Films that ripoff other films

[Nightowl]

The X-Files season one episode "Ice" rips-off John Carpenter's The Thing
The last episode of the first season of Psi Factor rip-off the above mentioned episode more than the movie

Thats a good one.

...More on The F13 Series:

Friday The 13th Part 2 rips from The Town That Deaded Sundown



The Town That Dread Sundown


Friday The 13th Part 3 rips from Bay Of Blood

[JaseSF]

The Island is a rip off of Parts: The Clonus Horror

Casablanca rip-offs: Caboblanco and Barb Wire

[Trevor]

The train-station scene from The Untouchables is supposedly a rip-off of the 1925 silent film Battleship Potemkin. I've never seen the film, but a friend of mine who was a film student told me that if you watch the scene from Battleship Potemkin it is pretty obvious.

Your friend is 100% correct ~ I once screened Potemkin to students who hadn't seen it before and one guy in the Q&A afterwards asked me why this Russian film ripped Brian DePalma's The Untouchables off. 

[Flick James]

The train-station scene from The Untouchables is supposedly a rip-off of the 1925 silent film Battleship Potemkin. I've never seen the film, but a friend of mine who was a film student told me that if you watch the scene from Battleship Potemkin it is pretty obvious.

Your friend is 100% correct ~ I once screened Potemkin to students who hadn't seen it before and one guy in the Q&A afterwards asked me why this Russian film ripped Brian DePalma's The Untouchables off. 

Wow. Really? Did the student not know that silent films pre-dated films with sound? Or do you think he believed someone made a silent film after The Untouchables? I hope he wasn't a film student.

[Rev. Powell]

The train-station scene from The Untouchables is supposedly a rip-off of the 1925 silent film Battleship Potemkin. I've never seen the film, but a friend of mine who was a film student told me that if you watch the scene from Battleship Potemkin it is pretty obvious.

Your friend is 100% correct ~ I once screened Potemkin to students who hadn't seen it before and one guy in the Q&A afterwards asked me why this Russian film ripped Brian DePalma's The Untouchables off. 

Funny story, Trev.

But what's the difference between tribute and a ripoff?  I'm sure DePalma defends scenes "quoting" Eisenstein and Hitchcock as a tribute, and I don't think he ever pretended they were his ideas originally.  Also, he didn't really gain any commercial advantage from these "tributes", and I think that attempt to ride on the popularity of someone elses ideas is the key feature of a "ripoff."

[Flick James]

The train-station scene from The Untouchables is supposedly a rip-off of the 1925 silent film Battleship Potemkin. I've never seen the film, but a friend of mine who was a film student told me that if you watch the scene from Battleship Potemkin it is pretty obvious.

Your friend is 100% correct ~ I once screened Potemkin to students who hadn't seen it before and one guy in the Q&A afterwards asked me why this Russian film ripped Brian DePalma's The Untouchables off. 

Funny story, Trev.

But what's the difference between tribute and a ripoff?  I'm sure DePalma defends scenes "quoting" Eisenstein and Hitchcock as a tribute, and I don't think he ever pretended they were his ideas originally.  Also, he didn't really gain any commercial advantage from these "tributes", and I think that attempt to ride on the popularity of someone elses ideas is the key feature of a "ripoff."

I'm a bit on the fence on this one, Rev. There is a part of me that suspect that De Palma was deeply tributary, but also used it to his advantage. My main consideration is the obsurity of Battleship Potemkin. Sure, your average film student would get it, but the average theatre-goer? I doubt it. Additionally, De Palma's train station sequence was very well done, IMHO, and it often a go-to point when someone is praising The Untouchables. Now, is it as bad as City of Angels, where Hollywood was blatantly ripping off Wim Wenders' Wings of Desire, counting on the virtual certainty that little to none of it's key demographic would have seen it? Well, no, but I have a hard time believing that De Palma wasn't at least thinking about it.

Anyway, I've alwasy enjoyed The Untouchables. Not a terrific film, but a decent balance of mainstream dialogue "money lines" and stylish filmmaking.

[Jack]

I'm currently watching Warriors of the Wasteland (as in, I haven't worked up the stamina to make it through to the end yet).  It's definitely a Road Warrior ripoff.

I always thought the X-wings vs. Death Star battle at the end of Star Wars was a direct ripoff of Midway. 

Let's see:

DNA rips off Predator.
R.O.T.O.R. rips off Robocop.
Komodo vs. Cobra rips off Curse of the Komodo (actually uses a page of its script).

Now I'm starting to think of Project Viper, which uses footage from Species, and Sorority House Massacre 2, which uses flashback scenes taken from the Slumber Party Massacre. 

Looking at some of Jim Wynorski's recent movies:   
House on Hooter Hill
The Breastford Wives
The Da Vinci Coed

Just guessing, but they sound like they might be inspired by other movies 

[InformationGeek]

Just about all Asylum films rips off something popular.  Snakes on a Train for example.

Ice Spiders rips off Eight Legged Freaks.

Tremors might be ripping of Dune or Blood Beach.

Grizzly rips off Jaws.

[Leah]

Psycho 2-4 rips off Hitchcock!
The Hearse rips off The Car
2 Fast 2 Furious rips off The Fast and the Furious
The Wraith Rips off Nail gun Massacre

[vukxfiles]

Piranhas rips-off Jaws

[Fausto]

Dressed to Kill. Complete ripoff of/homage to Psycho.

DePalma has something of an obcession with that film. You see a lot of little shout-outs to it in his stuff.

[Andrew]

I watched "Project Shadowchaser 3000" the other night, which rips off of both "Aliens" and "The Thing."  Instead of a cat there is a little dog, and the whole bit with a shapechanging creature (well, android) plays off of "The Thing."  The scene with the dead frozen guy at the radio in "The Thing"  is there.  Ditto with a reactor that is going to blow, and a last desperate fight at the escape pod (more like the original "Alien" in that regard).

There are also some nods to "The Terminator," and even to "Leviathan," but the influence is not nearly as strong as the other two films.

A film that shamelessly rips off of "The Thing" is "Unknown Origin."  It even copies some scenes and dialog exactly.  A review, which includes a sound clip of some copied dialog:

http://www.badmovies.org/movies/unkorigin/

[Joe the Destroyer]

Xtro 2 rips off Alien

The Giant Behemoth and The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms rip off Godzilla: King of the Monsters

Gappa: The Triphibious Monster rips off Gorgo (Gorgo sort of rips off Mothra)

Snowbeast rips off Jaws (same plot, but with a yeti in place of the shark and a snowy mountain resort in place of the ocean)

Parts of Autopsy rip off Suspiria

Bloody New Year rips off The Shining and The Evil Dead

Night of the Zombies rips off Dawn of the Dead

Reservoir Dogs rips off Q, The Winged Serpent (just remove the monster)

Manhattan Baby rips off The Exorcist

Avatar rips off of Dances with Wolves and Princess Mononoke (and probably a few other movies)

Dolly Dearest rips off of Child's Play

Tiki rips off of a segment from Trilogy of Terror

Humongous rips off of Anthropophagus

[JaseSF]

Beast From 20,000 Fathoms predates Gojira.

[Joe the Destroyer]

Beast From 20,000 Fathoms predates Gojira.

Good to know.  I always thought Gojira came first.