The most remade movies of all time

Music Magpie has analyzed over 1,483 movies since 1902 to determine which ones have been remade the most, and the average time between original and remake. It turns out that the most remade movie of the last century is Scrooge, the festive favorite based on Charles Dickens’ novella, A Christmas Carol. Since the 1935 original, which starred Seymour Hicks as Ebenezer Scrooge, there have been seven remakes, with the most recent being the 2009 version with Jim Carey.

There are 13 films on the list produced by MM which have been remade five times, including Brewster’s Millions, Jungle Book and Robin Hood. Meanwhile, films of classic literature, like Jane Eyre, Great Expectations, and Oliver Twist have all seen success on the big screen, but directors seem to think they can improve on the last versions, and have remade each of them five times since the original releases.

According to the analysis, the average time between an original film and its first remake is 23 years, with this gap becoming shorter with each subsequent remake. The movie with the longest time between remakes was The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, with the original coming out in 1920 and the remake in 2005, 85 years later. Following closely behind is Dumbo, with 78 years between the 1941 original and 2019 remake, due out later this year.

Despite conventional wisdom, Hollywood is not currently at its peak when it comes to remakes. The noughties was the decade which saw the most remakes, with a total of 189, an average of 19 per year. It appears that 2005 came out on top overall, with an 33 remakes released that year, closely followed by 2004 with 30. Drama proved to be the most popular remake genre, followed by comedy, romance and horror.

According to IMDb ratings, the remakes in the conducted analysis received a score of 1.85 lower on average than their predecessor. However, this isn’t always the case. Reefer Madness saw the biggest rating increase, with the 2005 musical comedy remake earning an IMDb score of 7.1, while the 1936 original only managed a score of 3.7. At the other end of the scale, 2019’s The Upside, which stars Bryan Cranston, Kevin Hart and Nicole Kidman, takes the crown as the worst remake of the last century. The 2011 French original, The Intouchables, earned a score of 8.5, being nominated for a number of other international awards. The American remake didn’t enjoy quite the same success, being panned by critics, and receiving a score of just 3.6 on IMDb.

Anyone care to mention their favorite remakes on here? You can discover more of Music Magpie’s data here: https://www.musicmagpie.co.uk/movie-remakes/