What were the worst ripoff copycats?

[Johnny Z]

What movies were blatant and terrible ripoffs of other movies? I know that Halloween was the launching pad for slasher/killer movies of the late 70's, early 80's but for the most part don't consider the subsequent bloodlettings copycats.

[Cullen]

Carnosaur 2.  That movie so wanted to be Aliens.  A really painful mess.

[FearlessFreep]

Good freaking grief!  Pick any big movie from the last  30 years and you can name dozens of copycats

Heck, I think Italy had a whole industry based on rip-offs of Conan and Mad-Max

I think I've seen a dozen movies that fall in the genre of "time travelling androids from a post-apocalyptic future" alone

[FearlessFreep]

Carnosaur 2. That movie so wanted to be Aliens.

Agreed you could name the rip-off points on a scene-by-scene basis in *that* one.

[Johnny Z]

Good point Fearless, maybe I should have gone in the opposite direction and asked which movie wasn't a ripoff. LOL

[Eirik]

Feardotcom was a ripoff of the Ring.  

Video where if you watch it you die became web site where if you watch it you die.

In both the heroes mistakenly think they broke the curse by finding the girl's body.

In both the girl's ghost makes a big scarey appearance at the end.

[Velvet Brotha]

> Feardotcom was a ripoff of the Ring.

Video where if you watch it you die became web site where if you watch it you die.

In both the heroes mistakenly think they broke the curse by finding the girl's body.

In both the girl's ghost makes a big scarey appearance at the end.



Perfect example of Hollywood doing their part in recycling their waste. ; ) Come up with something new already.

[Flangepart]

Maby, we should ask which is the FIRST offical ripoff?
Could do by date of release and amount of copying.

[Zilla]

There's two words I gotta say to you guys.....Kill Bill.

[AndyC]

One of my all-time favourite ripoffs has to be Star Crash.

Let's see.... a smuggler, a guy with mystical powers and a comical robot set out to find and destroy a superweapon owned by an evil count in black leather and a helmet, whose first name happens to be Zarth. They locate the weapon, rescue a prince, have a laser sword fight and make a daring escape. The movie concludes with an all-out attack on the villain's giant space fortress.

Sounds really familiar, doesn't it?

Caroline Munro as Han Solo, Marjoe Gortner as Ben Kenobi and David Hasselhoff as Princess Leia, battling bad models, stop motion monsters on a par with Rudolph's Shiny New Year, and a lot of standard sword and sorcery crap. Too much goofiness to list.

[Eirik]

"Maby, we should ask which is the FIRST offical ripoff?
Could do by date of release and amount of copying."

That's an interesting topic, Flangeport.  If you ever read The Onion's Our Dumb Century, there is a "film review" on their fictional 1902 issue that reads: "Man Riding Bicycle a stale retread of Man Jumping Rope."  A pretty brilliant cut at the earliest movies.

But that aside, the earliest ripoff that comes to my mind is the 1949 King Kong ripoff Mighty Joe Young.  Giant gorilla falls in love with a human woman, is removed from his natural habitat, misunderstood by society, and dies tragically.

[Cullen]

Eirik wrote:

> But that aside, the earliest ripoff that comes to my mind is
> the 1949 King Kong ripoff Mighty Joe Young.  Giant gorilla
> falls in love with a human woman, is removed from his natural
> habitat, misunderstood by society, and dies tragically.

Actually, Mighty Joe Young was made by many of the same people who made Kong, so it is more like a retread than a rip-off.

Also, there is a bit of a difference between the two.  Joe was an honestly misunderstood ape, who, when he rescued a group of orphans from a fire, was released back into the wild.  Kong was an honestly misguided ape, who, after dropping, chewing on people, and causing general destruction throughout New York, was killed.  One's an adventure, the other's a tragedy.

Sorry for the nitpicking.

[Bgrade.]

And for Carnosaur 2's relentless copying of Aleins, it has earned a spot as one of my fovorite movies.  Pure art.  Highly recommended. but it is still pure crap.

[Bgrade.]

For one that are very close copies and not just story and idea stealing
The previously mentioned Star crash and Carnasuar 2.
And DNA and The Watchers 3 (I think 3 it could be 2)  as copies of Preditor.

I also like the rework of Yojimbo in The Warrior and the Sorceress

[Jayson]

The Movie "Virus" with Jamie Lee Curtis was such a ripoff of the Borg in Star Trek