The Best Remake Of All Time (According To IMDb) Is A Crime Thriller – SlashFilm Trending Global News

Remakes have a (not entirely unjustified) bad reputation. They lack originality and often remain a pale imitation of some other work of art in some form or the other. Still, every now and then, a remake comes along that offers something new. We’ve seen this many times before in the science fiction genre, with new technology allowing filmmakers to really let their imaginations run wild, resulting in sci-fi remakes that even surpass the original.

Something similar happens whenever a Hollywood remake of a non-American film is announced, whether non-English language or otherwise. Beyond the fact that American remakes make it easy for American audiences to avoid familiarizing themselves with different cultures, languages, and concepts, these films also lose something in translation. Still, there are several American remakes that have actually turned out to be quite good.

All of this is to say that, despite their bad reputation, remakes aren’t inherently a bad thing. In fact, some of the films considered to be the best of all time are remakes. Such is the case with one of the highest-rated movies of all time on imdb – namely, a crime thriller directed by Martin Scorsese that is currently sitting comfortably at number 37 on the website’s top 250 and was also the film that ultimately earned the legendary filmmaker his first Oscar for Best Director. That’s right, the best remake so far (according to IMDb) is “The Departed”, based on the 2002 Hong Kong film “Infernal Affairs”.

The original “Infernal Affairs” was directed by Andrew Lau and Alan Mak. Andy Lau and Tony Leung play an undercover cop who is infiltrating a trio and a cop who is also a spy for the same trio, respectively. The film is an incredible portrayal of post-colonial Hong Kong’s identity crisis and conflict following reunification with mainland China. It’s also an emotionally complex crime film that has enough memorable characters to warrant an entire trilogy, in addition to inspiring a video game and, again, an Oscar-winning Scorsese film (which would later be followed by 2008’s “The Departed”). It was parodied by “The Simpsons” in “The Simpsons”.

Martin Scorsese’s take on “Infernal Affairs” changes tone, becoming less concerned with almost operatic displays of emotion and more with an interrogation of masculinity and shocking displays of violence. Most importantly, “The Departed” does away with the Triad and post-colonial commentaries, and instead takes inspiration from the true story of Whitey Bulger and his relationship with the FBI. While not quite Leung and Lau, Scorsese’s remake also features a killer line-up of great actors, including Leonardo DiCaprio, Jack Nicholson, Matt Damon, and Martin Sheen.

While “The Departed” lacks the grandiose, cosmic coincidence that began “Infernal Affairs” (in which the film’s police heroes meet), the two films thereafter begin to parallel each other. Scorsese’s film compensates for this by combining the bare bones of the “Infernal Affairs” plot with the kind of crime thriller flair at which the filmmaker excels, giving us a complex web of lies and conspiracies that slowly unravels. Unfolds through a lot of bloodshed. It’s a case of justifying the remake by giving a different but still recognizable rendition of the source material that stands on its own.

Like the original film, “The Departed” also kills off most of its cast in increasingly violent ways. Unsurprisingly, this didn’t stop studio executives from trying to convince Scorsese to keep some characters alive in order to make a sequel. And although Scorsese refused, the franchise could have easily continued in other ways (see also: 2003’s “Infernal Affairs II”, which served as a prequel to its predecessor rather than a sequel).