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Wednesday
21Oct2009

New Line to Remake 'What Women Want' for Kids

DateWednesday, October 21, 2009 at 6:53AM
I could have lived to be 1,000 and would never have guessed that a studio would not only remake What Women Want but that the studio making the decision would teen up the whole affair and call it What Boys Want. Can we be far away from an equal and opposite reaction leading to a poorly conceived book adaptation called Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret Thatcher?

New Line is the studio taking the Mel Gibson-Helen Hunt hit and putting in high school. It will reportedly star someone called Selena Gomez, and though I don't recognize her name, her show The Wizards of Waverly Place rings a bell. However, Gomez is already something of a power broker, I guess. She's got a production company and already has a deal in place to develop at least two films she'll star in and produce. And she's 17.

The film was pitched by Amy Andelson and Emily Meyer, the writing duo behind Step Up 3-D, a film I can guarantee won't rely on a screenplay for...anything. Clearly, this remake is based solely on the belief that Selena Gomez can draw a crowd, at least a fair percentage of the Waverly Place audience.

But the Disney-to-the-big-screen road isn't always paved with gold. That Jonas Brothers movie tanked, and the career of Hilary Duff never amounted to very much.

And this isn't even a Disney vertical integration thing; New Line will have to sell Gomez on her own to the tween audience, which can be surprisingly fickle. Of course, New Line found quite a bit of success this year with another Disney product, Zac Efron, in 17 Again. That movie also lacked for originality, but made a hefty amount of money. It cost a estimated $20 million and brought in over $135 million worldwide.

But can Gomez draw like Efron? Probably not. Will What Boys Want have enough of an adult component, the way 17 Again did, to bridge that gap? Also not sure about that.

AuthorColin Boyd | | in , | Print ArticlePrint Article | | Comment2 Comments |

Reader Comments (2)

as dave chappelle said about What Women want "you could never make the opposite of that movie, because it would be too gross" i guess they have to ruin a perfectly good movie rather than get their own ideas

Wednesday, October 21, 2009 | Unregistered CommenterChad

I was about to say the exact same thing that Chad did- as men, we're disgusting, but as boys, we're even more so. When I was in my early teens, man, I had a filthy, filthy mind.

I think it would be cute if it was called "What Girls Want" w/ Ms. Gomez in the lead female role & another up and comer playing the Mel Gibson role; that might work, although it'll probably be terrible. But far less terrible than this remake in reverse seems.

Wednesday, October 21, 2009 | Unregistered CommenterVince

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