James Gunn took to Facebook to confirm and support Mark and Brian Gunn’s involvement in writing the script for the remake of the 1994 action movie Timecop:



This is what my brother and cousin are up to. Their take on it is unbelievably cool.

Gunn then went on to discuss successful remakes of classic movies and how they can be an interesting counterpart to the source material:



The Man Who Knew Too Much, The Thing, The Fly, Casino Royale, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, The Wizard of Oz (yes, the famous one), The Departed, James Whale’s Frankenstein, The Maltese Falcon, and – although Tarantino only barely admits it – Reservoir Dogs are all remakes as good as or better than the original.



That said, a remake doesn’t need to be better than the original to be worth watching or making. Scorsese’s Cape Fear works as a counterpart to the original film and they’re fun to watch back-to-back. I always hoped that my own Dawn of the Dead was so different from the original – only the premise from that film really remains – that it would be full of surprises for people who know Romero’s film well.



Remakes are not “Hollywood running out of ideas” – they’ve been around in film since the silent era, and on stage long before that. Also, Hollywood isn’t pushing remakes on audiences – audiences go see them, so the studios keep them coming. So if you want to stop seeing films remade, stop watching them.



For me, all I care is that the movie works well, that it has heart, good characters, and a story that pulls me in, remake or not.

Timecop will be produced by Marc Shmuger (credits include We Steal Secrets: The Story of WikiLeaks and The Spectacular Now) and Mike Richardson from Dark Horse will be the Executive Producer. However, the Gunns are currently working on a number of scripts including: Journey 3, MacGyver and The Monster Squad.



