on to the past for future projects? Maybe because a lot of people in high positions were a product of the 80′s themselves. They remember how much fun they had as a kid sneaking into a screening of the latest brat pack flick and they want replicate that magic (both of their childhood and at the box office). Remakes and squeals offer up a brand that people know, it allows for studio commissioners it to understand an idea without reading it. “If it was successful before, it will be again. I don’t need to see a script. Just plug $100 million dollars into it… and make it 3D.” This, I believe are the words utter by many studio boss.
Give it a few more years and the 90′s will be up. We will see remakes of The Matrix, Thelma and Louise, Babe and the Full Monty… although maybe that wave is already coming in! We have just had Toy Story 3 and Clerks 2, while Scream 4 and Titanic 2 are just around the corner.
But back to Back to the Future, it appears, at least for now, that some of my childhood memories are safe. The Bieber story comes from the the Examiner, hardly a cornerstone of journalism integrity, and quotes unnamed studio execs and references British tabloids, none of which actually appear to be running the story.
and 
already out there and Battleships, Monopoly and Rock ‘em Sock ‘em robots on the way, the race to find the next toy property is on.
are in final negotiations to write and direct the Lego movie. Although there is no word on the plot it will be a mix of live action and CGI much like the upcoming Smurfs movie.
, it might have some funny moments, but as for heart, character development and plot — those pieces might be missing… or lost down the back of the sofa.
, Family Fun-House, the 
, the 
and another 
, and now after over 70 years since Charles Addams original dark vision of the 
first graced the pages of New Yorker it is head back the Big Screen as a stop-motion picture.
was an excellent book about turn of the century stage magician Charles Carter, although a fictionalised account of his life it does capture the golden age of magic as technology was making huge leaps forward. Oh, you say, so it is like Christopher Nolan’s 
then. Well there are some similarities, which might explain why Carter Beats the Devil has struggled to get off the ground since Tom Cruise left the project back in 2002.
(BBC1)
(E4)
