April 23–30, 1998

cover story|philadelphia festival of world cinema

Flick Books

Bedside reading for insatiable cinephiles.

Play It Again, Sam: Retakes on Remakes

Edited by Andrew Horton and Stuart Y. McDougal with an afterword by Leo Braudy, University of California Press., 367 p., $50, $19.95 paper

This scholarly collection offers a new vocabulary for thinking about and discussing what has been too simplistically called the remake. If you can accept that Honey, I Blew Up the Kid is a Text, and can decode the academese (not that difficult once you get the gist of it), then you will begin to see the usefulness of more nuanced terms like "makeover," "homage" and "allusion." Highlights include an engaging essay (in the section "Remakes and Hollywood") on the subtle borrowing from Hitchcock for the "remake" of Cape Fear, and two interesting contributions on Dracula movies in the section on cross-cultural remakes. The section on cross-media remakes, "M*A*S*H Notes," goes beyond its cutesy title and delivers an informative history of the transition between the film and TV series. Other films covered include the three versions of A Star is Born, the Godfather cycle, and the two interpretations of Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Sensitive artiste James Cameron plans to film a remake of The Planet of the Apes for his next project. Uh, who says bankability is the motivation for refilming favorites?

-Scott Shrake

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