The “Watch the Original” List: 9 Foreign Films That Were Remade in Hollywood

Plenty of movie fans have had this experience. You watch a thriller or a comedy, enjoy it, and later learn it was based on a film from another country. Hollywood has borrowed from world cinema for generations, and the results have ranged from classics to shrugs.

Here are nine remakes worth knowing about, each paired with the original that came first. The originals are often easy to find and well worth a weekend evening.

Infernal Affairs and The Departed

Infernal Affairs came out in 2002 in Hong Kong. It was directed by Andrew Lau and Alan Mak, and it follows a police officer undercover in a triad and a triad mole inside the police. It’s tight and tense, and it runs at a brisk pace.

Martin Scorsese’s The Departed arrived in 2006 and moved the story to Boston. It won the Academy Award for Best Picture at the 2007 ceremony. Watching the original afterward shows how much the American version expanded the characters and the running time.

Ringu and The Ring

Hideo Nakata’s Ringu, released in 1998, is based on a novel by Koji Suzuki. It centers on a cursed videotape that kills viewers within a week. Its quiet, slow dread helped set off a wave of Japanese horror films.

Gore Verbinski directed the American version, The Ring, in 2002, with Naomi Watts in the lead. It keeps the core premise and the haunting imagery while giving the story a glossier look. The two films make a good double bill because their atmospheres feel so different.

Let the Right One In and Let Me In

Tomas Alfredson’s Swedish film Let the Right One In was released in 2008. It’s adapted from a novel by John Ajvide Lindqvist and tells of a lonely boy who befriends a strange new neighbor. The story is a vampire tale, but it plays more like a bleak, tender coming of age drama.

Matt Reeves directed Let Me In in 2010, setting it in New Mexico. Many critics found it a respectful remake, and it stays close to the original’s mood. Still, the Swedish snowbound setting gives the first film a chill that’s hard to duplicate.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

The Swedish adaptation of Stieg Larsson’s novel was released in 2009 and directed by Niels Arden Oplev. Noomi Rapace played Lisbeth Salander, the hacker who helps a journalist investigate a decades old disappearance. It was the first of three Swedish films based on the books.

David Fincher directed the English language version in 2011, with Rooney Mara as Lisbeth. Mara earned an Oscar nomination for the role. Since both films adapt the same book, comparing them is a handy way to see how two directors read the same material.

Oldboy

Park Chan wook’s Oldboy, released in South Korea in 2003, is a revenge story about a man held captive for years without explanation. It won the Grand Prix at the Cannes Film Festival in 2004. The film is also known for its stylized violence and a twist that’s hard to forget.

Spike Lee directed the American remake in 2013, starring Josh Brolin. It changed some details and didn’t win over audiences the way the original had. Even so, it’s an interesting case of a director taking on a famous cult film.

The Intouchables and The Upside

The Intouchables is a French comedy drama from 2011, written and directed by Olivier Nakache and Eric Toledano. Omar Sy and François Cluzet star as a caregiver and the wealthy man with quadriplegia who hires him. The film was a major hit in France and found a big audience abroad.

The Upside, directed by Neil Burger, starred Kevin Hart and Bryan Cranston. It was made in 2017 and reached American theaters in January 2019. It follows the same basic friendship story, though its humor and tone lean toward a more mainstream style.

Three Men and a Baby

This one surprises many people. Coline Serreau’s French comedy Trois hommes et un couffin came out in 1985, about three bachelors who suddenly find a baby on their doorstep. It was a big success in France.

The American remake, Three Men and a Baby, followed in 1987, directed by Leonard Nimoy. Tom Selleck, Steve Guttenberg and Ted Danson played the confused guardians. It’s a warm family comedy, and seeing the French original gives you a sense of its roots.

Seven Samurai and The Magnificent Seven

Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai, released in 1954, tells of a village that hires warriors to defend it from bandits. It’s long, but it’s praised for its characters and its action. Many later films have borrowed its structure of assembling a team for one big job.

John Sturges turned it into a western with The Magnificent Seven in 1960. The story moved to a Mexican village, and gunfighters replaced samurai. Antoine Fuqua made another version in 2016, so you can watch three takes on one idea.

Force Majeure and Downhill

Ruben Östlund’s Force Majeure, a Swedish film from 2014, follows a family on a ski holiday. An avalanche scare leads the father to react in a way that shakes the marriage. It’s a dry, uncomfortable comedy about how people see themselves.

Downhill, released in 2020, brought the story to American audiences with Will Ferrell and Julia Louis Dreyfus. It keeps the central incident but plays the awkwardness differently. Viewers who want the sharper, colder version of this story should start with the Swedish original.