Oompa Loompas and Remakes

“Oompa, Loompa, doom-pa-dee-do. I have a perfect puzzle for you.”

A couple of days ago I finally saw the remake of Willy Wonka/Charlie & The Chocolate Factory. I was expecting the same emotions I had when I watched the original version as a young boy. I was truly disappointed. They made an excellent children’s movie into an arty-farty trippy movie.

The remake would have been awesome to watch after taking a tab of acid, coming down from a night out on ecstasy or being completely stoned on hash but I would rather let my daughter watch the old Gene Wilder version than the Johnny Depp version. Even without the help of computer animation the Oompa Loopa’s looked better, the music was better and in general the storyline was better (although adapted from the same book) in the old version.

The arty-farty people might not agree with my assessment of the remake but to me it was supposed to be a children’s story and not an art project. This made me wonder why people invest money in remaking movies and music without improving the quality.

Below are a few remakes that to me have not improved form the original version:
1) Uptown Girl by Westlife – Why the hell do you remake (more like duplicate) a song to sound exactly the same as the original? Just play the Billie Joel original I say.
2) Psycho – never touch a classic.
3) Planet of The Apes – never have one of your character to look like Michael Jackson

Some that are actually better redone:
1) The Lord of the Rings – did anyone see the animated crap they did in the 80’s?
2) The Italian Job – the original was good, the new one was awesome.
3) Emotions by Bee Gees – redone very well by Destiny’s Child.

I know there are plenty more good and bad ones but due to the lack of food in my system my brain could only muster up three each.

p/s : as usual its Friday and I’m in a good mood and listening to The Cure.