1.Fame (MGM, 3,096 Theaters, 107 Minutes, Rated PG): Not a very good week for originality. We have a remake, what seems like it could be a remake, and a graphic novel adaptation. We will eventually come to a time when every film will be a different version of the same film, half of them starring Will Ferrell.
This is the remake of the 1980 film of the same name. I guess it still revolves around a group of kids at a performing art school.
The main characters are all unknowns, but the teaching staff appear to be a bunch of quasi-famous names, including at least one carry over from the original in Debbie Allen. So it’s got that going for it.
One of the most interesting things about this remake is that the original was rated R and this is rated PG. Have we come so far that what was an R in 1980 is now a PG in 2009? Or have they cleaned this up a little to try and appeal to the High School Musical crowd? Let me know, would you?
2. Surrogates (Touchstone, 2,951 Theaters, 88 Minutes, Rated PG-13): This would be the comic book adaptation of the bunch. It adapts the 2005 Top Shelf miniseries.
It is set in the future where humanity lives their lives through robotic duplicates. When these duplicates start becoming destroyed, a mystery develops.
This is a little deeper than your usual comic book film, dealing with the concept of identity in a digital world. Metaphor, proof that comics aren’t just for kids anymore.
How will this do at the box office? Well, who knows? The concept is good, but if Whiteout is any indication, comic book movies that the general public doesn’t know that much about don’t usually do that well.
3. Pandorum (Overture Films, 2, 506 Theaters, 108 Minutes, Rated R); Finally, we come to the one that should be a remake. Can you guess of which movie?
The crew of a space-faring ship discovers that there is an “Alien” presence aboard. They struggle to find out what it is and find a way to fight it before they are all dead.
At least that is what the ads make it out to look like. Perhaps the film doesn’t really resemble Ridley Scott’s Alien at all. I’m sure there is some kind of twist that separates the movies from each other.
What I am amazed by is that Dennis Quaid is in this. Don’t get me wrong, I love the fact that he’s getting work, but between this and G.I. Joe, it feels like he is really slumming.
