Why is Quibi Remaking ‘The Princess Bride’ Instead of Shutting Down a Forever?

Quibi is such a stupid idea that it’s not surprising it was dreamed up by a Hollywood executive thinking he’s clever.  No one wants to watch a movie broken up into 5-10 minute chunks while sitting in a waiting room or whatever; if we want to watch a movie, we’ll sit and watch a movie. If we want to want a five-minute video to fill the time, we’ve got YouTube. Also, PornHub if you’re in a more forward-thinking waiting room.

I guess people didn’t hate Quibi enough because they’re remaking The Princess Bride, presumably just so when people won’t shut up about it they have to add “Oh, I mean the good one with Billy Crystal and Andre the Giant.”

And it’s even worse than you’re thinking. The New York Post reports that it was remade by the actors on their phones at him during quarantine.

Though the project is helmed by “Juno” director Jason Reitman, who has previously staged live readings of the film’s script, the remake was shot entirely at-home by each cast member using their phones. Beginning June 29, Quibi will release chapters of the fan-made movie every day for two weeks.

How do you pitch this? “Hey, you know that movie The Princess Bride that everyone loves? What if we do a remake of it and have it be absolute dogshit?”

”Dogshit you say?” replied a Quibi exec. “I know just the place for it.”

Okay, this isn’t a real remake, it’s more like a dumbass riff on the film with all the production values of Adam F. Goldberg recording himself playing with his parent’s video camera at age 12. But Hollywood needs to stop remaking good movies.

What studios need to do is start remaking bad movies. If I want to watch The Princess Bride, I don’t need a remake, I can just watch The Princess Bride because it’s still good. But what if I want to watch, I don’t know, anything Jim Belushi’s ever been in? I can’t because every tasing le thing he’s ever done is awful. He’s such a bad actor and loathsome person I’m surprised Quibi hasn’t bought the rights to According To Jim to chop it up into 5-minute episodes.

Why not leave the good movies alone and remake the Jim Belushi movies until you get something watchable?