10 Best Horror Movie Remakes Of All Time
4. The Fly (1986)
The original The Fly from 1958 falls squarely into the 'fear of nuclear holocaust' sub-genre of creature features in the fifties. But even then, it was very clearly a body horror film. Which makes it clear why Cronenberg would have ever been interested in remaking it in the first place.
The 1986 version jettisons a lot of the plot from the original, basically just sticking with the essentials. It's still about a brilliant scientist working on a teleportation device, who decides to test it on himself, only for things to go horribly wrong when a fly enters the machine with him. But that's pretty much where the similarities end.
Cronenberg goes all-in on the body horror, with Goldblum's character growing more and more fly-like with each progressive scene. The effects work here is outstanding, and holds up to this day. The transformation is continuously grotesque.
But beyond the wonderfully delirious gore and effects, the remake is made much stronger off of the back of the relationship between Goldblum and Geena Davis' characters. They have a genuine chemistry, and Cronenberg wisely plays up the tragedy of them being separated and forced against each other by this tragic accident.