The Departed (2006)
Few would have guessed that Martin Scorsese would turn this American version of Hong Kong’s Infernal Affairs (2002) into a powder keg. Scorsese attacks the gimmicky scenario (an undercover cop poses as a thug while a dirty rat embeds himself within the police) with a live-wire intensity, making this crime drama superior to its source material and arguably the director’s best work in years.
David Fear
The Fly (1986)
The original 1958 tale of science run amok was best known for its squeaky punchline (‘Help meeee!’). David Cronenberg’s gory reimagining, however, turns an outlandish premise into another signature meditation on body horror. More amazing is the fact that the director doesn’t skimp on the love-story aspects, emphasising the doomed romance between Geena Davis’s journalist and Jeff Goldblum’s mutating creature. Long live Brundlefly!
David Fear
His Girl Friday (1940)
It boggles the mind to think that sassy Hildy Johnson – ace reporter, ‘doll-faced hick’ and, unforgettably, Rosalind Russell – wasn’t even female in the original stage and screen productions of The Front Page. Credit director Howard Hawks with the good sense to swap genders (reportedly after hearing a script girl read the Johnson part) and unwittingly bear a protofeminist classic. To luxuriate in the sexy banter between Russell and editor Cary Grant is this cinephile’s idea of absolute heaven.
Joshua Rothkopf
Imitation Of Life (1959)
Douglas Sirk’s last Hollywood film, about race and mother-daughter love, is one of his best, outshining John M. Stahl’s original weepie. The post – Brown v. Board of Education era helps: Juanita Moore’s maid bows and scrapes far less than Louise Beavers’ in the 1934 version. And life really is imitated: production on Sirk’s film started after Lana Turner and her daughter settled the Johnny Stompanato affair – weirdly reflected when the characters played by Turner and Sandra Dee fall for the same man.
Melissa Anderson
Invasion Of The Body Snatchers (1978)
As daring as remakes come, Philip Kaufman’s update of Don Siegel’s 1956 thriller is an improvement for two reasons. The first is W.D. Richter’s Pynchon-worthy script, a stinging indictment of nascent yuppiedom come to San Francisco. The second is an unparalleled cast of the decade’s most sensitive neurotics: Donald Sutherland, Brooke Adams, Jeff Goldblum, Leonard Nimoy. It’s the best horror film Woody Allen never made.
Joshua Rothkopf
The Maltese Falcon (1941)
Dashiell Hammett’s pulp novel was actually filmed twice before: once in 1931 and again, albeit falconless, in 1936 under the title Satan Met a Lady. (The femme fatale in that one? None other than the grande dame of screen bitchiness, Bette Davis.) But the third time was the charm, thanks to John Huston’s sure hand and a perfectly hard-boiled Humphrey Bogart as Sam Spade. This is the stuff that gumshoe-cinema dreams are made of.
David Fear
The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956)
Alfred Hitchcock preferred his remake of this suspenser to his own 1934 original, and with good reason. As a vacationing American couple that becomes privy to top secret information (and whose son is kidnapped in exchange for it), James Stewart and Doris Day forge an unforgettable folie à deux, a potent blend of parental hysteria and determination. Plus, Dodo’s golden pipes – singing ‘Que Sera, Sera’ and screaming in the Royal Albert Hall – provide two unforgettable moments.
Melissa Anderson
Ocean’s 11 (2001)
The original was little more than Frank Sinatra and his Rat Pack mates goofing off, turning up late and showing little care for the project. Steven Soderbergh then stepped up 31 years later and invoked the near-golden rule of remakes: you should only remake a film if it was originally a good idea that you know can be improved upon. George Clooney takes on the Sinatra role and Soderbegh’s remake is slick, coolly soundtracked, and edited with a sharpness that makes the cast look like the coolest people on earth. Even Don Cheadle’s cockney accent can’t derail it.
Matt Pomroy
A Star Is Born (1954)
For Judy Garland, George Cukor’s reprise of the 1937 original should have been A Star Is Reborn; this was her first film in four years, after MGM had given her the boot. Despite all the trims Warner Brothers demanded, nothing could curtail Judy’s staggering performance as an up-and-comer disastrously in love with an alcoholic has-been. She sings her heart out in ‘The Man That Got Away’ – far superior to ‘Evergreen’, which Barbra Streisand crooned in the stinker remake from 1976.
Melissa Anderson
The Thing (1982)
Here was the opportunity John Carpenter had long prayed for: a green light to remake his favourite film, The Thing From Another World, by his favourite director (an uncredited Howard Hawks), and with a decent budget. Driven by visionary impulses, Carpenter came up with an uncanny masterpiece, twice as paranoid as the original and as chilly as its Antarctic setting. Give credit to special-effects wizard Rob Bottin (working himself into exhaustion), whose disgusting aliens put today’s CGI to shame.
Joshua Rothkopf
