Motion Pictures: Hollywood's Creative Bankruptcy.

As a child of the 1980’s, I remember when Hollywood films were mainly original creations. Today, audiences are treated to a number of movies based on comic books, video games, and old television shows. While filmmakers have always used other sources for inspiration, this practice is more commonly used today than ever before. The same can be said of remakes. Up until about 10 years ago, remakes were fairly scarce productions made several decades after the original films. For instance, the 1983 version of “Scarface” was a remake of a 1932 film, and the first remake of “King Kong” (1933) was released 43 years later. Presently, a total of 50 remakes are in some form of production. Many of them are based on 1980’s action classics such as “Robocop”, “Lethal Weapon” and “Commando”. So how exactly did original ideas become such a rarity in Hollywood? I have no idea. But I do know that even the highest-grossing movie of all time, “Avatar”, is basically a re-skinned “Dances with Wolves”.

The “reboot” is also another form of recycled material. According to the freedictionary.com, the term means to restart. That’s exactly what Sony Pictures is doing with the live-action version of Marvel Comics’ “Spider-Man”. In 2002, the company released the first big-screen incarnation with Tobey Maguire as the titular character. Two sequels (and a decade) later, the studio is releasing “The Amazing Spider-Man” which tells the origins of Peter Parker’s superpowers. That’s the same scenario depicted in the ’02 film. Why is there a need for this? Undoubtedly, it is because Hollywood has entered into a period of creative bankruptcy. Need proof? The classic board game “Battleship” will be released this summer as a big-budget sci-fi flick from Universal. That’s right, a board game for inspiration. Oh, and the movie version will feature aliens invading earth for good measure. I rest my case. Oh well. At least there's plenty of quality television shows nowadays.