If there was ever a good reason to remake the '80s chestnut Red Dawn, it would be to bring John Milius's teenage action movie kicking and screaming into the 21st century in a version that didn't resemble such a Cold War relic. And that seems to have been the motivating idea behind this new, updated Dawn that's finally opening in theaters a full three years after it wrapped production in 2009. (The movie fell victim to the bankruptcy of its original studio MGM -- the same plight that delayed the release of Joss Whedon's The Cabin in the Woods, which was made around the same time and received a belated theatrical release last April.) Funnily enough, in the relatively short amount of time, the new Red Dawn already seems as dated as its 1984 predecessor. Her are four ways that this largely pointless remake feels so 2009:

Tags: Red Dawn

At the Licensing Expo in New York this weekend, MGM unveiled a teaser poster for the upcoming Robocop remake. Aside from the fact that Robocop will apparently be played by the X-Men's Cyclops, no details have been released, except that it's due out in 2010 and can never, ever be as good as the original. Seriously, why even try? The only good thing about this is that they can get rid of the terrible Nancy Allen, and use a CGI ED-209 instead of the stop-motion animation they used in the original. Oh, and they can totally get Kurtwood Smith to come back and play Clarence Boddicker again.

Meanwhile, in the category of "Movies that Could Actually be Improved the Second Time Around," Robocop will be joined by a remake of 1980s Commie invasion flick Red Dawn, which starred a young Patrick Swayze, according to this article in last month's Hollywood Reporter. Maybe if Swayze's health continues to improve, he can play the imprisoned dad in the remake. I want to see him in a concentration camp, yelling at the top of his lungs, "AVENGE ME!"

Tags: Kurtwood Smith, Licensing Expo, MGM, poster, Red Dawn, Robocop, teaser