In a 2022 interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Sylvester Stallone reflected on his career, citing the 2000 remake of Get Carter as an “underrated” film and a “big disappointment.” He lamented the challenge of remakes, noting, “even if you do it better than the original, there’s a tremendous nostalgia attached to the original.”
While Stallone’s career has seen remarkable highs, his assessment of Get Carter is contentious. The suggestion that this ill-advised American remake could be superior to the classic 1971 British crime drama, directed by Mike Hodges and starring Michael Caine, is a difficult one to support.
The original film is a masterclass in gritty, uncompromising noir. It follows Jack Carter, a cold-blooded London mob enforcer who returns to his bleak hometown of Newcastle to investigate his brother’s death. Caine’s portrayal is iconic, presenting a character whose glimmers of humanity are swiftly extinguished by brutal fury.
An American adaptation of the source novel, Ted Lewis’s Jack’s Return Home, is not an inherently flawed concept. In 1972, Gene Corman produced Hit Man, a successful Blaxploitation version directed by George Armitage that relocated the story to Los Angeles and cast Bernie Casey in the lead. This proves the material can be effectively reinterpreted.
By contrast, the 2000 film, directed by Stephen Kay, is a slavish tribute that misses the original’s spirit. It incorporates superficial nods, from a techno remix of Roy Budd’s classic score to a supporting role for Michael Caine himself, who reportedly joined as a favor to his Victory co-star.
For Stallone, the role likely seemed a perfect opportunity. Following his dramatic turn in 1997’s Cop Land, which didn’t fully reinvent his screen persona, playing Jack Carter offered a chance to be both a taciturn bruiser on a righteous mission and a sensitive protector to his victimized niece, played by Rachael Leigh Cook.
However, the “tough guy with a heart of gold” archetype, though familiar territory for Stallone, fundamentally undermines the story. The title Get Carter carries an expectation of cruelty and moral ambiguity. The 2000 version pulls its punches, softening the protagonist and dulling the original’s sharp, cynical edge. While it attempts to mirror the dreary Newcastle setting with a rainy, gloomy Seattle, the remake lacks the genuine grit of its predecessor, even awkwardly updating classic lines of dialogue.
Ultimately, the film suffers from a fatal tonal indecision. It struggles to reconcile the bleakness of a hard-boiled crime drama with the sleek aesthetics of a new-millennium action movie, complete with jittery editing, stylized color palettes, and a trendy soundtrack. This identity crisis makes Stallone’s Get Carter a curious relic of an era when Hollywood studios and 80s superstars were awkwardly trying to reconcile past and future. The greatest irony is that in its attempt to modernize a classic, the remake feels dated, while the cynical, timeless 1971 original hasn’t aged a day.
