Conclusion

“In remaking or sequelising Hollywood, Bollywood plays an important role not only in constituting “Indian-ness”, but in continuing the ideologies that pervade the cultures of India well into the future.” (Cooke, 2009) Film Sequels: Theory and Practice from Hollywood to Bollywood by Carolyn Jess-Cooke, Page 121”

Firstly, I would like to revel that Sholay itself is a remake of two Hollywood and hence we cannot call it “original”. The movie is an ‘Indianised’ version of Seven Samurai (1954); (which was remade as Magnificent 7) and Once upon a time in the West (1968).

Hence Sholay is not exactly an original film. As a result, this leads to a few questions; what can be called original? The question of fidelity, and is there really a point in remakes?

The first question is of what is original and what is not.

“The film’s originality, paradoxically, lies in the audacity of its imitation, quotation and absorption of other texts, its ironic hybridisation of traditionally opposed discourses.” (Stam, Burgoyne & Flitterman-Lewis).

The definition of originality is the ‘quality of being original’ and the same dictionary defines original as:

1. Preceding all others in time; first.

2. a. Not derived from something else; fresh and unusual: an original play, not an adaptation.

b. Showing a marked departure from previous practice; new: a truly original approach.

3. Productive of new things or new ideas; inventive: an original mind.

4. Being the source from which a copy, reproduction, or translation is made

(Definitions from www.thefreedictionary.com)

The first, second and third definition would regard Sholay as a copy and not original but if one looks at the forth definition which says that it is a source from which a copy or reproduction is made; then Sholay can be considered. Hence, one can conclude that putting a tag of originality on a movie differs from person to person. Some will disregard the fact that Sholay is ‘inspired’ from another movie and some will accept it and still adore the movie and there will be some who wouldn’t like the movie irrespective of the fact that it is original or not. Sometimes originality is simply how much creativity one puts in the work instead of blindly copying.

Talking about fidelity; this word is generally used for adaptations of literature into moving images. “Andre Bazin highlights fidelity to ‘the spirit rather than the letter’” (Elliott, 2003). We would not get into the depth of the fidelity argument but the basic point theorists of fidelity argue is that the adaptation should be kept real to the source. But when fidelity is considered for remakes which can be regarded as a type of adaptations i.e. video to video adaptation or similar to adaptations; a viewer will view the film depending on his knowledge of the ‘original’ i.e. the source of the remake. If the viewer has seen the previous work he/she will unintentionally compare the two; and will make his perception about the remake according to his view about the original. For example, when I saw the remake of the movie Casino Royale; I liked the film a lot; being a hard core Bond fan, I have seen the Casino Royale (1967) and I liked the film but the 2006 Daniel Craig film appealed to me more as it was not only very well shot but every other aspect of the film was outstanding. It was not a cut copy paste of the original. It had its own uniqueness and 21^st century’s feel.

This brings us to the last and most important question; is there a point in a remake?

After looking at the different types of remakes and the reasons a remake is made, from an audience’s point of view, it can be said that it is not bad to remake a film. I conducted a small survey and saw that around 34 % of the people said yes when they were asked if movies should be remade and 56% were unsure if they want to watch a remake and only arounf 10% were negative about remakes (http://www.surveymonkey.com/MySurvey_Responses.aspx?sm=LSZTESEhzNLBygYhtc6Oz5YZo%2b2vOS2rYQpnIklDOeI%3d). Also, the audiences are negative about movie remakes mostly because of having a bad experience after watching some dreadful remakes like Ram Gopal Varma Ki Aag and Ugly aur Pagli (remake of a Korean movie-My Sassy girl). If remakes are not made we would not have been able to enjoy classics like a King Kong, Sholay, Ocean’s Eleven, Casino Royale and many more! So it is impossible to stop people from remaking films; but it is important for filmmakers to understand the value of the original film and treat it in a very good way with the use of their creativity to make better movies.

Thank you for reading.

I would like to thank my professor Jim Pope for giving us this project so that we could understand the theory behind film making and apply it in practical film making.

Bibliography:

Fidelity knowledge: Adaptation: Studying Film and Literature by John Desmond, Peter Hawkes.

Film Adaptation and Its Discontents: From Gone with the Wind to The Passion of the Christ By Thomas M. Leitch

N put all the others