Today I’m going to mindlessly bitch about a topic that makes me nervous every time I think about it: American remakes of awesome foreign films. I want to rant about why it’s wrong, why it doesn’t work, and why it’s wronger than it was three seconds ago when I first typed that it was wrong. To do that, I feel I must use a hypothetical example that ALMOST happened, but the idea has since descended into Production Hell, where it deserves to stay for eternity.
And yes, it involves Battle Royale. Fuck you, bitch.
A few years ago, an idea was started in Hollywood to remake the epic Japanese (because everything epic is Japanese) action/psychological horror film Battle Royale. It was eventually scrapped because of the Virginia Tech shootings and it was considered insensitive. The very idea of Battle Royale being Americanized is fucking scary and downright disturbing.
Battle Royale, if you’re a poor enough soul to have not seen it, is basically about Japan in a futuristic Militaristic Totalitarian state where once a year, one class is chosen to be kidnapped, taken to this remote location, given weapons, and told to kill each other in 3 days. They are tagged with explosives so they cannot escape, and if there is more than one survivor after 3 days, the explosives go off and no one survives.
Immediately, can’t you think of ninety thousand ways Americans would fuck up this film? Well, maybe you’re not a total nerd like I am, but I certainly can, and most of them don’t even have to do with the plot itself, although the first and most obvious thing that comes to mind is the fact that the plot will be ‘cleaned up’ and ‘dumbed down’ for the American audience. Hell, Battle Royale isn’t even distributed in the US, and my DVD copy is an import with crappy subtitles. The Japanese didn’t hesitate to spill the blood and make it good and gross. Americanized Battle Royale would be a lot more visual effects and a lot more fluff.
Another thing about the real Battle Royale I adore is the relationships between the students. ALL of the students. In the movie, you could really feel they were a class. Each one of the characters, even the very minor ones, had backstories within themselves and with others. What American movies do a lot is they focus so much on the main characters the minor characters have NO development. And also, everything is so damn clique-ish. In BR they purposefully created a sense of unity within the class in some aspects, which made the fact that they killed each other more chilling and intense. America would bypass that mood completely and get right to the general plot with Nanahara and Noriko.
Which brings me to another point. BR casted a LOT of newcomers in the film. Tatsuya Fujiwara’s first major film was BR, and the movie used very few veterans. America would go for the all-star cast led by Zac Efron and Miley Cyrus. Who would fuck it up because they suck at life, and the whole thing would be ruined.
Not to mention in casting, the American BR would have 40 white, middle-class hotties with the exception of maybe ONE or TWO black people. They would all be hot beach bunnies with little life and personality outside sex and their cliques. Just like every other American movie that takes place in high school from 2000 on. At least in BR the students, while all Japanese (for obvious reasons) we still so diverse in character and actors. Most of them were new. There were ugly and awkward guys and even a few chubby girls mixed in with the pretty girls and the hot sports star guys. That further makes the Japanese movie creepy and effective. The class gave the illusion of an AVERAGE class, not a private school from Orange County. Oh, and the personalities were so diverse too. Loud girls, quiet girls, horny boys, bullies, and bookish dudes! American movies just don’t do that ever. American movies just seem to hate diversified casts. That would ruin the eeriness BR had.
Because the point the director was trying to make when making it was to have you ask yourself, “If that were my class, what would I do?” How can you ask that if you have hard time believing that these blonde, tones 20-somethings trying to play young teens are in any way relatable to you?
One more major thing (among many others…damn, I really could go on all night about this) that Americanizing BR would fail at is the plot. BR is just as much psychological as it is a bloodbath. American directors would dumb down the psychology and so right for the guts. The psychology is what makes it such a damn great movie! It would just be a straight-up slasher flick that would have no long-term impact on the minds of it’s audience. Because that’s the American way, and it sucks.
Damn, you would’ve thought I was a Canadian the way I keep expressing my hatred for the crap-ass American media…but anyway, that’s all I got to say ‘bout that.
And yes, it involves Battle Royale. Fuck you, bitch.
A few years ago, an idea was started in Hollywood to remake the epic Japanese (because everything epic is Japanese) action/psychological horror film Battle Royale. It was eventually scrapped because of the Virginia Tech shootings and it was considered insensitive. The very idea of Battle Royale being Americanized is fucking scary and downright disturbing.
Battle Royale, if you’re a poor enough soul to have not seen it, is basically about Japan in a futuristic Militaristic Totalitarian state where once a year, one class is chosen to be kidnapped, taken to this remote location, given weapons, and told to kill each other in 3 days. They are tagged with explosives so they cannot escape, and if there is more than one survivor after 3 days, the explosives go off and no one survives.
Immediately, can’t you think of ninety thousand ways Americans would fuck up this film? Well, maybe you’re not a total nerd like I am, but I certainly can, and most of them don’t even have to do with the plot itself, although the first and most obvious thing that comes to mind is the fact that the plot will be ‘cleaned up’ and ‘dumbed down’ for the American audience. Hell, Battle Royale isn’t even distributed in the US, and my DVD copy is an import with crappy subtitles. The Japanese didn’t hesitate to spill the blood and make it good and gross. Americanized Battle Royale would be a lot more visual effects and a lot more fluff.
Another thing about the real Battle Royale I adore is the relationships between the students. ALL of the students. In the movie, you could really feel they were a class. Each one of the characters, even the very minor ones, had backstories within themselves and with others. What American movies do a lot is they focus so much on the main characters the minor characters have NO development. And also, everything is so damn clique-ish. In BR they purposefully created a sense of unity within the class in some aspects, which made the fact that they killed each other more chilling and intense. America would bypass that mood completely and get right to the general plot with Nanahara and Noriko.
Which brings me to another point. BR casted a LOT of newcomers in the film. Tatsuya Fujiwara’s first major film was BR, and the movie used very few veterans. America would go for the all-star cast led by Zac Efron and Miley Cyrus. Who would fuck it up because they suck at life, and the whole thing would be ruined.
Not to mention in casting, the American BR would have 40 white, middle-class hotties with the exception of maybe ONE or TWO black people. They would all be hot beach bunnies with little life and personality outside sex and their cliques. Just like every other American movie that takes place in high school from 2000 on. At least in BR the students, while all Japanese (for obvious reasons) we still so diverse in character and actors. Most of them were new. There were ugly and awkward guys and even a few chubby girls mixed in with the pretty girls and the hot sports star guys. That further makes the Japanese movie creepy and effective. The class gave the illusion of an AVERAGE class, not a private school from Orange County. Oh, and the personalities were so diverse too. Loud girls, quiet girls, horny boys, bullies, and bookish dudes! American movies just don’t do that ever. American movies just seem to hate diversified casts. That would ruin the eeriness BR had.
Because the point the director was trying to make when making it was to have you ask yourself, “If that were my class, what would I do?” How can you ask that if you have hard time believing that these blonde, tones 20-somethings trying to play young teens are in any way relatable to you?
One more major thing (among many others…damn, I really could go on all night about this) that Americanizing BR would fail at is the plot. BR is just as much psychological as it is a bloodbath. American directors would dumb down the psychology and so right for the guts. The psychology is what makes it such a damn great movie! It would just be a straight-up slasher flick that would have no long-term impact on the minds of it’s audience. Because that’s the American way, and it sucks.
Damn, you would’ve thought I was a Canadian the way I keep expressing my hatred for the crap-ass American media…but anyway, that’s all I got to say ‘bout that.
I saw Battle Royale in Japanese and it was sooooooo good.
ReplyDeleteYou bring up a good point when you say that the Japanese class felt more united. I think it has to do with a culture thing. In America, teachers and mentors focus more on individual achievements and less about being a team player. We're almost never taught that being a team player means that we have to make sacrifices.
If you want an example just look at our sports teams. Players aren't always willing to sacrifice themselves so that the team can gain a point. Doing that would ruin their stats. And I guess we can't have that. And that's why our superstar sports heroes do miserably when they compete internationally.
And it's partially the viewers' faults who put these people on such high pedestals.
In movies, people are less likely to watch a movie with unknowns, much less ugly people, in it If Miley Cyrus's name were attached to any project, preteen girls would love it.
In a lot of Asian countries, they're taught to embrace the conformity that America despises. They're held up to the same standards and do everything as a whole. But they're not "all the same" with no personality which makes their backstories and histories so much more interesting and important.
And I know they're going to butcher this movie.
haha..america FAIL. this happens with almost every remake of anything. it's usually awful.
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