ABSTRACT
Chapter 6: The Fashionable Remake explores the harnessing of fads as a key driver in media reproduction. I explore trends in genre – such as musicals and biblical epics in the 1950s, or horror films in the 2000s – whereby the whims of audience appetites are central motivations in remaking. Also examined are different happenings in the zeitgeist – for example cultural revolutions like evolving race and gender relations, and social issues such as HIV/AIDS, climate change and violence – that are harnessed to update material for a new audience, enabling an old story to seem fresh and cutting-edge. Renewed interest in certain topics like the military and surveillance emerging after 9/11 for example, saw the remaking of Cold War era media. Similarly, the era of MeToo and the Trump presidency ushered in a reinvigorated interest in women’s stories, thus seeing feminist and female-centric media remade to capitalize on the zeitgeist.
