At press previews, to which movie critics are lured on weekday mornings by platters of complimentary croissants and fruit segments, a special mood of resentment greets the unspooling of a franchise in its later instalments: the ninth Nightmare on Elm Street, say, or the 12th Friday the 13th. Relentless repetition of the same characters or set-up is viewed as proof of imaginative poverty and commercial opportunism.
As another Great Expectations, Wuthering Heights and Anna Karenina loom, Mark Lawson writes in the Guardian on why they still appeal. Very interesting and thoughtful but I keep asking myself do we really need another Great Expectations, Wuthering Heights or Anna Karenina? Why not try some other Victorian writers?
