The 2020s are the years of the double-take. They are years meant for revisiting, reassessing and coming back to what we know, which is especially true for the entertainment industry. But why is that so?…
Looking at the Top Grossing Movies at the Box Office, we can formulate a pattern involving taking an existing story and refashioning it through the second set of lenses. Below is a screenshot of the Top Grossing Movies of 2022 taken from the-numbers.com. After looking at the image, we can see just how many of the top 20 films have recognizable titles like The Batman, Spider-man: No Way Home, Scream, The Matrix Resurrections and West Side Story for example.
The fact that so many of those titles mentioned above remind us of classic cinematic moments shows that we are going through a period of reflection and nostalgia for the pre-COVID days. In 2020, we were thrown into the COVID-19 crisis and had to stay indoors for an unknown amount of time. As a result, it meant we sought out comfort and excitement through our home screens. Naturally, our favourite online streaming services saved us by becoming a sufficient source of escapism through updating the variety available to us. I can recall how many times Mnet cleverly set up themed channels such as the James Bond one or how they improved their Catchup selection for us during the toughest of lockdowns. However, as excruciating as the memory of this time maybe for some of us, it was crucial for changing the way we perceive movie adaptations. For years remakes have been frowned upon because we labelled the original as the only acceptable version. We had not fully acknowledged the notion that multiple adaptations can co-exist without damaging the reputation of the other. At least not until recently.
Looking at the statistics of what is being produced and released in 2022 thus far, we can see a collection of sequels, remakes and ensemble reunions. The reason for this is that the film industry came out of lockdown, bursting with the urge to improve and better the cinematic universe of these classic titles, in one way or another. It also might have been a way of getting people excited about returning to the movie house on a Friday night since so many of us were in this nostalgic mindset anyways.
For some directors, the 2020s were a way for them to point out how much the original movie had failed to capture by ensuring that theirs would cover every detail necessary. One such director would be Denis Villeneuve, who felt that the 1984 motion picture, Dune, had not grasped the entire atmosphere of Frank Herbert’s novel. Villeneuve had expressed in interviews over the years how much he dreamed of creating his own novel-to-film adaptation because of how important the book was to him as a young boy. So, in 2021 when his version of Dune came out, his dedication to accuracy made the movie stand out. He had gone into the project intending to perfect the visual aspect when portraying the book since the 1984 version did not have the technology or time to achieve this. As a result, his movie was a huge success, and it brought more attention to the story of Dune as audience members revisited the history of sci-fi by experiencing the film. It heightened the sense of nostalgia that we were all feeling at the time it had come out: His movie had made audience members go out and read about Dune, become invested in the history of Dune, and even resonate with their parents or elders over the 1965 epic novel. Therefore Dune (2021) marks an era of perfecting the nature of storytelling by taking an old film that failed and refashioning it to bring it affluence.
For other directors, it was a challenge considering that the previous adaptations had received enough success in the past. One such situation would be if we looked at Matt Reeves’ The Batman (2022). He faced a lot of initial objections from the public for wanting to make another Batman movie because Christopher Nolan’s trilogy was accepted as the best there is. Yet, in an interview, he said that he had always promised to make a Batman movie that was more emotional and subjective than any other had been before. He wanted the audience to “empathise with the villain and criticise the hero”, as Time.com successfully put it. When I watched it last week, I went into the cinema with an apprehensive attitude as a Christopher Nolan fan but walked out of it admiring the bravery and uniqueness of Reeves for producing a film as raw as The Batman (2022). Reeves’ version showcased the same level of excellence and caution but had taken a completely different route compared to Nolan. Now, after the success of The Batman (2022), the world will have to accept the idea that there can be more than one Oscar-worthy motion picture for the same storyline. It is also worth noting that the stills from Reeves’ The Batman (2022), reveal shots that almost mirror the comic illustrations and the film has a score that immerses you in this melancholic atmosphere throughout the film.
See the images below for reference:
This alone shows how a brilliant film is a brilliant film even if the storyline is popular or even arguably overused. It is the success of a film like this that makes me think more directors in the future will become persuaded into creating the ‘perfect’ adaptation of classic stories to achieve a similar reaction worldwide. Thus, this film kickstarted 2022 by proving to us how remakes can be better than we expected if we choose to accept the idea that multiple artistic approaches can exist side-by-side in their respective cinematic universes.
Speaking of multiple universes, if you have seen the movie, or even if you have watched the trailer, for Marvel’s newest hit Spiderman: No Way Home (2021) you would see the return of the previous Spiderman-related villains. To avoid massive spoilers, I will comment only on these villains. The incorporation of these characters reveals an incredibly unique way of involving the other stand-alone Spiderman movies to create one major motion picture. The fact that no director has ever attempted to do something like that in a large-scale sense meant that this version of the Spider-man storyline achieved record-breaking results and recognition. This film revisited the past Spiderman movies and quite literally altered their storylines to fit with the plot of Spider-man: No Way Home. Willem Dafoe, Alfred Molina, Thomas Haden Church and Jamie Foxx all returned to the big screen as the Spider-man villains they had once played in this major motion picture. This tactic of using multiple movie adaptations to their advantage caused cinema audiences all around the world, including mine, to squeal and scream in unison. They took the fact that Spiderman fans had been involved and swept up in so many versions of Peter Parker’s life, that they created a compacted nostalgic moment for them to experience together. The release date of this film was also an important aspect of its success because the pandemic had made us long for a time when things were simpler, which would be around the time that those previous Spiderman movies had come out. Thus, Spider-man: No Way Home (2021) is a film that shows us how riveting it can be to revisit old adaptations and characters.
All in all, the cinematic aspect of the 2020s has started with a bang. When the artistic visions of directors meet the enlightenment we’ve learnt through this pandemic, truly unique films emerge. In the future, we can expect to see more films adopting an open-minded nature meaning that remakes and sequels will never be treated the same after the pandemic.