Friday, July 4, 2008

Superman



History has a way to repeat itself. A good example is Hollywood movie that is being remake every year for our pleasure. During our discussion on Monday, I think the professor mentioned someone’s blog about Superman. And it occurred to me that that Hollywood does make a Superman remake titled “Superman Returns.” Superman exists everywhere from cartoons, televisions, and movies. And every decade, there will be at least one remake of Superman that is portrayed in cartoons, or television.

It's A Bird, It's A Plane, It's Superman

At this age, who doesn’t know Superman? The most discussed character that is ever made. The question that we have to ask to ourselves is why does the studio make remakes? And why do we even bother watching it, since it’s still has the same story, Superman catching the bad guys and the world is once again save from criminals. The answer is big budget. Hollywood studios have the budget to re-create the movie with bigger special effects, music, actors, and advertisement compared to the movie back in the 70s. With new invention such as HDTV and CGI-effects, now, the audience can enjoy it with even bigger expectation. So does history repeat itself? I don’t think so. Sure the story is the same, but I think people expect different experience when they are watching Superman, that’s why people will not be bored while watching it. Some people might have the experience to re-live the moment when they watch re-makes movie to the point where they still remember the feeling of watching the old Superman.

Another reason the studio made a remake is that in many ways, it is easier to make a remake since the script is there, just need a little polish to create a remake movie. By doing that, the movie will definitely make a huge success in a box office.

In conclusion, we see that even though remakes act like history repeats itself, but I don’t think it does. As we all know, we all take parts in making history, we can still use the resources from previous material, but it will definitely are different the experiences compared with previous movie.

2 comments:

Christopher Schaberg said...

What is really fascinating about the Youtube Superman video is the way in which different iterations of Superman are mixed up and patched together—this ends up turning 'history' into somewhat of a cyclone or vortex, do you see what I mean? You could make an argument out of this treatment of history. Next time you use a Youtube clip, really *use* the material to forward your argument, don't just embed it as self-evident! Your last sentence is garbled, and I lost your meaning. Proofread!

Bernie said...

My roommate had a recent assignment for a different UWP class to write about a remake of anything from media such as songs, TV shows, and movies. Regarding comic book characters, there have been remakes of Batman and Superman movies in the past decade. Your question is, "Why do studios remake old movies?" One may interpret this literally and say, "Well, people are running out of ideas, so why not remake old movies by adding new technology and modern slang?" On the other hand, Hollywood is appealing to its older and newer fan base by re-introducing universal icons. Big budgets also play a role in these movies, but I believe the budget is mainly influenced by technology: the higher visually mesmerizing qualities in a movie, the bigger the budget.