Blowing the dust off

Nothing makes me feel older than seeing a remake of a movie I remember, as Flatliners reminded me. Here are some remakes heading to cinemas this year.

TOMB RAIDER

Oh dear, not another one. The Tomb Raider videogame series has reinvented itself three times since its 1996 debut, and now the movie series based on the games is doing the same. This new one is more in line with the recent Tomb Raider games and stars Alicia Vikander (above) as Lara Croft. At the very least, this remake won’t be a disappointment because I seriously doubt anyone considers the previous movies starring Angelina Jolie to be good.

MOWGLI

I guess this one technically isn’t a remake, but it hasn’t even been long since the bigbudget Disney live action version of The Jungle Book. This one isn’t by Disney, though, but by Warner Bros, and from the trailer it looks like it’ll be basically the same idea — just with a different flavour. I was about to say “more realistic” flavour, but the CG talking animals made me think twice.

THE GRINCH

Ah, I saw the trailer for this one when I went to watch The Incredibles 2 – which I highly recommend, by the way, it's brilliant. It's a completely animated version of the 2000 family Christmas comedy that starred Jim Carey in a big green fur suit extracting some genuine laughs for once. The voice for this new animated Grinch is provided by Benedict Cumberbatch, so there’s bound to be some superbly delivered lines. I might see it for that alone.

DEATH WISH

Finally, a remake of something that is older than I am. The original film was released in 1974 and starred Charles Bronson in the role of an architect who becomes a vigilante after his wife is murdered by street thugs. This remake is a similar idea, and has Bruce Willis in the role of a surgeon who does exactly the same thing for the same reason.