DB7

Clark to Remake Jordan's Mona Lisa
Source: Variety January 24, 2005


Variety reports that Larry Clark (Bully, Ken Park) will direct Shame, has a remake of the Neil Jordan-directed Mona Lisa from 1986. The project is set up with StudioCanal and Clark is courting Rosario Dawson to star.

"I've written the screenplay with David Reeves, keeping the basic story intact but contemporizing it and setting it in New York," Clark said.

In the original noir-infused love story, Bob Hoskins plays George, a small-time loser employed as a chauffeur to an enigmatic, high-class call girl. His fascination with her leads him on a dangerous quest through the sordid underbelly of London, where love is a weakness to be exploited and betrayed.

42ndStreetFreak

WHAT!?

This film is wonderful! A real British classic.

Larry Clark can go and do one!
It's about time the Government got hold of certain British gems and put a protection order on them like any other item of historical importance so damn American film makers can't drip their burger grease all over them with damn re-makes!

Paul E

I can imagine Larry Clark handling this quite well - he's not one to flinch from the seemier side of life after all and its gritty stuff. Finding a good short funny (but slightly menacing) guy will be the hard part.

deckard

Oh God! I can see it now....I bet they go for Danny DeVito!!!!! eek! Regards, Decks.

"and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock"

42ndStreetFreak

I am reading the book "Starring Michael Caine" and Jordan is quoted as being shocked when he was offered a chance to re-make this..he could never see it.

Little did he know!

This film IS British. It's many strengths are the British takes on things. The typically cheap small time con job sleaze, the small time thugs with ideas of Gangster grandeur, the jarring change from a whore crowded Kings Cross bridge at night, to the sight of Hoskins in the sun in joke sunglasses on a seaside pier.

A love American sleaze films and the whole history and vibe of places like 42nd Street. But theere is a difference in the whole make-up of British sleaze and the underworld compared to America.

Just as it would be awful to have a British "Taxi Driver" or "Bad Lt"..it would be awful to have an American "Mona Lisa".
And what with "The Ladykillers" and that true icon of British movie making "The Italian Job" being raped (and maybe "The Wicker Man") this news is just too damn much!

I've come out swinging at the very idea of making classic American films like "TCM" and "DAWN", this is not just because it's a British film no matter what.
But given our relative small scale history (and dire state of our industry at the moment) every gem in our crown instantly means so much...
So to have them poached by a Country/industry that spews films out at astonishing rates with massive backing all round so they go from shining gem i a crown to just another unimpressive trinket in a huge pile..is disgraceful.

And NO ONE can touch the wonder of the 3 lead perfromances.
Clark...Leave it,go away, have twinkie and a deep think and go away and make you own film.

[ 25. January 2005, 21:47: Message edited by: 42ndStreetFreak ]

giallihaydw

I agree,to remake this would be just another AMerican crime film...
Im new here by the way.42NDSTREET,are you the same 42NDSTREET from the anchor bay site forum? im the same haydw but i added the "gialli" bit as i was bored...

samkydd

I’m getting a little fed up of American film makers taking good films and remaking them as bad ones, particularly British classics. Previous generations of film makers would read novels and commission a screenplay based on a good story, and with wit and imagination could turn it into something wonderful for the big screen.

The latest generation of film makers brought up on TV have all the imagination of a Friends scriptwriter and are too idle to bother researching something new and different. Either that or are just too frightened of failure.

The television programmes turned into films in recent years like The Saint, The Flintstones, Scooby Doo, Mission Impossible, Starsky & Hutch etc have all been absolute dross and that goes for the remakes of good films too; The Thomas Crown Affair, Get Carter, The Italian Job, The Ladykillers (wasn't that awful) et al.

We all seem to thrive these days on nostalgia and familiarity and if a film is based on something that has gone before people will flock to it in their droves! When they come out of the cinema they often feel that they’ve been conned and that the film was crap, but by then it’s too late, their money’s already in the coffers and the DVD version is already on its way to the shops ready to be bought by the suckers who missed it during its brief stint at the pictures, but still fell for the hype.

Call me Mr Cynical, but I think money is everything and creativity isn’t even on the list of priorities any more. I’d take Dogville over Die Another Day every time, at least such films give us some hope for the future!

I suppose Bob Hoskins will have a cameo role as the sodding white rabbit!

"...the chairman of Littlewoods stores made a Keynote speech!"