Lesser Known Sequels

[mothman]

Not too long ago I watched Godfather 3. Thinking surely it can't be as bad as they say. And, well, though I didn't hate it, there's defintely something lacking from the first two. Maybe it's having one too many subsitutions of existing characters for new ones (due to excessive salary demands); but then G2 had one or two of those as well to no great detriment. Perhaps it's far too much time spent on labyrinthine close-to-real events involving the Vatican Bank (and the notioin that the Corleone Family/Foundation has literally billions of dollars to throw around; yet Michael is supposed to be on this endless quest for respectability and legitimacy... hell, how much more respectable does he need to become?). Perhaps it's the too-neat mending of bridges with Kay. One thing I don't think it is is Sofia Coppola. Oh, sure, she's a terrible actress, but she's not in it all that much. One doesn't watch it thinking "Oh, if only Winona Ryder had played this part, she'd be much better AND would have saved this movie"

[Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth]

I read an article about this subject not too long ago, but I can't find it now. There's a mini industry dedicated to churning out straight-to-video sequels to pretty much any film that's moderately popular. The example given in the article was Jarhead 2: Something Something - it had no connection to the original beyond the name, but that's apparently enough. It's all about brand recognition and such. It's basically the slightly more respectable cousin of the mockbuster.

[Crabwalk]

If Prometheus 2 is a hit, I've heard that they're going to remake Alien as Prometheus 3. Then will follow Prometheuses, then Prometheus⁵ and finally Prometheus Erection.

[Custard]

Where do people stand on Airplane 2?

Some of the original cast, none of the creative team, and boy it shows

Its pretty shoddy when these studios package up bollocks sequels with the good films in DVDs, as its like eating a lovely Pot Noodle, before finding shards of glass in the bottom. But yup, that's how I've seen Airplane 2

US Marshalls was a vehicle to give Tommy Lee Jones' cop in The Fugitive another go round. I've never seen it, but I think it tanked. Wesley Snipes is doing the Harrison Ford, I think. Sounds great!

[mothman]

I have seen it but more than ten years ago and I can't recall anything about it. Did it have Wesley Snipes in?

I haven't seen Airplane 2 in years, and back then my critical faculties were much less (some would say they've not changed at all). I imagine if I watched it again now I'd be suitably appalled.

[St_Eddie]

...Sofia Coppola. Oh, sure, she's a terrible actress, but she's not in it all that much.

She might not be in it much but she still managed to shift my opinion of The Godfather: Part III from "pretty disappointing" to "pretty fucking bad".

Nepotism at its worst and I've seen After Earth!

US Marshalls was a vehicle to give Tommy Lee Jones' cop in The Fugitive another go round. I've never seen it, but I think it tanked. Wesley Snipes is doing the Harrison Ford, I think. Sounds great!

That's been sat on my shelf, next to The Fugitive for a couple of years now, still in its shrink wrapping.  I can never quite bring myself to actually watch the bloody thing.

[Custard]

To be a little fair to Francis Coppola though, I think he signed up Winona Ryder for the part of Michael's daughter, and she had to drop out last minute, for some reason. Though why they could only get in his non-actress daughter to play the role even at short notice, who knows. I'd have imagined most actresses would've killed for that role

Godfather III is proper terrible though, I think. I rewatched the trilogy a couple years back to check out them lovely looking blu-rays, and the third film is laughably bad compared to the first two. Embarrassingly so

[Steven]

Perhaps it's far too much time spent on labyrinthine close-to-real events involving the Vatican Bank (and the notioin that the Corleone Family/Foundation has literally billions of dollars to throw around; yet Michael is supposed to be on this endless quest for respectability and legitimacy... hell, how much more respectable does he need to become?).

All the Godfathers are based on very real events just switched around a bit, Mario Puzo hung around with Mafia types and so was told lots of stories and as with most explosive information fictionalised it into a novel. Godfather Part 3 shows Michael Corleone being 'initiated' into a Secret Vatican order at the beginning and the Corleone family welcomed into playing with the big boys, the Vatican has massive worldwide drugs and money laundering operations. This all ties in with the murder of Vatican banker Roberto Calvi and the murder of John Paul the 1st etc, trying to fit all these events into fictional narrative with the relationship shite between Michael and Kay, and awful romance scenes between Sofia and Andy Garcia without his shouting not going all Spanish was obviously a difficult task!

[Mijkediablo]

Where do people stand on Airplane 2?

Some of the original cast, none of the creative team, and boy it shows

Its pretty shoddy when these studios package up bollocks sequels with the good films in DVDs, as its like eating a lovely Pot Noodle, before finding shards of glass in the bottom. But yup, that's how I've seen Airplane 2

Yeah, it's dreadful. Like with the most comedies they repeat jokes and rehash situations, but that's not even the worst bit. For me, the nadir of Airplane 2 is the montage of footage from the first film. It's like watching Airplane on shuffle, but not even as fun as that would be.

[Johnny Textface]

Hold on, what about the door/screen thing with Shatner? #pissedmeselllaughingfuckinbrillopants

[St_Eddie]

To be a little fair to Francis Coppola though, I think he signed up Winona Ryder for the part of Michael's daughter, and she had to drop out last minute, for some reason. Though why they could only get in his non-actress daughter to play the role even at short notice, who knows. I'd have imagined most actresses would've killed for that role.

Well, preciously.  If it looks like nepotism, smells like nepotism and feels like nepotism; then it's nepotism, plain and simple.

Just because it didn't start out that way, doesn't mean that's not how it ended up.

[Replies From View]

Well, preciously.  If it looks like nepotism, smells like nepotism and feels like nepotism; then it's nepotism, plain and simple.

Or Nepotism 2.

[mothman]

Hold on, what about the door/screen thing with Shatner? #pissedmeselllaughingfuckinbrillopants

This is probably the hight point. And when we can say that the high point of the film is a Shatner "cameo" taking the piss out of himself, when we're looking back from a vantage point of 35 subsequent years of Shatner movie "cameos" where he takes the piss out of himself, that says something about the rest of the film.

(I appreciate that many roles were more than just cameos, but it felt apt to describe them as such, hence the quote marks)

[Small Man Big Horse]

I quite like Airplane 2, possibly due to my fondness for Shatner, but I think it's unfairly criticised and does have a lot of great moments in it. It's not as good as the first, obviously, but I'm not sure why it generates the hatred from some quarters (not here, but elsewhere) that it does.

[Ballad of Ballard Berkley]

Hold on, what about the door/screen thing with Shatner? #pissedmeselllaughingfuckinbrillopants

That's a genuinely great sight gag, hence why it's the only thing anyone ever remembers about Airplane 2.

[great_badir]

When compared with the preceding two films, Godfather 3 is always going to fall short.  But, if you take it on its own (and it can just about be taken as a stand-alone mob movie), there is absolutely nothing wrong with it[NB]aside from Sofia Coppola[/NB].

Also count me as another person who likes Airplane 2.  Not a patch on the first, obviously, but there's enough in there (besides Shatner's wholly brilliant cameo - packing his bags in a rush to do a runner gets and equally big belly laugh from me) to make it worth a watch.

[Ant Farm Keyboard]

Return From the River Kwai, directed by Andrew V Mclaglen right at the tail-end of his career, when he was making mostly really really bad films.  Starring Chris Penn, just as he started to put on the terry.  Denhom Elliot and Edward Fox try their best.  Also features one of the Bottoms brothers as an Aussie.  Which says it all.

Return from the River Kwai isn't a sequel or related to the David Lean film. It's based on a separate novel by different writers that happens to feature "Return" in the title.

The Two Jakes was supposed to be part two of a planned Jack Gittes trilogy that would have involved director Roman Polanski, lead Jack Nicholson, writer Robert Towne and producer Robert Evans. Chinatown was about water in the 30s, The Two Jakes was about oil/fire in the late 40s, and Gittes vs Gittes would have been about road system/air and earth in the fifties or early sixties.

With Roman Polanski out of the sequel for obvious reasons, Robert Towne intended to direct The Two Jakes in the eighties, with Kelly McGillis as Lilian or Kitty (I don't remember) and Robert Evans (who had made his start as an actor) as Jake Berman. Towne hadn't completed his script (he's notoriously late for delivering anything outside of script polishing), and Evans had just had plastic surgery (from friend Alain Delon's personal surgeon), opting for a catlike look, which shocked everybody when he came on set for the first time. The combination of changed looks with less facial mobility for an actor who had never been good to begin with, plus the script issues caused Towne to stop shooting after a couple of days.

Nicholson, who was still friends separately with Towne and Evans, directed the script (still left unfinished by Towne) in 1990, featuring Harvey Keitel (in what's actually a terrific understated performance that Keitel is seldom asked to deliver), and Richard Farnsworth's biggest part before he was cast as the lead on The Straight Story. Evans was the nominal producer.

But if you want more lesser known sequels:
More American Graffiti
The Miniver Story
The Evening Star (sequel to Terms of Endearment)
Texasville (sequel to The Last Picture Show)
Fiasco in Milan and Big Deal After 20 Years (sequels to Big Deal on Madonna Street)
A Man and a Woman: 20 Years Later
XXX 2: State of the Union
Carlito's Way: Rise to Power (prequel)
Shock Treatment (sequel to The Rocky Horror Picture Show)
2010: The Year We Made Contact
Return to Oz

[Ignatius_S]

Belles on Their Toes – sequel to Cheaper of the Dozen, no, not that one – the one with Clifton Webb.

I quite like Airplane 2, possibly due to my fondness for Shatner, but I think it's unfairly criticised and does have a lot of great moments in it. It's not as good as the first, obviously, but I'm not sure why it generates the hatred from some quarters (not here, but elsewhere) that it does.

I suspect a lot of it has to do with people who haven't seen it. It's very much more of the same; maybe not as good, but there's a very similar style and I really can't imagine anyone who liked the first, thinking it was a travesty.

Sequels usually aren't as good as the first and when the first film is held in high esteem, they're usually held up to higher scrutiny – conventional wisdom dictates the second film isn't going to be anything as good.

Also, people look at how much money a film made. I think I mentioned in another thread, with various articles and books, whenever there used to be lists of the 'greatest all-time turkeys', some high budget and very unprofitable films would always be on there – the principle being that if they lost that much money, they must be terrible. But many, if not all, have had reassessment and had some kind of rehabilitation.

Just had a quick look and Airplane 2 might have broken even but as the first was a huge hit, I'm sure that's coloured public opinion.

When compared with the preceding two films, Godfather 3 is always going to fall short.  But, if you take it on its own (and it can just about be taken as a stand-alone mob movie), there is absolutely nothing wrong with it...

If someone has watched the previous films, I think it's too much of a stretch to do that – particularly as you have the same person helming the project. But maybe that reflects more than me than anyone else.

...But if you want more lesser known sequels:
More American Graffiti
The Miniver Story
The Evening Star (sequel to Terms of Endearment)
Texasville (sequel to The Last Picture Show)
Fiasco in Milan and Big Deal After 20 Years (sequels to Big Deal on Madonna Street)
A Man and a Woman: 20 Years Later
XXX 2: State of the Union
Carlito's Way: Rise to Power (prequel)
Shock Treatment (sequel to The Rocky Horror Picture Show)
2010: The Year We Made Contact
Return to Oz

That's a good list. I think Texasville is sort of remembered because of a vague awareness of a follow-up, even if people aren't aware of the film on itself (speaking for myself, I always forget the name!). 2010 used to be talked about a lot more and it's interesting how that's diminished.

Wouldn't agree with Shock Treatment – because of the availability, it being often packaged with The Rocky Horror Picture Show and continuing interest in Rocky Horror, there's a definite awareness I would argue. It does get mentioned in UK press every so often (especially when O'Brien is being interviewed) and Barry Humphries also flags it when writing about his past, every so often. Also, it got a stage version (finally) this year, which got quite a bit of coverage (but did close rather early).

With Return to Oz, although I think in the wider public consciousness it's a 'forgotten' film, it resonates strongly with people who saw it when it came out.

[great_badir]

Return from the River Kwai isn't a sequel or related to the David Lean film. It's based on a separate novel by different writers that happens to feature "Return" in the title.

Well that's me learnt up - I had no idea.  Also props for extra Jakes info.  It was actually one of my dad's favourite films.

I love 2010, and Texasville is okay.

I think people of my generation and, perhaps, a bit older (mid 30s to mid 40s) may well have seen Return to Oz before the original - it certainly had regular TV airings in the UK throughout the late 80s and early 90s, which probably accounts for people-of-that-age's fondness for it.

More American Graffiti is plain embarrassing.

[Dr Rock]

Many of these films I remember as Quite Good (Two Jakes, Texasville, Psycho 2) and also in the category of FILMS THEY NEVER SHOW ON THE TV. BBC CUNTS BRING BACK SOMETHING LIKE MOVIEDROME YOU BBC CUNTS.

Channel Four, I've given up on you. 'Dementiaville'? Yeah that won't be exploitative.

[Head Gardener]

Wes Anderson's The Shining

[Brundle-Fly]

Here is the first sequel to the remake of a second sequel.

[mothman]

Ahh, 2010. I had such hopes for it, being as 2001 was already my favourite movie in my early teens (yes, I know, and let's not go there). Given Clarke's book was little like 2001 of course I wasn't expecting the sequel to be anything like the original, but neither was I expecting it to be such a complete mess. Was there some sort of rule in the 1980s that any film featuring Americans AND Russians had to go down the same "hey, you know, really we're all the same, so why don't we just try to get along?" route of trite cold war moralising?

And then there's the title: "The Year We Make Contact." Ugh, ugh, ugh. Plus, if what "contact" they make (fleeting) meets their definition of Contact, what would a possible film of 2061: Odyssey Three have been renamed to? 2061: The Year We Get Married And Settle Down In The Suburbs To Raise Half-Alien Children?

And, lastly and - and ohh, the fuckers reaped the whirlwind here, I tell you - most unforgiveably, they messed about with the internal structure of the Discovery. Long before I got a book about how 2001 was made and how they constructed a working centrifuge, I was trying to figure out the configuration (and, er, build it in Lego). Such profligacy wasn't in the budget for the sequel, so instead they had the primary hull full of nice long corridors seemingly using artifical gravity.

[Gulftastic]

Best bit from Airplane 2:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=it_JuaiJ0WM

[marquis_de_sad]

Ace Ventura: Pet Detective Jr.

I'm sorry.

[Replies From View]

Ace Ventura: Pet Detective Jr.

I'm sorry.

Because fatness is its own physical comedy.

[St_Eddie]

Huh, I only just found out that Sofia Coppola played one of Queen Armadillo's handmaidens in Star Wars Episode I: The Pant-line Crevice...

Bizarrely, this role lead to her being nominated for a 'Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Supporting Actress', which is very strange because she must have had one line of dialogue at most.  I'd say it was delayed retribution for her role in The Godfather: Part III but she'd already won a 'Golden Raspberry Award' for that.  Perhaps there were some who felt that one award wasn't enough punishment for that turkey.  I can't say that I'd disagree.

With Return to Oz, although I think in the wider public consciousness it's a 'forgotten' film, it resonates strongly with people who saw it when it came out.

That's very true.  I love Return to Oz.  It's so dark and has some inspired moments of creativity.

[checkoutgirl]

I have no idea why but 2010: The Year We Make Contact (1984) was one of the films we were shown in class in primary school when I was 9 or 10 years old. This would be around 1988. I can't be sure the reason for showing it to us. I suppose the teacher must have been a fan. It may not be much cop for film reviewers and seasoned adults alike but it's a fucking head trip for a 10 year old kid who is paying attention. "My god, it's full of stars" is a line that has baffled me ever since.

[Replies From View]

I seem to remember feeling not totally disdainful at The Lawnmower Man 2. This may have been because it was on TV late one Saturday evening in summer, when it was really hot AND the goons in the house backing onto ours were having a full-on house-invasion party which ended with police attending.

The back of the video tape proudly boasted that the effects were better than in Terminator 2.  I didn't know who to believe.

[thenoise]

Tagger got there first but here's the trailer