March 24, 2009 Screenwriting duo Stiles White and Juliet Snowden didn't just the so-so sci-fi film "The Knowing," now in theaters. They are also writing the remakes of "The Birds" and "Poltergeist" and recently spoke with IGN about their take on the redos.

First, "The Birds":

"With something like The Birds, you can take the concept of birds gone crazy and put that onto a myriad of situations…It was presented to us as they wanted to go back to the original source material because you just don't want to attempt to remake a Hitchcock film. But the original novella, by Daphne du Maurier, had a lot of interesting source material. Alfred Hitchcock used it as his jumping-off point and told a story that was somewhat different from the novella….We took that same approach and went back to the source material rather than going to his film. Ultimately, what you would get is a modern-day telling of what if a bird phenomenon happened like that again -- rather than saying, 'This person's gonna play the Tippi Hedren role,' and 'Here's the famous moment on the jungle gym.' We really tried to avoid those things."

And on "Poltergeist":

"Poltergeist, on the other hand, is a much more specific story -- one family, one house. So, how to update that without just recycling it? Poltergeist was a seminal film for us, you know, in our lives, and it's like your dad's classic vintage car that's been in the garage and you're not allowed to touch it…Poltergeist was a real snapshot of the American family in the year that it came out --1982 -- and I think what we would do with the reimaging of it is, 'What is the American family up to today?'"

Well, how about this for a suggestion? Don't remake these movies at all -- especially not "The Birds." We don't want 'em, don't need 'em, and western culture would be better served by investing money in original projects.


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