Are there any Original Ideas in Film Today?

When you look at many of the biggest blockbusters out today, you can’t help but notice that most are either a sequel, or based on an existing property, or a remake or drawn from a comic or book. All of this leads to the vital question of where the originality of film went. Just this year there are so many films that we are drawn to because they’re a sequel or based on a book or comic that we loved. You may remember classic original ideas like ‘Star Wars’ ‘Back to the Future’ and ‘E.T’. Is this the end of original writing as we know it, will anything ever truly surprise us again?

It is very likely at some point you have gone on some sort of rant against remaking a particular film like ‘Robocop’ or ‘Total Recall’. But there’s an instant connection with these remakes and even if you only see it so you can hate on it, you saw it, therefore you’ve contributed to the success and therefore helped studio executives find the answer to ‘Should we just remake every old film as a quick way to earn money?’

Looking past remakes of course you find that there are so many films that originate from existing forms of media. The biggest blockbusters right now are undeniably superhero films derived from classic comic books. You can criticise this all you like and find ways to poke holes in the framework of these concepts but then again, given the huge budget that most of these films are generating, it’s safe to assume that a majority of people who saw ‘Avengers Assemble’ didn’t actually read the comics or watch the TV shows. Sure, they’ve certainly heard of the characters but probably know very little about their true character traits and emotions. So from their perspective, isn’t that practically an original idea anyway.

Then look at ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’. Put aside the popularity of that film and come clean, did you actually have any idea who those characters were before the film, at all, even in name? I’ll admit I didn’t (because everybody’s an expert on something once it’s popular, and everyone was interested in it before everyone else was). How could you get any closer to an original story that managed to attract audiences?

Of course, one could point out that ‘Guardians’ used the Marvel brand to draw in audiences, but then how is that really any different from using the name of a director, actor or writer to raise awareness of their latest film. After the success of ‘Jaws’ and ‘Close Encounters of the Third Kind’ Steven Spielberg’s name was put onto every project he was involved in.

Also, if a film is part of a franchise then anyone that saw the a previous film will be interested in this one, virtually guaranteeing a profit similar to the first film. There are exceptions to this, but generally it seems to work. It’s much more of a risk to put out an original idea that has nothing going for it, to understand what this is really about audiences will have to see it, and in our current state of movie making we’re not really as sure about uncertainty.

But this current state of reinterpretation is definitely not a new phenomenon. Some of the biggest blockbusters of the past were, contrary to what you may think, based on existing forms of media. ‘The Godfather’ was once just a book, as was ‘Jaws’, so not every classic is original, it’s just that some are so good they eclipse what they were based on. Even today there are a number of original concepts amid the adaptations such as ‘Inception’, ‘Looper’ or ‘Inside Out’.

You also need to remember that though there are many sequels now, they all started off as original ideas at some point. Can you really blame their creators for wanting to take their original idea (that was proven to be successful) and taking it further creatively? As well as that you can look at ‘Star Wars 7’ set thirty years after the last instalment, meaning that by now the writers are virtually starting from scratch in terms of story, with just some familiar characters and environments to base their work on.

 Then of course you have the fact that if the writers are familiar with the source material and passionate about it then they will try their best to do it justice and the result is a better chance of getting a genuinely worthwhile cinematic experience. Sometimes this doesn’t work but then you look at the excellent quality of Marvel, ‘Lord of the Rings’ and ‘The Lego Movie’, instead of producing lazy adaptations just to attract people to the rest of their medium, the creators want to create the best movie they can.

I’m not saying that we should accept a lack of unoriginality, I love stories that I have no idea over where they’re going to go or end up without anything from the past that connects me to it. Original ideas will always be important and will always be present, the only difference is that they just don’t get as much attention right now. But don’t fear, eventually we will ask for something original, we will want to be surprised with something new and then Hollywood will be forced to find new ideas. But right now, I’m not bored of adaptations, so until I am, I’ll just keep watching and be thankful that they’re as good as they are.