7. Remakes Muscle In

Nothing lasts forever, and torture porn has seen its box office throne rocked by a different - if related - type of horror slowly taking over.

While studios were happy to keep making direct torture porn pics because they were cost-effective, the rise of the remake has been inexorable across all genres.

With the mega-corporations behind most of the big Hollywood powerhouses concerned about the bottom line, the remake trend has grown and grown.

After all, why go searching through several unsuccessful films when you can dig up an old title, give it a spit and polish, hand it to a cheap director and writers and wait for the money to roll in?

So it has been with the likes of Hostel and Captivity, which have seen their box office takings dip and other movies winning out.

In the last few years alone, the likes of The Amityville Horror, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Friday The 13th and even the classic Halloween have all been given the retread treatment.

Not all are successful, but most would not have been made had not a few carved out some serious box office success.

But there's a similar risk that audiences will get sick of seeing classic horror movies thrown into the remake abattoir.

"It just sounds like horribly cynical marketing, economic decision more than anyone saying, 'I just have to make that film,' and 'I have to find a way to get it made,'" says director Douglas Buck, who nevertheless made his own stab at the genre with a new take on 1973's Sisters.

It sounds more like a producer going, 'Ah! Let's remake Dawn of the Dead! Now let's find a writer, now lets find a director, and let's do it!' you know? Which isn't the best way to make great movies.

"But with the Sisters remake, as soon as I heard about it, something in my mind went, 'Oh yeah. That makes sense for me.'

"So I think there's room for these films. I just wish that it didn't feel so cynical, you know, just didn't feel so economic and so cynical like it does overall."
 
Not that producers such as Andrew Form and Brad Fuller of Platinum Dunes would ever say they're in it for the money… "With our track record, we could go out and make bigger movies where there's a better return for our company," says Fuller.

"We make horror movies primarily because we love them. That's what our company does, and that's the choice that we made.

You talk to a ton of producers who started in horror and then go and become big guys; our aspirations, although we do want to branch out, the branching out is simply because we feel like the stories we've told are starting to feel a little bit repetitive.

"I mean, I'll be in locations and I'll say to Drew, 'Didn't we do this exact shot?' Do you know what I'm saying? You hunger for something new. But when they say that we're just doing this for the money, that drives me insane."

Hell, even the Saw team have seen the opportunity as too good to resist. In the last few weeks, the producers snatched the rights to The Texas Chain Saw Massacre from the Platinum Dunes bods and are planning their own fresh franchise.

And unlike many of its contemporaries, Saw has stayed strong. At least, until now…

Next: Bleeding Dry?