Welcome to the Summer 98 film series, in which we'll be featuring remakes. Specifically, films that were originally made in black-and-white, and then were remade later in color. There aren't many restrictions on which film will be shown; in some instances, we'll be watching the first half of one film and the last half of the other.

The theme for this series was picked by Tanya, so she got to have first shot at picking a film.

Date Shown	Whose Pick	Film Title	What's the history?
June 11, 1998	Tanya	Little Shop of Horrors	What's the history?
June 18, 1998	Scott	Gamera, Guardian of the Universe	What's the history?
July 2, 1998	Amy	Sabrina (1954)	What's the history?
July 9, 1998	Jyotika	Wings of Desire (1987)	What's the history?
July 16, 1998	Chris	The Philadelphia Story / High Society	What's the history?
August 12, 1998	Christina	The Country Girl (1954)	What's the history?

Little Shop of Horrors

Little Shop was made as a b-grade horror/comedy film in 1960. It featured one of the first screen appearances of Jack Nicholson, as the masochistic dental patient. The film was reworked as a musical stage play, which was then made into a film in 1986. We watched the first half of the 1960 film and the last half of the 1986 remake.

Gamera

Gamera was a rival Japanese studio's answer to Godzilla in the 1950's and 60's. As a giant turtle, he had to do even more fantastic feats to keep up with his more famous cousin. Like Godzilla, he was resurrected in the 1990's with new special effects. We saw short scenes from the original Gamera and Gamera vs Guiron, and then watched 1995's Gamera, Guardian of the Universe.

Sabrina

The original 1954 Sabrina featured Audrey Hepburn, William Holden, and Humphrey Bogart as Sabrina and the Larrabee brothers, respectively. The film was remade in an updated form (i.e. certain story elements were changed) in 1995 and the cast comprised Julia Ormond, Greg Kinnear, and Harrison Ford. We watched only the original film, but Amy made us promise to watch the remake if we wanted to say anything bad about it.

Wings of Desire (1987)

Wings of Desire, a thoughtful film about Angels watching over post-war Berlin, was remade this past year as City of Angels. Among the changes they made: the movie takes place in L.A. (of course), Peter Falk's part was played by Dennis Franz, and Meg Ryan's brain-surgeon character was originally a trapeze artist. We bet the trapeze artist had better costumes.

The Philadelphia Story / High Society

The Philadelphia Story starred Cary Grant, Katherine Hepburn, and Jimmy Stewart as characters caught up in the intrigue surrounding a socialite wedding. Essentially, Hepburn's character comes to realize her own imperfections and learns to forgive the imperfections of others. The remake, High Society, succeeded by turning the original play into a musical, and featuring excellent actors -- Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, and Grace Kelly. It also didn't hurt that Crosby and Sinatra were also two of the greatest singers ever. One of the best remakes ever.

The Country Girl

In The Country Girl, Bing Crosby and Grace Kelly made the most unlikely screen pair ever, at least until the film was poorly remade with Dick Van Dyke and Faye Dunaway 28 years later. Crosby plays a former singer/actor who loses his faith in himself after his son dies in a car accident. Kelly plays a very de-glamorized role as his wife who tries to help him return to his profession.