It is one thing to remake a movie from the 50s for a modern audience who believe anything released prior to the year 2000 is not worth watching, but when that movie is one of the best movies of all time? It seems that this scenario could be about to happen as it has been suggested that 1958 Alfred Hitchcock thriller Vertigo is to get a remake with Robert Downey Jr. being eyed to take over the role of John “Scottie” Ferguson. The character was originally played by James Stewart, who as Ferguson found himself entangled in a web of murder, deceit and mistaken identity in what has previously been voted the best movie of all time by Sight & Sound.
According to the report from Deadline, the new movie will be written by Peaky Blinders and new Star Wars writer Steven Knight, and will be coming from Paramount Pictures, who have acquired the rights. The report says that Paramount was the preferred studio for the remake, over Universal who have held the rights to the Hitchcock Estate since the 1980s. Having previously distributed the original movie, as well as many of Hitchcock’s best known movies including Rear Window, The Man Who Knew Too Much and the iconic Psycho, it makes sense to bring the remake home.
Robert Downey Jr. will not only star in the movie, but also forms part of the production team with his wife Susan Downey for Team Downey. They will be joined by Davis Entertainment’s John Davis and John Fox. There is currently no date set for the movie’s release.
Vertigo Is One of The Greatest Movies of All-Time
While there are many movies of the 1950s that could be improved upon, Vertigo is not one of them, and that raises the question of what the remake can actually bring to the party other than becoming another unnecessary remake of a movie that is destined to be doomed to comparisons to Alfred Hitchcock’s masterfully executed film.
The 1958 movie starred Stewart alongside Kim Novak, Barbara Bel Geddes, Tom Helmore, Raymond Bailey and Henry Jones, and is not only considered one of Hitchcock’s best movies, but in 2012 the film overtook Citizen Kane as Sight & Sound’s greatest movie of all time, toppling Citizen Kane from the top spot for a rare occasion. With those kind of credentials, it is a brave decision to attempt to remake what is considered by many to be a perfect movie.
Of course, many Hitchcock films have been given the remake treatment over the years, although in many cases you could be forgiven for irradiating many of them from memory – Vince Vaughn’s Psycho anyone? It is hard to believe that Vertigo can be any different, and even though Robert Downey Jr. has plenty of acting experience behind him and more than capable of delivering a credible performance as Detective Ferguson, it is hard to see the new version of the movie being anything other than a pale imitation of the innovative and insurmountable original.