MovieChat Forums > The Go-Between (1971) Discussion > Time for a re-make?

Time for a re-make?

posted 18 years ago by flawless04
21 replies | jump to latest

Don't get me wrong, I LOVE the original film and its soundtrack, but I was wondering that a re-make of the film would be in order with possibly the following cast:

Marian = Kiera Knightly (seeing she did such a good job in P&P)
Ted Burgess = Clive Owen
Emma Thompson = Mrs Maudsley
Jude Law = older Leo Colston

with Harry Gregson-Williams doing the soundtrack based on the original's themes and any other Brittish luvvies easily filling out the cast.

Director = Hmmm....

What do you think?

[–] kathylove 18 years ago

If a thing works don't try to fix it.
A remake would be an artistic disaster. If anyone asks why just say I said so.

[–] ottobroeker 18 years ago

The scene where we see him as old, the one he's talking to was that Marion? I didn't see all of the movie.

[–] hcim90 18 years ago

the older leo is supposed to be about 60 years old. jude law could never look 60.

I wish I could think of something witty to put here, but I can't.

[–] chucktum 17 years ago

I agree, However I would Rather like to see it out on DVD

[–] abletonyallen 17 years ago

"The Go-Between" is one of the greatest films of the 20th century. It perfectly captures the sense of time, place and character of L.P. Hartley's original novel. The themes of childhood innocence, adult deviousness and the rigid mores of the British upper classes are cleverly woven into a beautiful yet ultimately tragic tale.

It is Joseph Losey's masterpiece.

It is perfectly cast and beautifully played by all concerned.

Nobody captured the nuances of the British class system better than Losey, denied the right to earn a living in his native America by the excesses of the McCarthy witch hunts.

Why anybody would even think of remaking this classic movie is completely and utterly beyond me.

Surely we have had more than our share in recent years of disastrous remakes of good, bad and indifferent movies. Any attempt at a new 'version' of "The Go-Between" would be nothing short of a catastrophe.

More sensible by far would be to ask Rolf Harris to produce a 'new' version of the "Mona Lisa"!

[–] relaxed_sphincter 17 years ago

It's never time for a re-make of anything.

Deck

[–] silcock-2 17 years ago

If it was going to be remade i'd cast:

Marian: Romola Garia
Ted: Gerard Butler
Hugh: Paul Bettany
Mrs Maudsley: Kristen Scott Thomas

That's all i can think off.

[–] Liightspeed 17 years ago

It's never time for a re-make of anything.

Not even...

The Little Drummer Girl (1984)?
People may have enjoyed it but it bore scant resemblance to the only le Carre novel I ever enjoyed. The title just conned everyone.

Love in the time of Cholera (2007)?
Casting some actors may have helped. Would it have helped enough to compensate for the director though? Probably not. And then you'd have to say it was a brave fool who ever thought he could do justice to such a novel with a movie camera.

[–] Molly-31 15 years ago

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

[–] slee-10 15 years ago

Please NO!

I saw that movie as a junior in high school, and it made a huge huge impression on me and has affected me yet today in some ways.

It is the absolute perfect "period movie", only so much more.

Please go to the Turner Classic Movies website and ask for it to be shown. There is a specific category to do so.

[–] clivey6 13 years ago

Well the film didn't live up to the book for me, so I'd remake it.

Clive Owen as Ted is a good one, Bates was never that horny handed, he could do posh very well. Christie I simply never found that sexy tbh. And the film has that bleak, terse way about it, you don't warm to it at all, whereas you do warm to the book's early events, which makes the finale so bleak and shocking.

[–] fubared1 15 years ago

PLEASE! Where would you find the talent? It doesn't exist today! Granted Christie could play the mother now, but who else? Such talent doesn't exist anymore. Even Pinter is writing crap like the update of 'Sleuth'.

Life sucks, then you're reincarnated

[–] MJBRLD 15 years ago

Um, Pinter isn't doing much of anything nowadays since he died in December 2008

[–] pixienat 15 years ago

Ugh all of those cast members stink!
No re-make needed!

"And then I was being chased my an improperly filled in bubble screaming 'None of the above!' ".

[–] marudd50 15 years ago

Please--leave this be. And please, no more Kiera Knightly in anything. She sparkles but lacks gravitas. And there's only one Alan Bates.

[–] janemddunn 13 years ago

The children they would cast would not know how to speak so no . Isn t it too that there where people alive that knew the age .. Also it is shot at my husband s ancestral home !!!

[–] efaldk-349-274444 13 years ago

Saw the film only recently, and it already has become one of my all time favorites.
No, a re-make of "The Go-Between" is out of the question. No one could match Julie Christie and Alan Bates. Also, Losey was such a brilliant director, and Pinter one of the the world's finest script writers. Please don't mess with this masterpiece.