I'm looking for instances where a movie remake is superior than the original. I know the classic examples are The Maltese Falcon and His Girl Friday, but I'm especially wondering if any films during the present Hollywood Remake Glut have been worthwhile.

I'm assuming the ones I'm thinking of were the "remakes". i didn't realize there were other versions.

Ocean's 11. The original was pretty awful, really.

Ghastly. Although the ending was pretty good.

I fell asleep during both iterations of Solaris, but the only thing I could say was definitively better about the Soderbergh version was that it was significantly shorter.

Yes.

I preferred The Birdcage to La Cage Aux Folles.

Heresy!

Hitchcock's remake of The Man Who Knew Too Much is supposed to be better than his original, right? I've only seen the remake.

I don't know. Production values are better, but the whole "Que sera sera" aspect might blow this theory.

JZ will make the case that the Julia Ormond/Harrison Ford Sabrina is better written and cast than the original with Audrey.

She can make the case, but my Audrey love is too great to admit she is right.

Actually, to be perfectly accurate, the remake is way, way better written, but the original is probably more or less better cast (more WRT Hepburn and Holden, less WRT Bogart, who didn't much like Hepburn or the entire project and it showed). My absolutely ideal film production would have Audrey Hepburn, William Holden and Harrison Ford using the remake's script.

And, since I am language's bitch, if I have to choose one version, I'll go for the remake. Reluctantly and regretfully, but still. Better words, and all three lead actors thoroughly invested and committed (I love Bogie beyond words, but he really didn't like doing Sabrina, and an actor who doesn't give a shit and is walking through a role, even one like Bogie who oozes charisma even when he isn't trying, just gets my back up).

Production values are better, but the whole "Que sera sera" aspect might blow this theory.

Not a fan?

I preferred The Birdcage to La Cage Aux Folles.

::boggles::

I'm pretty sure The Birdcage is the original source of my abiding Robin Williams hatred. Even more than his hideous string of "sickly sad clown/robot/divorced dad/miscellaneous manboychild with a song in his heart and a wound in his soul" abominations. Nathan Lane was wonderful, and Calista Flockhart was surprisingly good in a tiny and mostly thankless role, but the entire rest of the movie was, to me, a bucket of meh. Except Williams, who was a bucket of STABKILLRAGE.

Although the ending was pretty good.

It's definitely the best part, but it doesn't quite make the rest of the movie worthwhile, alas.

Todd Haynes' Far From Heaven is gorgeous and beautifully acted, and I like that much better than the Douglas Sirk version, mostly owing to my complete inability to take Rock Hudson seriously as the flannel-wearing, Thoreau-quoting naturalist/lover.

Uh, it's not exactly highbrow, but I really like Rob Zombie's take on Halloween. As a movie (with, like, actual plot and motivation, in so much as they are horror movie plot points), I like it a lot more than the original.

I heard the sequel was a big mess, though.

I'm looking for instances where a movie remake is superior than the original

The Thing.

Little Shop Of Horrors.

Nathan Lane was wonderful, and Calista Flockhart was surprisingly good in a tiny and mostly thankless role, but the entire rest of the movie was, to me, a bucket of meh.

Hank Azaria!

Far From Heaven isn't actual a remake, more an homage, AFAIK.