5 movies that should never, ever be remade

Yep, Hollywood is out of ideas.

We were annoyed when Hollywood decided to reboot Star Trek. We were fuming when they remade Evil Dead, despite that Bruce Campbell cameo at the end. We wanted to kill someone when the remake of Ghostbusters with Paul Feig at the helm was announced. And now, the straw that crippled the dromedary has landed: 80s cult classic Big Trouble in Little China won’t be getting a sequel after all – it’s another sodding remake!

With seemingly nothing being sacred in Tinseltown’s pursuit of The Almighty $$$, we are frankly beginning to fear for even more of the movies we’ve loved for years. So, as if such a thing needed doing, we’ve compiled a list of movies that the remake machine should not touch with a ten-foot pole.

1. Alien

Alien is the quintessential science fiction horror flick. It’s claustrophobic, it’s filled with tension you can chew on and, thanks to Ridley Scott’s use of shadow to hide the limits of 1979 effects technology, you jump at every flicker of darkness. This is as close to perfect as a film of its type can be. Mercifully, Scott’s ongoing talk about a follow-up to Prometheus means that there’s not likely to be any rebooting of this franchise for a while.

2. Back to the Future

When the Ghostbusters reboot was announced, the second thought (after righteous indignation) was to fear for the prospects of the other 80s science fiction comedy classic. Everything about Back to the Future was of its era: the use of a Delorean for a time machine, solely to get a joke about its gull-wing doors looking like a 1950s flying saucer; the scene of Marty terrifying George as Darth Vader from the planet Vulcan; the pre-rock n roll 50s teenagers reacting to Marty’s channelling of Jimi Hendrix and Eddie Van Halen at the dance… And that’s without taking Christopher Lloyd’s deliciously OTT performance as the terminally eccentric Doc Brown into account. Hopefully, Bob Zemekis has recently poured cold water on a remake. But there’s no way, no way AT ALL that any remake could be anything but an appalling travesty compared to this. Do not even consider it. You hear me, Universal?

3. Blade Runner

Another Ridley Scott masterpiece, again mercifully remake-free. In a future dystopia, humanoid replicants run to Earth to hide from recall and detective Rick Deckard pursues them. Sounds simple enough; turns out it’s anything but. A visual and cerebral masterpiece, so far it’s been kept out of the remake loop by the possibility of a sequel. Several names have been attached, most notably Chris Nolan and Scott himself, but fortunately nothing has yet emerged. Let’s keep it that way. There’s no need for a follow-up, let alone a reboot.

4. Lilo & Stitch

Disney have recently developed a really nasty habit of remaking their classic animated films as live action. It’s been a rather mixed bag, both critically and commercially speaking. No matter how many howls of protest are directed at The House Of Mouse, they keep planning to crap on the memories of generations of children in the search of CASH. So if they announce any plans to even think about touching the greatest, least traditionally Disney, Disney movie ever made, harm will be done. The story of a little girl being raised in difficult circumstances by her big sister in Hawaii, who crosses paths with an illegal alien genetic experiment who is pretending to be a dog, what’s not to love? There’s also even less need to remake this than there is The Jungle Book, which isn’t stopping them from remaking that, admittedly. Just, seriously, don’t. There is a special place in hell reserved for Hollywood executives who like to screw with cartoons, which leads us to…

5. Who Framed Roger Rabbit

No. Don’t even think about it. Can you hear that noise? That’s Bob Hoskins turning in his grave. Unfortunately, the usually reliable site Dorkly recently mooted this as a movie with great remake potential, because CGI has come a long way or something. No.

Everybody must know this movie by now. Unfortunately I can see Hollywood’s cast list for an abomination of a remake: Seth Rogen in the lead role, Melissa McCarthy as his girlfriend/barmaid, the setting moved from late 40s LA to modern-day Silicon Valley because Roger Rabbit is now fully CGI… no, please, make it stop!

I need a beer…