Is anyone a fan of these shameless abominations that are just an excuse for a quick buck, or are you a devote fan of the original movies? Thoughts?

Well I like The Night of the Living Dead remake, but its more like the original film in colour! In general I find trashy horrors enjoyable so remakes are usually fun too (like Dawn of the Dead remake, another Romero classic redone). Besides if the remakes are bad we always have the originals to watch anyway. Poor sequels are usually worse than remakes (ie The Exorcist, though the prequel wasn't so bad).

Personally I think it really is dependent on which movie is being remade. As far as I'm concerned, you can never remake classics like Texas Chainsaw Massacre or Halloween. Part of what makes movies like those classics is the time period in which they were made; they were the bar to which succeeding horror movies had to raise themselves, or as in most cases, fall miserably below. It also seems like moderately budgeted horror films are more cleverly done and more concerned with at least attemtping to build suspense and atmosphere. I don't care for most slice and dice slasher movies, but they can be fun too. I actually thought the remake of Texas Chainsaw was pretty good, but as expected was rather disappointed with the Halloween remake. Rob Zombie just sucks as a filmmaker, but at least he sucked a little less on that one.

I didn't enjoy the Amityville Horror remake (the one from like 2005 or something). The 1979 version is the best.

I remember really loathing the TCM and Amityville ones until I saw some genuinely bad movies. Now I just think they're mediocre and underwhelming. The Halloween remake was fun to watch, but I don't like thinking of it as Halloween - it lacked the atmosphere of the original.

I've been fortunate enough not to touch the brain-dead "remakes" of The Wickerman, The Hitcher, etc...

The Hitcher remakes weren't that bad, but I've seen better.

I bought that remake thinking the exact same thing, but ended up with a poorly made reimagining of the original with really bad dialogue (You Yo-Yo's, You Lamebrains!!!!!) and empty, static characters.

I'm one of the few people that enjoyed Rob Zombies remake of Halloween. It was more interesting and had more of a story than the original IMO.
I also enjoyed The Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake.

I liked both the Texas Chainsaw Massacre remakes (2003 release and the beginning which came out in 2006 if I can recall). I thought they were going to be pretty crappy, but I happened to really like them both!

Oh come on, the fact that it had "more of a story" was its biggest detriment. The original was great because the killer had no motive. I mean, sure, liking the Rob Zombie remake because it was entertaining is cool, but there's something great about the original because of its simplicity and blunt nature.

Pretty much all remakes of horror movies suck. I think that they should take shitty old movies and remake them instead of taking classics and butchering them to shit. The Wicker Man remake was amazing because of Nic Cage's performance. I mean Nic Cage punching a chick in the face while in the animal suit, can you honestly thing of anything more entertaining?

The Thing(1982).

Yes? The cheesy acting and production of the original? I just didn't find the remake very eerie.

I was actually discussing Nicolas Cage punching the woman in the bear suit last night with someone. It was fantastic.

Plus, the original had Christopher Lee and he is awesome. Much more awesome than Nic Cage.

Only 2 worth a damn. The Thing and The Fly.

Horror remakes of the 80's? Good films.

Horror remakes after the 80's? Almost 100% crap--entirely inferior to their original counterparts.

Although, to be honest, I am fairly interested in the remake of It's Alive since that film leaves a lot to be desired anyway.

Some are good, others are not. In some cases, the original isn't very good, so all it can do is be improved. Sometimes, the original is iconic and can't possibly be lived up to.

Just like Friday the 13th... and supposedly, they are remaking Hellraiser...

I actualy love the remakes. Yeah, they will never touch the originals but that doesnt mean you cant enjoy the same movie from a diffent aspect. I like seeing old movies remade with better movie affects. The remakes will never ever over rule the originals but that doesnt mean I dont like watching them.

I like the old horror films better then the remakes.
I heard the other day they are remaking Child's Play that will be intresting to see if that turns out any good.

I saw a clip of it on youtube and it made me so angry. The directors should be shot. Nick Cage bugs me anyway.

Just let them remake anything by Romero and it'll beat the living shit out of the fucking original.

Could you be any more incorrect? I think not.

As for my contribution to the thread, I second The Thing. Also, I didn't think that Rob Zombie's Halloween was bad, but it was flawed in a few ways. It's still worth seeing, though. I'm surprised that the Donald Sutherland version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers hasn't been mentioned yet; that's a classic.

That film is fucking awesome, a great mix of the psychological and the gruesome. I have it on DVD. Let's hope they don't do a shitty CGI remake.

How am I wrong? Romero's stuff is boring as fuck, totally overrated and couldn't end up any worse.

The NOTLD remake also lacked that absolutely killer ending from the original, and while I guess they wanted to update the film to current times and having a catatonic chick would just not go over well with today's audiences, I didn'tt like how she turned into a screeching gun-crazed loon .. seems like overcompensation to me. I watched this years and years ago so my memory of it is a bit vague .. maybe I'll have to try it again sometime, but I don't think I'll be in a hurry .. I'm more than happy with the 1968 film.

I believe making homages to your idols is a fine thing, but remaking classics is just a terrible idea. Would you re-write "Dracula"? "Moby Dick"? Then leave those classic movies alone!

That wasn't really a remake of "A Thing from Another World" though ... it follows the 1936 John W. Campbell story more closely than does the 1951 movie and I'd be surprised if Carpenter was at all inspired by the older film. of course, John Campbell had a pretty optimistic view of humanity's potential and while Carpenter's film follows the tale pretty closely the director's view seems much less hopeful.

"The Wickerman" re-make was beyond atrocious. One of the worst pieces of shit I've seen recently. All thee meaning and subtlety of the original has been exchanged for frivolous gratuities. Also, it is almost impossible to end a horror film better than the way they did with the original "Wickerman". At no time during the remake was I led to believe that the film-makers wanted me to question my sense of morality and right and wrong, which is the very essence of the 1973 movie.

Romero's early films provide psychological depth and social commentary while essentially laying the groundwork for all zombie movies. The atmosphere and mood of Night of the Living Dead and Dawn of the Dead are unmatched in later zombie movies, even those with better production values. Furthermore, few, if any, zombie movies have ever managed to be as thought-provoking as those films. Romero doesn't try to scare you through big explosions and cheap thrills; rather, he develops a pervading atmosphere of doom and inevitability and examines its effects on the psychology of the characters in question. The hypothetical situation of a zombie apocalypse is also used, not just as a primal nightmare, but also as a challenge to the established social order which Romero attempts to deconstruct and analyze. I challenge you to find a film critic or zombie movie aficionado who would not hail George Romero as one of the greatest directors in the genre of all time.

The original Wicker Man film is probably my favourite film of all time. I can't see how this could get anywhere near the same atmosphere... an American Island is going to be completely different to a Scottish one. I've avoided the remake so far, but I can tell it would also be lacking Britt Ekland and Ingrid Pitt!

With all the modern remakes I've seen you generally don't get the same feeling you do with older films. They have that gritty eerie feel about them that modern production techniques often doesn't convey.

I've heard that there were plans to remake Suspiria as well, I'm really glad they didn't!

I'm waiting for a bunch of Hammer Horror remakes with Jack Black and Keanu Reeves in Christopher Lee's and Peter Cushing's parts. Ingrid Pitt will be replaced by Paris Hilton.

The remakes are hit and miss. The ones that are more or less the same as the original film (like the Hills Have Eyes remake) seem rather pointless. Zombie's Halloween was ok. I find increasingly that the desire to "explain" everything to make it more "real" is actually a deteriment. What frustrates me is that it seems that remakes is all Hollywood is interested in doing now.

Yeah, people seem to have this mindset that it's a bad thing if you can't explain something that happened in a film. They need everything spoonfed to them.

The zombie movies were the only ones I liked remade, not the other garbage.

I really liked the remake of Halloween. It was nowhere near the original, but I thought it was pretty damn entertaining.

The worst remake I have ever seen was One Missed Call.
The Japanese version was supposed to be pretty good. i haven't seen it, but the American one was pathetic.

I'm not saying the remake of the Wicker Man was better than the original. I was saying that it's entertaining in it's horribly shitty way. Nic Cage's acting was so awful that I watch it just about every time I have the chance. Shit like that doesn't come around too often.

I didnt like the new Halloween seemed to have lost the hole Halloween movie feel to it just seemed to be like a cheep B-movie copy.

To me, these remakes are just more examples of laziness in Hollywood. This era of reality tv has really affected the quality of tv and other media in my opinion.

Rob Zombie needs to fuck up his own films, not other people's. It was merely decent because the original was great to begin with.

I hate them. Especially the splatter remakes. its like they take it so seriously and make it so realistic that it just sucks all the fun and cheesy goodness out of them which is what made them entertaining. I mean really who goes to see a splatter movie for the damn plotline? I want to see buckets of fake blood and animal organs. I heard their remaking Wizard of Gore. I might cry. Also a similar note their trying to remake the warriors but they want to make it more "street" by filming in modern day L.A. with some gangbangers. Greeaaaat.