Classic Films That Are Actually Remakes Quiz

Answer: The Wizard of Oz

L. Frank Baum originally published his wonderfully imaginative book "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" in 1900. A marginally successful 1902 stage play quickly followed and the first movie version of the book was a silent film in 1910. The silent film has Dorothy travelling to Oz with her family's suddenly animated Scarecrow, where she meets the Tin Woodman and Lion. The group escapes Momba the Witch and reaches the Emerald City just in time for the Wizard to retire and appoint the Scarecrow as his successor. A different 1925 silent version of "The Wizard of Oz" has Dorothy as an 18 year old lost princess of Oz, who saves the land and marries a prince. Notable from the 1925 version was that the Tin Man is played by a young Oliver Hardy.

The 1939 version starred Judy Garland as Dorothy Gale and followed Baum's book more closely. However, a major difference between book and movie is that Baum envisioned Oz as real place where in the movie it is a product of Dorothy's dreams. The film was expensive to produce and was not an instant box office success. The film earned seven Oscar nominations winning three awards, including Best Score and Best Song.

Answer: A Fistful of Dollars

"Yojimbo" is a 1961 masterpiece by Japanese director Akira Kurosawa that starred Toshiro Mifune as the Ronin, or samurai with no master, who wanders into a town in the middle of a fight between two rival gang factions. Refusing to take sides and wanting only to be left alone, the samurai nonetheless ends up clearing the town of both gangs.

Relatively unknown at the time, Clint Eastwood starred in "A Fistful of Dollars" produced in 1964 but not released in the US until 1967. The movie was made by Italian director Sergio Leone and set the action in the American West. Like the samurai in "Yojimbo", Eastwood's "man with no name" gunslinger is stuck between rival gangs in a small town. The similarities between "A Fistful of Dollars" and "Yojimbo" did not go unnoticed and the movie's release was delayed when Kurasowa sued for breach of copyright. Kurosawa won the case and ended up getting more "dollars" from the success of "A Fistful of Dollars" than from "Yojimbo".

Answer: Alfred Hitchcock

Remakes are a fact of movie life and there are several examples of directors remaking their own material. In 1934 Alfred Hitchcock directed Peter Lorre and Leslie Banks in "The Man Who Knew Too Much", the story of an innocent couple who learn of a crime about to be committed and are blackmailed with the life of their daughter to keep quiet. The film was a critical and financial success. Hitchcock wanted to Americanize the story so, in 1956, he remade the movie with Jimmy Stewart in the Leslie Banks role and cast Doris Day as his lounge singer wife. Audiences loved the new version and the film earned an Oscar for the song "Que Sera, Sera".

When asked to compare the two versions of "The Man Who Knew Too Much" Hitchcock was said to reply that the 1934 version was made by "a talented amateur", while the 1956 remake was made by a "professional".

Answer: The Omega Man

Often the determination of which version of a story is best is a matter of personal perception. Richard Mathison's intelligent novella tells the tale of the last surviving human overrun by the rise of a new species, in the aftermath of a pandemic. As a teenager in the 1970s, I was unaware of the 1964 version that starred horror film legend Vincent Price. People born after 1990 may only know the story from 2007's "I Am Legend", starring Will Smith. I prefer the 1971 version that starred Charlton Heston, during what we can call Heston's dystopian phase. From 1968-1973 Heston starred not only in "The Omega Man" but "Planet of the Apes", "Beneath the Planet of the Apes" and "Soylent Green".

The earlier and later versions of "I Am Legend" do not (in my humble opinion) capture the inherent satire and iconoclasm of the book, but are worthwhile nonetheless. "I am Omega" is a 2007 straight to video low budget version of the "I Am Legend" novella. Based on user reviews, few would consider it classic.

Answer: An Affair to Remember

In "Affair to Remember" Grant plays an engaged American playboy who meets a singer, played by Deborah Kerr, on a cruise ship and falls in love. They agree to meet in six months at the top of the Empire State building to see if they want to be together. Grant breaks his engagement and returns to being an artist to prove his worth to Kerr. As Grant waits anxiously at the meeting point, Kerr is in an auto accident that lands her in the hospital. Another six month pass and Kerr and Grant meet again this time realizing that true love will conquer all.

With little exception the only differences between 1957's "Affair to Remember" and the 1939's "Love Affair" are the stars. Do you prefer your suave gentleman as Cary Grant or Charles Boyer and your stunning beauty in the form of Irene Dunne or Deborah Kerr? Both movies received Oscar nominations but did not win.
"An Affair to Remember" is both a recurring backdrop and is the inspiration for 1993's "Sleepless in Seattle". That movie's ends with widower Tom Hanks and perennial single Meg Ryan meeting and coming together atop the Empire State Building.

Answer: The Front Page

Any movie that features the working of a newspaper will feel like an anachronism in the 21st Century. However screwball comedy works no matter what the subject. First appearing as a Broadway play, "The Front Page" tells the story of a reporter who wants out of the game, but is dragged into one last big story by his editor. The original movie version has Adolph Menjou as the scheming editor and Pat O'Brien as the put upon reporter. The 1974 remake was directed by Billy Wilder and starred Walter Matthau and his frequent comedy foil Jack Lemmon. Carol Burnett makes a wonderful appearance as a streetwalker and Susan Sarandon is Lemmon's bewildered but beautiful fiancée.

As a bonus you might also check out the delightful 1940 movie "His Girl Friday", where the reporter character becomes a woman played by Rosalind Russell and Cary Grant plays her still-in-love ex-husband editor. This version is much more a romantic comedy with some excellent 1940's repartee between the stars.

Answer: The Maltese Falcon

Mention the name "The Maltese Falcon" and the great 1941 movie with Humphrey Bogart as Sam Spade, Peter Lorre, Sydney Greenstreet and Mary Astor as the gorgeous treacherous femme fatale comes to mind. That film directed by John Huston was nominated for three Oscars and is often considered the quintessential example of a film noir. However it was not the first screen adaptation of Dashiell Hammett's novel of the same name. Hammett co-wrote the script for a 1931 film that starred Bebe Daniels and a badly miscast Ricardo Cortez as Sam Spade. The 1931 version is notable because it contains more (in a relative sense) graphic violence and suggestive sexual situations than the 1941 version.

1941's "The Maltese Falcon" (as well as the 1931 version) tells the story of cynical San Francisco private detective Sam Spade (Bogart) who is hired by Ruth Wonderly (Mary Astor) to help her locate her missing sister and the sister's boyfriend. Astor however is lying and she involves Bogart in a series of murders double-crosses and dangerous chases to locate what they are really after, the valuable jewel encrusted statute (The Maltese Falcon). In the end Spade's cynicism is well placed and no one comes away rich or happy.

Answer: A Star is Born

If you pardon the pun, a star was born with 1937's best story Oscar winner "A Star is Born". Famed writer Dorothy Parker co-wrote the screenplay and the film earned seven Oscar nominations including a nod for star Janet Gaynor. The story about a young girl who achieves her dreams of being a Hollywood star and is destroyed by fame is heartbreakking and timeless. Indeed the story was later retold in 1954 as a musical directed by George Cukor with Judy Garland as the naïve young singer who gains success and loses her herself in the process. The 1954 version was nominated for six Oscars. The movie is made even more poignant by the parallels between the life of film character Esther Blodgett and the real life struggles of Judy Garland.

Following in Judy Garland's footsteps is not an easy undertaking, but Barbra Streisand did so in the 1976 remake of "A Star is Born". Streisand's version is also a musical and features the Oscar winning best song "Evergreen". Streisand co-wrote the song with Paul Williams. The movie was nominated for four Oscars.

Answer: The Magnificent Seven

Hollywood loves to take the films of the great Japanese director Akira Kurasowa and translate the stories into English. Kurasowa's glorious 1954 tale "The Seven Samurai" tells the story of seven leaderless samurai or Ronin, who accept the task of defending a village from the attacks of a vicious gang of thieves. This tale of a band of misfit warriors who band together to redeem themselves by sacrifice, ranks amongst the most revered films of the 20th Century.

John Sturges and several screen writers faithfully reinvented Kurasowa's film into the 1960 English language version "The Magnificent Seven". The samurais become American gunslingers and feudal Japan transforms into the American West. Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson and James Coburn are amongst those fighting to save the farmers from the gang led by Eli Wallach. For fun watch the 1980's "Battle Beyond the Stars" that is a version of "The Magnificent Seven" set in space. "Battle" stars Robert Vaughn who was also in the 1960 movie. To complete the circle the farmers in "Battle" are called the Akira in honor of the Japanese auteur.

Answer: The Ten Commandments

Looking for big budget grand epics? Then Cecil B. De Mille was your man. De Mille began acting, producing and directing movies in 1910 during the silent era and continued until 1958's "The Buccaneer". In 1923 De Mille produced and directed the "Ten Commandments", which was, for the time, a huge budget, silent film that told both the biblical story of the book of "Exodus", and also a modern story of how people interpret the commandments. That film was so successful it remained one of Paramount Pictures highest revenue generating films for 25 years.

De Mille returned to the story of Moses and "Exodus" in the last film he directed, 1956's "The Ten Commandments". De Mille added color, sounds and subplots to his 1923 film, but included many of the same scenes. Charlton Heston starred as Moses and Yul Brenner as Rameses II, and the film was nominated for seven Oscars. My personal favorite character was Edward G Robinson as the cynical Jewish overseer Dathan, who sneers in a decidedly Brooklyn accent.