THIS Is Why You Do Movie Remakes

A few weeks ago, after seeing the movie "In The Heights" I made the comment on Facebook that seeing a great musical such as this had really put me in the mood and anxious to see the new version of "West Side Story" from director Steven Spielberg that will be released later this year. 

Well, as you might expect, this produced a whole bunch of comments along the lines of "I'll NEVER go see a remake of such a classic movie" or "Why are they doing this?" or "How can someone even THINK of tampering with such a classic?"  It was almost as if someone was painting a Groucho Marx mustache on the Mona Lisa.

I have written on the topic of movie remakes many times, most notably HERE and and on West Side Story specifically in this past post so I will not go chapter and verse today, but let me recount one incident from my vacation last week that brought home yet another reason WHY it is not necessarily a mortal sin to remake a classic movie.

In discussing "In The Heights" with our nieces Jennifer and Jill, both of whom are in the neighborhood of fifty years of age, and Jen's son Zach, 25, who is living in Los Angeles and working on a behind the cameras career in the film industry, Marilyn and I brought up Spielberg's upcoming "West Side Story."  None of them, it turns out, had ever seen the 1961 Academy Award winning "West Side Story"!  Oh, they know the story and many of the songs, but they had never seen this classic film, but they are planning on seeing the new version of this movie.

So there you have it.  A remake of a classic film exposes new generations of viewers to a classic piece, not only of American filmmaking, but of American theater.  And at our urging, each of them said that the release of this version will prompt them, either before or after, to see the 1961 version.  That alone is a good reason to remake a Classic.  Of course, the new version of such a film needs to be well done and of high quality, too, and with Spielberg and screenwriter Tony Kushner working with such quality source material, who can doubt that 2021's "West Side Story" will be of high quality?

Those who dismiss it out of hand and refuse to see it, could be depriving themselves of a wonderful experience.

Old Movie Time - "The Lady Vanishes" (1979)

Back on March 7, you may recall, I wrote about how I was prompted to watch Alfred Hitchcock's 1938 spy thriller "The Lady Vanishes."  If you don't remember, then allow me to refresh your memory:

https://grandstander.blogspot.com/2020/03/old-movie-time-lady-vanishes-1938.html

Anyway, when searching out information to write about the movie, I learned that "The Lady Vanishes" has been remade a couple of times. In 2013, it was done as a made for TV movie in Great Britain, but the version that interested me was another British version that was made in 1979.  I was able to find it on Amazon Prime, and last night I watched it.

This version was made by a British director named Anthony Page and it starred Cybill Shepherd, Elliott Gould, and Angela Lansbury as the three leads.  I have confessed on these pages that I had a major crush on Cybill Shepherd since my college days.  I still do have that crush, although it is not a "major" as it was back in those days (and yes, my wife is well aware of this).  So I was predisposed to like this one, and I did.  In this version, Shepherd is a "madcap American heiress" and Gould is an American photographer for LIFE Magazine, and Lansbury is the Lady that Vanishes, but other than that, this story pretty much follows the Hitchcock original almost scene for scene.  It included the straight from central casting Brit characters of Caldicott and Charters, and in an a "who-is-that-guy?" moment, the character of Dr. Hartz was played by Herbert Lom, the guy who played Chief Inspector Dreyfuss in all of the Peter Sellers Pink Panther movies.  I won't restate the plot here; you can check that out in the linked article above.

Miss Shepherd certainly not disappoint.  She played the entire movie on a full length, backless gown that was at times breathtaking.   

She was 29 years old at the time this was made, and she was indeed beautiful.  And she did an excellent job playing "madcap."   Miss Shepherd will never be confused with Meryl Streep, but she pulled off this role with some comic timing that was pretty damn good.

Of course, a movie like this brings up the always controversial topic of Remakes of Movies, especially a remake of a "Classic Alfred Hitchcock" film, no less.  Just yesterday, I wrote of how a 2009 remake of the 1974 thriller "The Taking of Pelham One Two Three" was an abomination.  1979's "The Lady Vanishes" is certainly not that.  It is a bit frothier than the original, and it is in color, not black and white (which my friend Dan will appreciate), but it is fast paced and entertaining, and it might serve another important purpose: It might prompt the viewer to seek out and watch the Hitchcock original, and that is never a bad thing.

So, all in all, I rate this at Two and One-half Stars on The Grandstander's always reliable scale.