RANTS AND RAVES >> Let’s torch Hollywood and start over. ::

I’m about to do something that you will RARELY see me do on this blog — RANT.

Annnnnd RAVE now that I consider my message here. Let’s start with the rave ::

Last night, I watched a CAPTIVATING film :: Chan-wook Park’s feverish masterpiece Oldboy. I’ve wanted to see it since it’s 2004 release here in the US and finally took the opportunity to watch it. I found the film to be a truly unforgettable labyrinth of revenge, violence, longing and desire with a SEARING performance by Min-sik Choi. Truly, his Herculean turn as Oh Dae-su was a triumph of honesty and not only pushes the limits of the art, it restores my faith in the power of acting. Just a tour de force. The film is closely tied to a series of graphic novels created by Garon Tsuchiya and Nobuaki Minegishi and it retains the grit of the series. Oldboy also ranks in at #117 on IMDB’s list of the top 250 films.

Though I’m showing the American trailer here (for clarity at a glance), the film should be watched in the original Korean with subtitles to get the full emotion and rhythm of the performances. No question.
 

After viewing the film, I went online to read a bit more about it. The result of my searches leads me to the RANT portion of this post. Again, you will rarely see me rant on this blog, but this was so eggregiously bad that I felt compelled to.

Apparently, Steven Spielberg has recruited Will Smith to try and put together a remake for the American audience. This is pretty much the worst situation imaginable for this work. Why?

Let’s start with the premise of telling this story again. Why does Hollywood keep doing this? There are SO many ideas out there, amazing tales yet to be told or told well and the Hollywood machine keeps churning out sub-par remakes of truly interesting work. I KNOW we are more ingenious as Americans and as the former leaders in thought-provoking cinema than to keep flailing around in this creative sewer. 

Let’s also address the players involved. Need we discuss the vacuum that has been Speilberg’s career since the early 90’s (and I’m being generous)? He had some early classic work, but lately, come ON. And what about Mr. Smith’s career? OY! Even if we decide that it makes sense to tell the Oldboy story again (which it does NOT), for me, Smith’s career as a whole does not even remotely point to the fact that he would be up to the task here. Have we forgotten what he’s done? Hitch? Men in Black? How about Independence Day, The Legend of Bagger Vance or the ever-so-brilliant Bad Boys II? Even a mild success like I am Legend was a remake. It’s really the same principle with his rap career. The formula seems to be :: find REAL work from real artists, rape it, leave it for dead, insert a few “signatures” like “WOO” and “HA-HA” and call it a day. Please!

The Oldboy story has been told and told well. Celebrate the success of that triumph. If my seven-year-old daughter kept looking at another talented student’s work and then doing a poor job of copying it, she would not only get poor grades, she would be “educated” as to why this just isn’t a good standard to live up to. If they found it inspiring, Spielberg and Smith would be better to use their money to give the original work a wider audience. They claim their version isn’t a remake and that they’re going back to the graphic novels for inspiration. However, the creators of the graphic novels were a part of the original film and received top billing as writers. Doesn’t anybody remember how HOLLOW it was when Vanilla Ice claimed that his hit Ice, Ice Baby wasn’t a remake of Queen’s great colab with Bowie, Under Pressure?

My vote is to kick all of these people out of the industry and start over. We need to hit the reset button.  

In the mean time, for those with the stomach for something raw, at times gruesomely honest, challenging and compelling, rent Oldboy. Support real art. Celebrate it. Crap belongs in one place and we know what to do with it when it’s there. It needs to be flushed.

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