Legendary horror director John Carpenter says that he supports all remakes of his films, as long as he gets paid. This stance is unlikely to surprise anyone familiar with Carpenter, as he's always been the type of guy to not hold back on his opinions, regardless of what the masses might think of them. While he hasn't directed a feature since 2010, Carpenter's filmmaking career lasted for over 30 years, and the man clearly knows of which he speaks when it comes to topics involving the film business.

While most of Carpenter's films weren't huge financial hits at the time of their release, few directors have proven as successful when it comes to their work attracting loyal cult audiences as the years go on. Films like The Thing, Big Trouble in Little China, and They Live weren't given much respect at first, but have since gone on to earn dedicated fanbases and reputations as genre classics of the 1980s.

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That said, it makes perfect sense that Carpenter's films have often been targeted for remakes or reboots, as his projects tend to carry with them an heir of importance among those who love horror, sci-fi, and action. To date, three of Carpenter's 18 features have been remade, those being Halloween, The Fog, and Assault on Precinct 13. The Thing was also basically remade, albeit in the form of a prequel story that shared the same title and covered almost all the same plot points. None of those remakes received great reviews, but is Carpenter bothered by that? Nope, not even a bit. He recently offered the following comments on the subject to The Guardian.

"I love it, if they are going to pay me money. If they pay me, it’s wonderful. If they don’t pay me, I don’t care. I think it’s unfair if they don’t pay me. I think everyone should pay me. Why not? I’m an old guy now and I need money. Send me money."

Escape from New York Kurt Russell John Carpenter Snake Plissken

While Carpenter's tone seems to be at least somewhat tongue-in-cheek, it's doubtful that he doesn't mean what he said, as he's expressed similar blunt, money-focused sentiments in the past. Of course, there's nothing necessarily wrong with Carpenter's attitude, as everyone needs to make a living. Also, no matter how badly the aforementioned remakes turned out, Carpenter's original films continue to stand the test of time, and earn new fans.

The next Carpenter films slated for the remake treatment are Kurt Russell-fronted 80s cult classics Escape from New York and Big Trouble in Little China. Both films have been in the remake pipeline for many years, but always seem to get stalled at some point. Currently, Robert Rodriguez is attached to direct the Escape remake, while Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson has been attached to produce and star in a Big Trouble remake since 2015, and was still insisting the project was alive last summer. Judging by his comments above, Carpenter probably wishes that both projects would get going already, for the sake of his bank account if nothing else.

More: John Carpenter: Halloween (2018) is Direct Sequel to Original Film

Source: The Guardian

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