Director Timo Tjahjanto responds to the backlash over the decision to remake the beloved Train To Busan.
Not everybody is happy about Train To Busan, the brilliant South Korean action movie, getting the Hollywood remake treatment. What’s more, those disgruntled fans have been letting the project’s director, Timo Tjahjanto, know their feelings via Twitter.
In turn, Tjahjanto has responded to the criticism by outlining just how much he cares about the project, and by reminding fans that he is in no way intending to let anybody down, least of all, James Wan, both his ‘boss’ on the project and his idol.
Tjahjanto took to Twitter to say: “when your @ is suddenly filling up & its more about Train to Busan remake. In James (Wan) own words: Timo, we need to rise above & beyond everyone’s expectations, just like other great remakes have done such as The Ring or Dawn of the Dead remake. Who am I to let my boss down ?”
Whether you feel that the two remakes mentioned above were able to ‘rise above and beyond everyone’s expectations’ is of course, a matter of personal taste. However, it does seem that working for Wan is a powerful personal motivator for Tjahjanto, who also tweeted, “needed to add that James has been my hero since my college days. As a South East Asian kid from a conventional middle class family who doesn’t exactly encourage artistic endeavors ( i.e blowing up heads, smearing fake blood) his rise from SAW inspired alot of us SEA genre doofus.”
It’s doubtful that Tjahjanto’s comments will ease fan concerns, but as with all projects, the director should be given the space to make the film he wants to make before judgement is passed. There’s little doubt though that the original Train To Busan is a beloved film, and rightly so. We’d advise you to make sure you’ve seen it before the Hollywood English language version remake pulls into the station at some point in the future.
Here are the Tweets…
— Thank you for visiting! If you’d like to support our attempts to make a non-clickbaity movie website: Follow Film Stories on Twitter here, and on Facebook here. Buy our Film Stories and Film Stories Junior print magazines here. Become a Patron here.When your @ is suddenly filling up & its more about Train to Busan remake. In James (Wan) own words: Timo,we need to rise above & beyond everyone’s expectations, just like other great remakes have done such as The Ring or Dawn of the Dead remake. Who am I to let my boss down ? pic.twitter.com/39eeBJu4bO
— Timo Tjahjanto (@Timobros) August 29, 2021
