Deeply Necessary Whatever Happened to Baby Jane Remake Announced
It's a bold move to remake a beloved classic film, but then again Walter Hill is a bold guy.
has announced that he is on track to produce, write and direct a remake of the seminal 1962 film Whatever Happened To Baby Jane. The basic gist of the remake will be to keep the original 1935 setting but modernize the period. As Hill states; "
The intensity of the Gothic storyline makes a reconfiguration of the drama still a potentially searing experience. The idea is to make a modern film without modernizing the period. It needs to resonate the golden age of Hollywood."Duh. Whatever Happened to Baby Jane is a disturbing film about two aging sibling actress (Joan Crawford and Bette Davis) as they struggle with their dependency and hatred towards each other. The original is a sublime piece of filmmaking. From the direction to the writing to the acting; for what it is Whatever Happened to Baby Jane is a near flawless film. Remakes generally work when the original film is a flawed but interesting piece (see: The Fly, The Thing From Another Planet) not a genre defining film. Since this remake (if it ever sees the light of day) should shoot for best-worst movie status I would like to humbly suggest Lindsay Lohan for both parts. We've already seen her master the delicate art of playing stigmatic siblings in the lost classic I Know Who Killed Me. Who knows? Perhaps I'm being cynical. Maybe the remake will help introduce a whole new generation to the film. And they can add in all the explosions that were sorely missing from the first one.