The 35 greatest movie remakes (that are better than the original)
Jul. 10, 2024These movies prove the virtue of a redo
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It’s a popular belief that most cinematic remakes pale in comparison to the original. But is thatalwaysthe case? Sometimes, and more often than you think, the remake actually ends up better than the original.
The history of cinematic remakes starts around the beginning of cinema itself; maybe it’s proof that maybe filmmakers havealwaysbeen starved of ideas. In 1896, legendary French director Georges Méliès directed the 67-second long film Playing Cards, a movie that “remade” a similar film titled The Messers from Louis Lumière. Both movies have the same “plot” of men sitting around tables playing cards.
With more than a century’s worth of movies, there are absolutely stories that heavily benefitted from a second chance. Here are 35 movie remakes that are actually better than the original.
32. The Parent Trap (1998)
It was a movie so good that many admit to believing Lindsay Lohan was twin sisters. In 1998, Nancy Meyers made her directing debut with an updated version of the 1961 original (both produced and released byDisney), both sourcing from the 1949 German novel Lisa and Lottie. In addition to Lohan shouldering the movie’s burdens (seriously, try playing your own twin, with a British accent!), the movie also starred Dennis Quaid, Natasha Richardson, Elaine Hendrix, and Lisa Ann Walter, all of whom bring colorful energy to the movie’s laid back atmosphere. The ‘61 original is cute, but the ‘98 version feels like home.
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It may surprise many to learn that Fatal Attraction, a late 1980s classic that kicked off the erotic thriller boom in Hollywood, is actually a remake. In a nutshell: Screenwriter James Dearden first wrote the story and turned it into his 1980 short film Diversion, which aired on British TV. Years later, the concept was retooled into Fatal Attraction, a bigger-budget production made for theaters with director Adrian Lyne. Today Fatal Attraction is rightfully considered a modern classic, emblematic of a time when mainstream movies weren’t afraid to get dirty. But its origins as a remake proves that some stories just need a second chance, and on a bigger screen.
Remakes aren’t a 21st century invention. Even in the 1950s, Hollywood filmmakers were taking inspiration from foreign cinema and making classics in their own right. In 1959, Billy Wilder crafted his now timeless and celebrated comedy Some Like It Hot, in which Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon co-star with bombshell Marilyn Monroe in a story about musicians who disguise themselves as women and join a traveling troupe to escape the mafia. The movie’s origins lie in the 1935 French film Fanfare of Love, with Betty Stockfeld as the Monroe analogue. Some Like It Hot is considered one of the greatest movies of all time with preservation in the National Film Registry, but that it’s a remake of a different movie simply means nobody’s perfect.
Prolific American director Cecil B. DeMille returned to the religious well at least twice throughout his career. In 1923, he helmed the silent film epic The Ten Commandments, which at the time was one of the most sophisticated film productions in history. A little over 30 years later, DeMille pushed the technical envelope even further with a second movie entitled The Ten Commandments, itself loosely remaking and elaborating on his previous film’s prologue. The ‘56 classic functions as a biopic of Moses (Charlton Heston) and his tumultuous relationship with his adoptive brother, Egyptian pharaoh Ramses (Yul Brynner) as Moses leads his fellow enslaved Hebrews out of Egypt. Still one of the most successful movies of all time, The Ten Commandments set a new standard for Hollywood filmmaking, and absolutely eclipses DeMille’s own previous effort.
Brian De Palma’s 20th century American classic famously stars Al Pacino as a Cuban refugee who rises to power in the Miami underworld. A similar story was told in the 1932 film version Scarface, with Miami and Cubanos swapped for an ambitious Italian immigrant (played by Paul Muni) who navigates 1920s Chicago. Both films source from Armitage Trail’s 1930 novel; while the ‘32 film version hews closer to the book, De Palma’s version has played an incredible influence in modern popular culture. Some of its most vocal fans are often hip-hop artists, who fetishize Scarface’s rags-to-riches success in the face of dangerous adversity.
The influential screwball comedy, directed by Howard Hawks and starring Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell, is in fact a remake of a different 1931 film titled The Front Page. (Both are adaptations of the play by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur.) But His Girl Friday is a giant, arguably the prototypical American comedy that gave rise to the term “Girl Friday” to mean a devoted and trusted (and usually female) assistant. In 1974, a more faithful remake of The Front Page came from filmmaking legend Billy Wilder, with Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau in the lead roles. Despite its star power, it still couldn’t hold a candle to Hawks’ immortal version.
Taking inspiration from a 1937 Hungarian play and the 1940 classic The Shop Around the Corner, Nora Ephron oversaw a lovely turn-of-the-century update that is the 1998 rom-com You’ve Got Mail. Firmly set in its contemporary setting - at the height of the dot-com bubble, and the nascent rise of bookstore giants like Barnes & Noble - Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan play rivals in the publishing world who, unbeknownst to them, are actually smitten with each other via anonymous emails on AOL. As bright as a summer walk in the park and cozy as a knit blanket in winter, You’ve Got Mail has it all. Even with its dated technology, it feels far more timeless than its predecessor.
If you want to get technical, The Man Who Knew Too Much from 1956 is not really a remake. Both the 1934 original and the more popular ‘56 version were directed by Alfred Hitchcock. Though they bear the same title and a similar story - a traveling couple on vacation get involved in an international conspiracy after their children are kidnapped - they each differ in plot, characters, and overall execution. For most people, the ‘56 version is superior to the original, with more star power and a more experienced Hitchcock applying refined craft behind the camera. If you were to ask Hitchcock himself, which French filmmaker François Truffaut did for his 1966 book, Hitchcock quipped: “Let’s say the first version is the work of a talented amateur and the second made by a professional.”
One of the most beloved Hollywood hits of the 1990s is, in fact, a remake of a French movie. La Totale!, released in 1991, tells of a family man who works as a secret agent and uses his professional skills to track his family - a decision that leads to unexpected consequences. A few short years later in 1994, James Cameron and Arnold Schwarzenegger teamed up for True Lies, an exciting but upbeat remake that reframes the family man (Schwarzenegger) as a U.S. government agent who struggles in his work/life balance. At the time one of the most expensive Hollywood movies ever made, True Lies is now remembered as one of the finest films of its era, and especially in Schwarzenegger’s career.
It’s admittedly hard not to laugh at a premise like The Blob. It’s pink alien gelatin that slowly devours an entire small town. Like, how hard is it to run away from? But while the original 1958 movie with Steve McQueen is goofy in all its B-movie glory, the 1988 remake from director Chuck Russell and starring Kevin Dillon is comparatively more insightful and striking. Featuring all the touches of its halcyon ’80s era and prescient allusions to government conspiracy theories, The Blob ‘88 is far more than its flabby, shapeless appearances let on.
A few years after helming the Johnny Cash biopic Walk the Line, director James Mangold stuck around the aesthetics of cowboys and tough guys for his remake of the 1957 classic Western 3:10 to Yuma. An improvement over the original in every way, Mangold’s movie carries the director’s assured and handsome direction, along with sterling performances from Russell Crowe and Christian Bale, with Bale taking on the dangerous job of escorting an outlaw (Crowe) to justice. 10 years later, Mangold revisited a different version of the same story, one that uses Hugh Jackman’s popular X-Men character Wolverine in the R-rated Western-inspired epic Logan.
You just can’t beat a collaboration like Tony Scott and Denzel Washington. Based on the 1980 novel by A.J. Quinnell, Man on Fire was first a different movie from 1987 with Scott Glenn in the lead role. Tony Scott had hoped to direct the film that first time, but with only one movie under his belt at the time - 1983’s The Hunger - he was deemed too inexperienced to take on the job. After years passed and the opportunity to adapt the book again came his way, Scott seized the chance and delivered a bonafide action classic of the new millennium. Sometimes, patience really is a virtue.
The original 1958 version of The Fly is a strange and grotesque movie, especially for its time. But what the story really needed was David Cronenberg. In 1986, the iconoclast horror filmmaker renowned for his fetish for body horror made his mainstream, big budget debut with The Fly, a remake of the ‘58 film. With Jeff Goldblum in the lead role, The Fly tells of a scientist who slowly turns into a half man, half fly creature. That’s a premise just begging for Cronenberg, and indeed Cronenberg’s movie is the only version worth watching.
Driven by Paramount’s success with The Ten Commandments, rival studio MGM moved forward with a new adaptation of Ben-Hur, some 25 years after the release of the original 1925 silent film version. (Even back then, studios were keen to rely on pretty much whatever worked before.) With the hiring of Charlton Heston to play the title role of Judah Ben-Hur, MGM strove to siphon some of The Ten Commandments’ unstoppable power, surrounding Heston with even more elaborate sets. The movie’s standout chariot race scene, which cost the studio millions in 1959 currency, has become the stuff of cinema legend in its own right.
Can Hollywood smell box office success? Perhaps only a few did in 1992, when Martin Brest helmed a remake of the 1974 Italian drama Profumo di donna, itself based on a story by Giovanni Arpino. Both the Italian and American versions tell of a retired military veteran who enlists the help of a younger man to assist him. The American version pairs Al Pacino with Chris O’Donnell, and it’s heartwarming and heart-wrenching in its tale of two men on completely opposite paths in life learning to better understand themselves. The movie was nominated for many Oscars, with Pacino actually winning Best Actor at the 65th Academy Awards.
David Lynch’s Dune, an adaptation of Frank Herbert’s seminal sci-fi novel, is something of an ambitious misfire. It has vision, it’s just not all put together in the way it maybe should be. Enter: Denis Villeneuve’s Dune duology, which amplifies Herbert’s political science fiction saga into a sand-blasted military thriller about the dangers of messianic revolutions. An all-star cast, led by Timothee Chalamet, brings to life Herbert’s story with maximum impact. Villeneuve, too, further flexes his might as a modern auteur who captures the awe of Arrakis with stately direction.
Whenever someone bemoans the sorry state of Hollywood and its insistence on remakes, remind them that some of the greatest movies ever made were adaptations and remakes. Case in point: The ultimate fantasy adventure, The Wizard of Oz starring Judy Garland and directed by Victor Fleming, is in fact the second adaptation of L. Frank Baum’s story. It was preceded by a silent film version in 1925, which dramatically altered the story and bears little resemblance to The Wizard of Oz that audiences are familiar with. Being a silent movie too, it cannot have a showstopper like “Over the Rainbow.”
A defining piece of 1980s horror and one of the best movies ever directed by John Carpenter, The Thing traces its origins back to the 1938 novella by John W. Campbell Jr. and the significantly less inspiring 1951 movie The Thing from Another World. Carpenter’s version brings the movie from snowy Alaska to ice-capped Antarctica, with a research facility torn apart by a shapeshifting alien parasite. A true milestone for horror filmmaking, Carpenter’s movie overcame middling reviews and a frosty box office to wind up a seminal American classic that’s influenced countless other artists everywhere.
Eric Francisco is a freelance entertainment journalist and graduate of Rutgers University. If a movie or TV show has superheroes, spaceships, kung fu, or John Cena, he’s your guy to make sense of it. A former senior writer at Inverse, his byline has also appeared at Vulture, The Daily Beast, Observer, and The Mary Sue. You can find him screaming at Devils hockey games or dodging enemy fire in Call of Duty: Warzone.
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