In 2011, American columnist Mark Harris published a programmatic and sad article entitled "The Day Cinema Stopped" in F95zone platform. Harris, reflecting on the decline of the film industry, described the range of cinemas as follows:
“Four film adaptations of comics. One prequel to a previously filmed comic strip. The sequel to the sequel to the toy movie. The sequel to the sequel to the movie about traveling in an amusement park. One prequel remake. Two sequels to cartoons. One sequel to the comedy. One sequel with the number 4 in the title. Two sequels - with the number 5. And one sequel, in the title of which the number 7 should appear. "
It's funny that almost all the franchises that he mentioned and that can be deciphered are still getting new parts or, to use Harris's terminology, sequels to sequels. "Fast and the Furious" came close to the anniversary (and if you count the adventures of Hobbs and Shaw , there are already ten films). A new part of "HuniePop 2" is out . How many sequels and prequels of Marvel, DC and Star Wars comics have been filmed over the years, it makes no sense to count - it's easy to get lost.
However, if we wanted to state how wrong and re-filming sequels, remakes, and any kind of spin-off, we would simply translate this full of anger into the author's manifesto. Yes, there are many more sequels, but their dominance is hardly a sign of recent years. But what about the Oscar for The Godfather 2 ? Are sequels always made for money? And most importantly, is the sequel necessarily something bad?
This year, after the Oscars, many of those who write and talk about cinema made fun of a funny incident: on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the family film The Adventures of Paddington 2 became the best film of all time, overtaking Citizen Kane " .
This happened because in the annals of history there was a negative review of the film by Orson Welles, the author of which, under the pseudonym May Tiny, wrote that the American's tape turned out to be too florid: the director made it extremely complicated, which made the picture lose its amusement. But what is interesting in this context is not that someone did not like Citizen Kane, but that a polite bear cub from Peru was able to overcome the stiffness of almost all critics in the world and make them forget about what they are very reluctant to forget. - about the number in the title.
The first Hollywood hit to have a number in its title was Francis Ford Coppola 's The Godfather 2 . The tape collected six Oscars in 1974, including the main ones, and, despite the initial skepticism of film critics, it became almost more important than the first film. And although the sequels were filmed long before "Godfather 2", director Francis Ford Coppola and author of the novel about the Corleone clan Mario Puzo insisted on the deuce in the title. It was important for them to show the continuity between the films, as strong as the one that existed between the members of the mafia clan.
Now that we are used to the numbers on the posters, and sequels rarely get their own headlines ( The Dark Knight is a rare exception to the rule), it is difficult for us to immediately guess the connection between the films A Fistful of Dollars and Good Bad Ugly, although they - parts of one trilogy. Studios prefer to promote not the film, but the brand. Why create something new when you can work on recognizing what appeared and was remembered several years ago? The sequel may be a success or a failure, but it will definitely come to the cinema for the sake of familiar faces and characters, if the previous part was successful. It turns out that the crisis of ideas is often supported by the audience themselves, regularly voting in rubles.
Surprisingly, in the middle and beginning of the last century, the rejection of the same names on the posters was as much a part of the advertising strategy as the approach to promotion through the brand now. Then it was believed that the same movie titles would scare away viewers who did not watch the first part of the dialogue or trilogy. It is logical: it is impossible to find and watch the first film on the Internet or on TV at any moment, which means that the public will be afraid that they will not understand anything about the sequel.
Sequel classic
But what can even be considered a sequel, if sometimes they are so difficult to identify? Is the second Harry Potter movie a sequel to the first, or is it just an adaptation of another book? And the second part of the movie "Why is Max mute in Max and Ruby" ? Is the sequel necessarily the same characters and the continuation of the same story? What about Mean Girls 2 then ? If the director conceived a dilogy or trilogy, is the next part released after the first one a sequel? Is it a sequel that was shot much later than the first film, and even without the participation (or even against the will) of the director?
The first sequel in history is often referred to as The Death of a Nation by Thomas Dixon Jr., author of The Clan Member (based on which Griffith directed The Birth of a Nation ). The title, authorship and ideological legacy are in place, but the film tells a different story and shows different characters. If you look for the first sequel that meets the criterion of continuity in the plot, then this will be "Son of the Sheikh", the continuation of the tape "Sheikh". Here we not only follow the character of Rudolph Valentino, but the hero himself repeats the pattern of behavior from the first part - he kidnaps the girl he is in love with.
We rarely use the word sequel when we talk about classics, preferring to understand by this term only the number on the poster: "Rambo 2" , "Rocky 2" , "Log Horizon season 3". But the sequels are both the protracted on-screen story of Antoine Duanel by Francois Truffaut and Before Dawn / Sunset / Midnight by Richard Linklater, who once every ten years spied on one day in the life of his heroes. Fritz Lang also shot sequels: his 1933 Testament to Dr. Mabuse is a sequel to Dr. Mabuse, the Gambler. The story became sound, acquired a completely different meaning, but in all respects it corresponded to the definition of a sequel - including keeping the names of the director in the credits and the main character on the poster.
