Until the trailer popped up in my social media feed yesterday, I had no idea that someone was remaking the amazing and award-winning film Amadeus.

Orion Pictures

For those not in the know, 1984’s Amadeus, screenplay by Peter Shaffer and adapted from his stage play, recounts a wholly ahistoric feud between the Italian composer Antonio Salieri (F. Murray Abraham) and the brilliant but abrasive Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (Tom Hulce.) It is ahistoric in that Shaffer himself referred to the play as a historical fantasy and used the two well-known and famous composers to explore themes of envy, genius, and madness. The 1984 film is a masterpiece, winning Oscars and many other awards. It is a beautiful work capturing the glory and despair of creativity in a manner that few cinematic projects have even attempted, and now the play is once again being adapted, this time in a mini-series for Sky Television.

While the cast looks quite talented, I shudder at the prospect of someone tackling a project that has already been done with such artistry and brilliance. There is little that does not work in the 1984 film, and what there is is of such small consequence as to be not worth mentioning.

A few online trolls have voiced terribly serious artistic concerns because the actor playing Mozart is not white. Opinions from closed and little minds such as these are unworthy of inclusion in discussions of art.

I hold to my two core principles when it comes to remakes. A remake should either tackle a film that was made poorly, that produced a bad film, or if it is a remake of adapted material, it should seek to hew closer to the source material, and this production is neither.