I just don't get it. Movie remakes (Prequels?)

I just don’t get it.  Lately, all the movies that have been coming out are remakes of movies I saw as a child or teen.  Just like the styles repeating, Hollywood is going retro.  What’s the point in that?  I mean, come on, I’m a big fan of the Lifetime Movie Channel.  The stories keep me watching, so I know there’s enough material out there to go around without having history repeat itself.

Sure, some movies need to have a sequel – but a prequel?  Really?  I’d be lying if I didn’t say I liked some of the prequels, but I also believe there are some great books just itching to be screen plays.

In fact, as I write I see the “production” in my head.  That doesn’t mean I have any illusions about my books becoming screen plays and ending up as movies.  It does, however, allow me to “see” what I’m writing.  As I write, I picture the scene.  Then it’s my job to tell the reader what I see, using as many senses as possible as in my earlier blogs.

The best part about this is where I get to go.  I’ve been lucky enough to travel the U.S. a few times as well as abroad.  I love to travel and I’m convinced I should have been a long distance trucker.  Ah, well, guess I’ll just have to write about that instead.  Anyway, since I haven’t been to every city in every state, I get to invent my own.  How’s that for power?

On the rare occasion that I write about something non-fabricated, I do a lot of research first.  I start simple and then delve deeper as my own plot takes momentum.  I make sure that seasons and scenery match.  I make sure cities have the buildings I describe and gather pictures of those buildings so I can describe them to readers who haven’t been there yet.  I try to capture the essence of the people who live there.

Growing up on the East Coast, I can’t tell you the culture shock of just moving to the West.   There is truly a different mindset here.  I would totally misrepresent these places if I didn’t research true places I have chosen to write about.  That’s why most writing teachers will tell their students to write about what they know.

Of course, there is a little of me in all my books.  I just look different in each one!  That’s another cool aspect about writing.  As your characters develop and surprises you (oh yes they will!), there is a feeling of pride.  Their presence is larger than the big screen Hollywood production going on in your head.  Just as the reader lives through the characters, the writer has been there first.

Authors who are lucky enough to have developed a character which readers fall in love with, are also smart enough to present that character in future novels.  Now here’s the stuff for movies, right?  One heroine, spurned by true love, throws herself into her work, or perhaps a flawed detective who we all fall in love with solves many a crime.  These characters are as alive to the reader as any on the silver screen.

So how do we show the reader our own production?  We carefully form the world around them.  Whether there are flashbacks, fight scenes or lustful love trysts, we must produce interest, emotion and realism so the reader can see the story we have created on the page.

Will we all be asked to do a screen play for our books?  Wouldn’t that be lovely?  But for most of us, we prefer to relive our story in its original form and not the “made-for-TV version”.  Still, the draw is there and the possibilities are as endless as our own imaginations.