Movie Remakes: Good, Bad or Ugly

I admit it, I am a movie buff. I love the feeling of getting lost in a story. It really doesn't matter to me whether it's a drama, comedy, dramedy or whatever. Just enthrall me and let me lose myself for 90-120 minutes. Hey, that's definitely worth ten bucks in my opinion.

Remakes are particularly interesting to me, because you never know what you're gonna get. Which is strange, because since it's a remake, you think you'll know EXACTLY what you're gonna get, but any director worth his cute little director's chair knows you gotta have an edge.

Just like success, right?

Anyway, tonight we watched an old favorite (and when I say old, I'm talkin' early 90s). The Cutting Edge, starring Moira Kelly and some guy whose name I can't remember. "The ultimate love/skate relationship" is the tagline. Well, I don't mean to spoil it for you, but it's The Taming of the Shrew all over again, with an ice-skaing spin. But with dialogue that's easier to understand.

I love movies about passionate people, don't you? And I'm not just talkin passion of the sexual nature (if that's what you're looking for, you may be disappointed with The Cutting Edge), I'm talking about people that DO what tehy are passionate about. In other words, living your dream.

So Olympic movies and sports-themed flicks are generally always a good choice for me.

Of course, on the other hand, there are remakes like "Guess Who?" (see also: Guess Who's Coming to Dinner? but the colors are reversed) For an Ashton Kutcher movie, it had some style. And a lot of laughs. Bernie Mac was definitely a winning choice to play the hard-to-impress dad.

I know that a movie is just an illusion. But I love to get caught up in the story. Of course, our lives are just illusions too, and man don't we love to get caught in THAT drama all the time. But unlike going to the movies, we can change what we're projecting in our lives. We just have to rememeber that we're the ones in control on the set.

We can remake our lives to model someone else's. We can tell a completely new and unique story. We can choose whether the ending is happy...or not. We are the writer, the director, the producer, the actor, the lighting guy, the editor, and even the projectionist. Yep, we're the ones calling ALL the shots in this flick.

Pretty empowering, isn't it?

Here's your question for the day:
Do you love the movie you're producing, or are you creating your own real-life horror flick? What steps can you take TODAY to create the movie YOU really want to experience?