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The precociousness of prequels METRO CANADA In Focus by Richard Crouse Published: June 1, 2011

X-Men: First ClassThe official definition of prequel is: a work that supplements a previously completed one, and has an earlier time setting. The unofficial meaning reads like this: prequels, a way to prolong a failing movie franchise’s life.

On McSweenys.net recently Sarah Garb suggested titles for some lesser known Hollywood prequels. My favorites? Four Bachelorette Parties and a Friend in the Hospital, Borderline-Inappropriate Dancing and There Are Plenty of Mohicans. Of course those movies don’t exist but you get the idea.

OK, I’m being cynical. Not all prequels are money grabs. The Godfather 2 is one of the greatest movies, prequel, sequel or otherwise, ever made and my fingers are crossed for this weekend’s X-Men: First Class, set in 1963 when Charles Xavier starts up a school for humans with superhuman abilities.

Hopefully the new cast, featuring white hot Oscar nominee Jennifer Lawrence and Brit favorite James McAvoy will mutate the movie into something a little more interesting than the dull-as-its-star’s-retracting-bone-claws-after-a-manicure X-Men: Origins: Wolverine.

Of course prequels are nothing new. The 1949 drama Another Part of the Forest supplied the backstory to the 1939 hit The Little Foxes and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly was a prequel to A Fistful of Dollars.

More recently George Lucas chose to make Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom a prequel to Raiders of the Lost Ark—Raiders is set in South America, 1936, while Temple takes place in Shanghai, 1935—as he did not want to use Nazis as villains once again.

The Silence of the Lambs, the story of creepy cannibal Hannibal Lecter, inspired not one, but two prequels and a sequel. Prequel-wise it had its ups-and-downs.

First the good. Red Dragon featured an all star cast, including Edward Norton, Ralph Fiennes, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Harvey Keitel and, of course, Anthony Hopkins who helps law enforcement track down a mysterious serial killer called The Tooth Fairy.

Five years later they took one more kick at the cannibal can with Hannibal, Lecter’s origin story. Hopkins was lucky enough not to be included. Rhys Ifans and Gong Li weren’t.

Finally, there’s The Hobbit, a two-part film adaptation of J. R. R. Tolkien’s 1937 novel and prequel to The Lord of the Rings trilogy, which has internet fanboys all abuzz. One thing is certain, with Peter Jackson at the helm it has to be better than Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd. Right?


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