When they do remakes/sequels/...
When they do remakes/sequels/... but then don't do them the way they used to... why are they doing that? Mostly every time a new team takes over, either because of the time that has passed or because someone died.
Some examples:
Music:
1. Live Free or Die Hard. Michael Kamen, the original composer of the first three moves, had died, so Marco Beltrami took his job. And all the cleverness was gone. Kamen always incorporated a classical music piece (Beethoven's 9th in the first, for example) and other stuff (like Singin' in the Rain or various Christmas songs) into the score for the Die Hard movies. And the scores had this typical leitmotif of frequently blasting horns (most prominently when Hans Gruber fell to his death).
Beltrami ignored all of that. He used ONE motif, the four note theme for John McClane, but that was it.
Same thing (again Beltrami) in Terminator 3. He TOTALLY ignored Brad Fiedel's score for the first two movies. Used his own (inferior, imo) theme instead.
2. The A-Team. Alan Silvestri is a fantastic composer, but his score for the A-Team is wrong (of course that's my opinion). The opening theme is only played in full glory in the end credits, and during the actual movie he uses his own themes. And his style is vastly different from the TV show's style (and I think the movie could have used that style).
3. Star Trek. Again, the theme is only in the End Credits, and doesn't appear in the movie AT ALL.
Cinematography:
1. Live Free or Die Hard. All three movies before it shared the same color palette of reds and blues, saturated with strong contrasts. Which is interesting because McClane is a cop and red and blue is an association to that. Yet the fourth movie, directed by Len Wiseman and DoP Simon Duggan (both involved in Underworld: Evolution) gave their movie a green-ish Matrix/Underworld style tint and made it dark, desaturated, less contrast. It totally runs against the style of what came before.
2. And example how you should do it: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. The original DoP died, but Spielberg and his DoP from War of the Worlds and Minority Report went great lengths to emulate that style. And in my opinion, they succeeded, giving Indy 4 a look and feel consistent with the other 3 movies.
Story:
1. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. ALIENS?! Seriously? Why, oh why. The first three had mysterious, religion related, yet still Earth bound myths and magic. Ghosts from the Ark, magical stones, eternal life by drinking from the Holy Grail. But in the 4th movie they had to go science fiction, with aliens, Area 51 and nuclear bombs. It totally didn't fit into it, imo. And they also reduced the amount of violence. The first three had a good solid amount of shooting and punching and gore and death. Almost non existant in the 4th one, and so some of the exitement was lost.
2. [ran out of time]
I could cite a lot more movies now, but I don't want to waste too much time one this, and you should have gotten my point by now.
My question is: why are they doing that? Is it the ego? Is the ego of creative people so strong that they simply can't step back and try to emulate someone else's work (for the sake of the art they are trying to make). I'm wondering about that especially with artists like Beltrami.
It's like doing a late follow up to the Mona Lisa (or any artwork, I don't mean to compare the quality of the movies/franchises I listed to the quality of the Mona Lisa), but the artist is actually an abstract expressionist and doesn't want to paint like DaVinci did (or he can't even do it). So the end product looks nothing like it, but he still calls it Mona Lisa 2. Why?
Why is it that people feel the need to do sequels but then also feel that urge to put their own stamp on it, "ruining" (in my opinion) that sequel because it doesn't fit into the rest of the series or franchise?
When they do remakes/sequels/... but then don't do them the way they used to... why are they doing that? Mostly every time a new team takes over, either because of the time that has passed or because someone died.
Some examples:
Music:
1. Live Free or Die Hard. Michael Kamen, the original composer of the first three moves, had died, so Marco Beltrami took his job. And all the cleverness was gone. Kamen always incorporated a classical music piece (Beethoven's 9th in the first, for example) and other stuff (like Singin' in the Rain or various Christmas songs) into the score for the Die Hard movies. And the scores had this typical leitmotif of frequently blasting horns (most prominently when Hans Gruber fell to his death).
Beltrami ignored all of that. He used ONE motif, the four note theme for John McClane, but that was it.
Same thing (again Beltrami) in Terminator 3. He TOTALLY ignored Brad Fiedel's score for the first two movies. Used his own (inferior, imo) theme instead.
2. The A-Team. Alan Silvestri is a fantastic composer, but his score for the A-Team is wrong (of course that's my opinion). The opening theme is only played in full glory in the end credits, and during the actual movie he uses his own themes. And his style is vastly different from the TV show's style (and I think the movie could have used that style).
3. Star Trek. Again, the theme is only in the End Credits, and doesn't appear in the movie AT ALL.
Cinematography:
1. Live Free or Die Hard. All three movies before it shared the same color palette of reds and blues, saturated with strong contrasts. Which is interesting because McClane is a cop and red and blue is an association to that. Yet the fourth movie, directed by Len Wiseman and DoP Simon Duggan (both involved in Underworld: Evolution) gave their movie a green-ish Matrix/Underworld style tint and made it dark, desaturated, less contrast. It totally runs against the style of what came before.
2. And example how you should do it: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. The original DoP died, but Spielberg and his DoP from War of the Worlds and Minority Report went great lengths to emulate that style. And in my opinion, they succeeded, giving Indy 4 a look and feel consistent with the other 3 movies.
Story:
1. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. ALIENS?! Seriously? Why, oh why. The first three had mysterious, religion related, yet still Earth bound myths and magic. Ghosts from the Ark, magical stones, eternal life by drinking from the Holy Grail. But in the 4th movie they had to go science fiction, with aliens, Area 51 and nuclear bombs. It totally didn't fit into it, imo. And they also reduced the amount of violence. The first three had a good solid amount of shooting and punching and gore and death. Almost non existant in the 4th one, and so some of the exitement was lost.
2. [ran out of time]
I could cite a lot more movies now, but I don't want to waste too much time one this, and you should have gotten my point by now.
My question is: why are they doing that? Is it the ego? Is the ego of creative people so strong that they simply can't step back and try to emulate someone else's work (for the sake of the art they are trying to make). I'm wondering about that especially with artists like Beltrami.
It's like doing a late follow up to the Mona Lisa (or any artwork, I don't mean to compare the quality of the movies/franchises I listed to the quality of the Mona Lisa), but the artist is actually an abstract expressionist and doesn't want to paint like DaVinci did (or he can't even do it). So the end product looks nothing like it, but he still calls it Mona Lisa 2. Why?
Why is it that people feel the need to do sequels but then also feel that urge to put their own stamp on it, "ruining" (in my opinion) that sequel because it doesn't fit into the rest of the series or franchise?
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