Today's Bad Remake Idea
Posted: Fri Mar 27, 2009 12:15 pm
ABC will be remaking Ben Hur as a four-hour miniseries, with David Wyler, son of director William Wyler, as executive producer. No word on the cast yet, but the budget is $22 million, big for TV but peanuts compared to what the original would have cost had it been staged today.
http://www.variety.com/article/VR111800 ... id=14&cs=1
Recent TV remakes of The Ten Commandments and Spartacus (with ER's Goren Visjniac) have bombed and Ben Hur is a problem on at least two levels. First, the level of spectacle in the original can't be duplicated, so we'll get either a tiny production (the chariot race staged at a local high school stadium) or some bad CGI effects or both. Second, the spirituality in the original film worked for 1960, but it would be very difficult to get right today. It would be too easy to come off as either excessively preachy or as poking fun at Christianity. There's also the fact that the film as a whole comes off as borderline camp (not as much out-and-out over the top campiness as Ten Commandments, which is why Commandments is more fun to watch today).
http://www.variety.com/article/VR111800 ... id=14&cs=1
Recent TV remakes of The Ten Commandments and Spartacus (with ER's Goren Visjniac) have bombed and Ben Hur is a problem on at least two levels. First, the level of spectacle in the original can't be duplicated, so we'll get either a tiny production (the chariot race staged at a local high school stadium) or some bad CGI effects or both. Second, the spirituality in the original film worked for 1960, but it would be very difficult to get right today. It would be too easy to come off as either excessively preachy or as poking fun at Christianity. There's also the fact that the film as a whole comes off as borderline camp (not as much out-and-out over the top campiness as Ten Commandments, which is why Commandments is more fun to watch today).