Peter Jackson to remake classic British war film 'The Dam Busters'
September 3rd, 2006 by Chris Blagden
The Lord of the Rings and King Kong director Peter Jackson is set to redevelop the 1954 war movie ‘The Dam Busters.’
The original movie, a now classic british war film carried the famous tag line ‘The story of the “bombs that had to bounce” - and the air-devils who had to drop ‘em!’
Peter Jackson is set to act as producer for the new film, while King Kong animator Christian Rivers will direct.
Jackson said it would be “as authentic as possible and as close to the spirit of the original as possible”.
The 1954 original movie was a true story of how during the Second World War Britain developed the now famous ‘bouncing bombs’ to destroy vital German dams and infrastructure. The Dam Busters is based on a book by Paul Brickhil. The the original film, shot in black and white starred Michael Redgrave as Barnes Wallis and Richard Todd as Wing Commander Guy Gibson. It was Gibson who eventually led the RAF bombing mission to drop the bombs and destroy the german dams. The new remake is set to use details of the actual bombing mission that were still unreleased to the public at the time.
The original version of the film was made by director Michael Anderson and he would not have been privy to all of the information about the famous raid as it was still clasified at the time.
The new Peter Jackson project is due to start filming next year, with an estimated budget of £16-21m.
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Not a good idea to re-make Dam Busters as it wouldn’t work in today’s politically correct world (nonsense though a lot of it is). Therefore you might have to re-write the truth to pander to certain sections, not a good idea. Besides which the Dam Busters was a absolutely brilliant film and you couldn’t possibly better it!
Leave it well alone is my view.
It is not compulsory for a re-make to be a re-hash. In the former category, “Ocean’s Eleven”; in the latter, “Psycho”. The same story can be told any number of ways, as long as the telling of it is entertaining. In 1954 neither the writer nor producer had access to the full truth behind the dam-busters - which was that, despite the inventive genius of Barnes-Wallis and the bravery of the flight crews, the mission itself was not a tactical success. For myself I look forward to seeing what ought to be a contemporary and fully-informed “take” on one of the most extraordinary tales of WW2.