Spies like US ... Ulrich Mühe in The Lives of Others
Following the deaths of Anthony Minghella and Sydney Pollack in such quick succession, the focus has quite rightly been on the individual legacies left by each director. But now that the obituary writers and critics have had their chance to opine on the latter's life and films, attention has turned to the gaping hole left in the fabric of Hollywood by their joint departure.
Minghella and Pollack shared many things, not least an eye for a scene-stealing cameo. But they were also joint owners of the film production company Mirage Enterprises. And it seems that now that both have departed, the firm they left behind is rather at a loss as to how to move forward.
But what caught our eye when reading the story above, was not, with all due respect, the fact that the Botswana-set BBC TV series The No 1 Ladies' Detective Agency is now rather rudderless, but rather one of the proposed projects on Mirage's slate: namely, an English language remake of the Oscar-winning German thriller The Lives of Others.
The film was one of the most popular foreign language movies of the last 10 years, and even rated as theguardian.com/film readers' favourite film of 2007 in an end-of-year poll.
Great source material then? Well, yes, but with one significant problem: the entire thing was set in communist east Germany, at a time when the Stasi were so paranoid about dissent that they were tapping the apartments of half the population. We honestly can't think of another film so tied to its location and period in political history - and unless they're going to change those, what's the point of a remake? Surely a US version would be like remaking World Trade Center as a 19th century English costume drama.
Can you think of any other sillier remakes? And in particular, any that have actually made it to the big screen?
