Directors best and worst remake tourney (1 Viewer)

[John C. Wilson]

The Magnificent Seven

 

[Arman]

abstain

 

[george kaplan]

The Magnificent Seven and Down to Earth win.

Best:

The Maltese Falcon (1941) vs. Ben-Hur (1959)

Worst:

101 Dalmatians (1996) vs. Flubber (1997)

 

[Jim_K]

The Maltese Falcon - tough

 

[SteveGon]

The Maltese Falcon
Abstain

 

[Brook K]

The Maltese Falcon

 

[Nick Sievers]

Ben-Hur
Flubber

 

[Scott Weinberg]

B: The Maltese Falcon

W: Flubber

 

[John C. Wilson]

The Maltese Falcon
101 Dalmatians

 

[Bill J]

The Maltese Falcon

 

[george kaplan]

The Maltese Falcon and Flubber win.

Which brings us to our finals:

Best:

The Maltese Falcon (1941) vs. The Magnificent Seven (1960)

Worst:

Flubber (1997) vs. Down to Earth (2001)

 

[SteveGon]

The Maltese Falcon
Abstain

 

[Nick Sievers]

The Maltese Falcon
Down to Earth

George, looking at your last 5 watched i'm interested to hear what you thought of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.

 

[Lew Crippen]

The Maltese Falcon

 

[Bill J]

The Maltese Falcon

 

[Jim_K]

MF

 

[george kaplan]

 

[Scott Weinberg]

B: The Magnificent Seven

W: Down to Earth

 

[george kaplan]

No, I was paying very close attention. For One hundred and eighteen agonizing minutes. Just because I disagree with your assessment of the film, doesn't mean that I wasn't paying attention. :rolleyes

I think Henry that perhaps you are the one who wasn't paying attention when I wrote

 

[george kaplan]

Henry,

Let me explain my philosophy about film aesthetic to you briefly. Deep meaning and symbolism are great in films. Social and political commentary is nice. But if the story in which that is embedded isn't interesting to watch (and I found the story to be completely stupid), then who cares.

For me, a movie with a great story that also has more (e.g., great symbolism), is like your favorite food prepared with spices to taste better than it ever has before. A movie with great symbolism or really meaningful profound statements about life, but without a great story, is like a plate full of salt and pepper.

You may not realize this, but the Wizard of Oz is actually a very interesting allegory about the gold vs. silver standard (as well as many other political aspects of the time it was written). But without a great surface story, you'd be left with either a dry commentary about those things, or even worse, a boring story that left you unmotivated to find those things.

P.S. I personally think that classic Doonesbury (70s) did what this movie was trying to do much, much better - Doonsebury took the Duke character and made great social and political commentary in an ENTERTAINING and FUNNY way. This movie made social and political commentary in a BORING and UNENTERTAINING way. At least for me. Of course Trudeau had the advantage of not trying to tell Hunter's own story - I've always found his writing itself to be as stupid as this movie, although his character as satarized by Trudeau is hilarious.