This page is a list of films that are considered imitations of each other. Inspired by a film's success,
. Which is the original and which is the imitation is not always completely clear; sometimes, however, it is painfully so.
Hollywood is a simple business.
. When
see that one well-written, well-directed and well-executed movie makes cash, they commission a hundred films in the same genre.
Studios will war with one another. Often, one starts a film, and another will create a similar film to be released at the same time.
Of course, most of the examples shown below aren't copying other studios, but had just came out around the same time with the same theme. Keep that in mind when comparing two movies to each other.
| Initiator | Imitators | Description | Misc | Winner? |
| A Bug's Life, Monsters Inc, Finding Nemo | Antz, Shrek, Shark Tale, Small Soldiers | It's hard to say what started the Pixar/Dreamworks Animation Feud * though Hollywood insiders believe it was a Take That by Jeffrey Katzenberg against his former bosses at Disney/Pixar . Fortunately, many of the later films have no relation. But the movie that kicked off the CGI-animated comedy/action films was Toy Story. | The two studios also have unrelated projects. For example, Pixar has the Toy Story franchise and Dreamworks has Shrek (Small Soldiers might be viewed as Dreamworks counterpart). But there is a clear trend of Dreamworks creating imitations of Pixar hits, though this is dying down lately. (To be fair, the only things A Bug's Life and Antz had in common was a story about ants in an ant colony, and the one ant who wanted to be different.) | Pixar generally tends to be more respected than Dreamworks Animation. |
| Madagascar | The Wild | Both involve zoo animals escaping and going to Africa, one of whom is a lion character who doesn't really want to leave. | It's worth noting that The Wild started production several years before Madagascar, so this might be an example of the above feud, carried on by Pixar's parent company. | As far as box office receipts, Madagascar was a huge hit, and The Wild bombed. |
| Ratatouille | The Tale Of Despereaux | An incident involving a rat, some soup, and interactions with humans have wild repercussions. | Ratatouille is all about a rodent in the kitchen while Desperaux's soup-loving rat is only the beginning. | Desperaux was based on a best-selling children's book and had the flashier cast but Ratatouille won the day and the Best Animated Feature Oscar. |
| Jurassic Park | Carnosaur | The latter is basically a low-budget clone of the former, with less philosophy and capitalism and more gore and mad scientists, by Roger Corman, the master of movies several grades lower than B. | This example is mostly notable for the fact that the imitator actually got into theaters first, due to a massively quick shooting schedule. Also, Harry Adam Knight, author of the deliberately trashy novel Carnosaur was based on, has gleefully pointed out that one scene in Jurassic Park occurs in his book, but not Michael Crichton's. | Jurassic Park |
| Deep Impact | Armageddon | Meteor-strike disaster movies. Neither films were imitations of each other per se, but they revolved around different reactions to the same idea, one more dramatic, the other more action-based. Armageddon made more money, but scientists lauded the technical accuracy of Deep Impact. | Amusingly, in an early screening of Deep Impact, Morgan Freeman is giving a speech in which he reassures his audience that life will go on after the meteor-hit, declaring, "There will be no Armageddon." Too many viewers at the screening got the in-joke, however, and the uproarious laughter at what was meant as a dramatic scene induced the director to cut the line from the final print. | Although Deep Impact is regarded as the better film, Armageddon wins with better box office and is much better remembered and sought after 10 years after the fact. |
| Dante's Peak | Volcano | Volcano disaster movies. The former is set in a small town, the other in Los Angeles. | As above, not exactly imitations, but in the same way, these were both released around the same time and dueled each other with very similar plots. The former, incidentally, is considered notable for being one of the few popcorn disaster movies that actually tries for scientific accuracy. | Dante's Peak won, with $6 million more in box office reciepts. |
| Knock Off | Rush Hour | Rush Hour was a comedy-action movie teaming martial arts star Jackie Chan with comedian Chris Tucker. Knock Off had a similar set up by teaming Jean-Claude Van Damme with Rob Schneider. | While many people have accused Knock Off of being a Knock Off made to capitalize on Rush Hour, they seem to be ignoring the fact that it was released a month before the better movie. | Rush Hour by a mile, which has also gone on to spawn 2 well-received sequels. |
| Destination Moon | Rocketship X-M | Moon was scientifically accurate, featured a script by Robert A Heinlein, and pretty much kicked off the "space adventure" genre of film; X-M featured sound in space, rockets stopping when the engines cut out, and Plucky Comic Relief, and eventually ended up on MST3K. | Another case of the ripoff making it into theaters first; Destination Moon was famously advertised as "Two years in the making!", and X-M took advantage of it. | Destination Moon |
| Independence Day | The Arrival | Alien invasion movies released in the summer of 1996. | Independence Day was the big-studio production with a big budget, big stars, big promotion and churned out an even bigger profit. The Arrival was more of a thoughtful thriller, with only one brand-name star (Charlie Sheen) and ultimately tanked. | Although ID4 is subject to much YMMV, can anyone actually remember The Arrival? |
| The Illusionist | The Prestige | Period movies about magicians who seem to perform the impossible, both having their wide release in fall 2006. | The Prestige was an edgy thriller, The Illusionist a love story with a softer fairy-tale feel. | Both. They were equally successful, for different reasons. |
| Transformers | Transmorphers | Both feature giant CGI'ed transforming robots, but otherwise there's not much similarity. About the only notable thing is how blatant the attempt at market confusion is — the same studio has also done The Da Vinci Treasure, Pirates of Treasure Island, Allan Quatermain and the Temple of Skulls, Alien vs. Hunter, Snakes on a Train... | Hey, at least we didn't get a new GoBots movie. | A blockbuster vs. its cheap imitator... is this even a question? |
| Dr. Strangelove | Fail-Safe | Both films feature the President of the United States collaborating with the Soviet Union to avert imminent nuclear Armageddon. Interestingly, the books were at war too, with the precursor to Strangelove winning out. When Stanley Kubrick heard that Fail Safe was being made into a movie, he tied the production up in legal issues to get Strangelove out first. | Though both are generally received as classics, Fail-Safe didn't feature Slim Pickens riding a nuclear bomb to annihilation, and that crucial oversight cost it in the long run. | Dr. Strangelove wins due to several Academy Award nominations and being regarded as the best satire in cinema history. |
| Godzilla | Gamera | Giant Monsters smash cities and battle other giant monsters. | The Godzilla series started in the lead in the "Showa" era with more and better films, but the "Heisei" series for both were a marked change. Despite having only a trilogy, Gamera had the better and more successful films overall when it went into a more realistic, Darker And Edgier direction. It dropped it with its own attempt at a third series, leading to a repeat of the Showa status-quo for the Millenium. | Godzilla has had much more staying power and is still having movies churned out. |
| Tombstone | Wyatt Earp | Historical westerns about . . . Wyatt Earp. Tombstone starred Kurt Russell, while Wyatt Earp starred Kevin Costner. | Costner was originally involved with Tombstone but left over disagreements regarding the script, deciding to make his own Earp pic. He even put pressure on studios to refuse distribution of Tombstone, but guess which one made more money in the end... | Tombstone proved to be a hit and earned the better reviews, while Wyatt Earp flopped at the box office and got nominated for five Razzies. |
| The Matrix | The Thirteenth Floor | Both center around reality not being really real, and just a virtual simulation in the future. Albeit for different reasons and created by different sources. | Of course, the Matrix was a huge blockbuster, while The Thirteenth Floor will always be remembered as a copy. It's not, however; it just came out second. eXistenZ is sometimes accused of this as well, but with a generous helping of Body Horror. You could probably put the previous year's Dark City into this mix as well. | The Matrix by a country mile. |
| The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring | Dungeons & Dragons | High fantasy in a magical land of elves, goblins and other fantastical creatures based off legendary and sacred nerd franchises. Of course, you know which was great and which was terrible. | Both were to feature former Doctors in cameo roles. Sylvester McCoy was to be Bilbo Baggins, and Tom Baker was the King of the Elves. In the end, however, the role of Bilbo went to Ian Holm | Do we even have to say it? |
| The Lord Of The Rings trilogy | Pirates Of The Caribbean trilogy; The Matrix sequels | Gigantic, special effects-heavy trilogies made three and two films at once, respectively, dealing with no less then the fate of humanity, or at least a good chunk of it. Coincidentally, all three featuring spectral, skeletal badass ghosts at some point; they also share a few actors (Orlando Bloom in LOTR and POTC; Hugo Weaving and Bruce Spence in Matrix and LOTR). | LOTR and POTC have a year between films while Matrix waited about five months. | While you can't deny that all three were hugely successful only LOTR didn't suffer from third film fatigue (Ending Fatigue is a whole 'nother story). And then there's all those nice, shiny Oscar statues, including Best Picture. |
| The Descent | The Cave | Horror movies with similar titles, made in the same year, and both about a group of cavers who go spelunking, meet some cave monsters, and die. | When it was released in America one year afterward, The Descent ended up becoming known as "Like The Cave, but it doesn't suck." |
| The Abyss | Deep Star Six and Leviathan | 1989 saw three submarine sci-fi thrillers. | It's not clear that one is original and the others imitators, but The Abyss is generally regarded as the best, and the other two ended up soggy. They all feature people trapped in confined spaces, ridiculous aquatic gear, monsters, and tons of water. | The Abyss |
| Sex And The City | The Women | New York-set, Costume Porn (or at least should've been, in the case of The Women(part of the reason why it's allegedly unfilmable))-filled Chick Flick about four close older female friends (a romantic, a cynic, a prude, and an Anything That Moves) band together when relationship troubles loom. | The Women is based on a play; said play is about how ridiculously cruel women are to each other. Another feature of the play/film is that no men are ever seen or even heard in a kind of faux-Gendercide. | Both opened to middling reviews, but SATC got the most box office. |
| Lambada | The Forbidden Dance | Attempts to cash in on the short-lived Lambada dance craze. | Released on the same day, both movies flopped. Neither was a good movie , though at least their failure prevented Macarena: The Movie from being made. | None. |
| Sky High | Zoom's Academy for Superheroes | Kid superheroes learn to use their powers | Very different, if you give Zoom a chance. But I don't blame you if you don't. There's very little substance hung on Zoom's plot scaffold. Notably, Zoom is one former superhero employed by the military training youngsters, instead of the full-fledged institution implied by the title. | Sky High made back over double its budget and earned favorable reviews, while Zoom flopped and earned Tim Allen a Razzie nom. |
| Inkheart | Bedtime Stories | Some kid brings stories to life. | Only superficially similar, Inkheart is a modern-fantasy adventure tale centered around a young teen while Bedtime Stories is a more lighthearted Adam Sandler vehicle involving much younger children. The "stories come to life" is played for tension and action in the former while it is played for laughs and poignancy in the latter. | Neither film was well-liked by critics, but Bedtime Stories pulled in over $100 million in the US alone (and $200 million worldwide), while Inkheart was a flop, earning only $17 million domestically (its worldwide gross of $70 million was barely enough to recoup its budget). |
| Paul Blart: Mall Cop | Observe and Report | Early-2009 comedies about overweight mall security guards attempting to foil criminals. | The former stars Kevin James, and is mostly a silly action-movie parody. The latter stars Seth Rogen, and is a rather Darker And Edgier comedy about socially dysfunctional people. | Mall Cop opened to better reviews and a bigger box office than Observe. |
| U2 3D | Hannah Montana & Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert | 3-D concert films from early 2008. | The U2 concert was shown at IMAX, while the Hannah Montana concert was only shown in digital 3-D only. The Hannah Montana one had much worse songs than the awesomeness (Your Mileage May Vary) of the other concert, though. And one year later came the cheaper Jonas Brothers 3-D concert, which was also shown at IMAX. | Hannah Montana had a much bigger box office, but U2 3D was better received by critics. |
| Capote | Infamous | Truman Capote during the years he was writing In Cold Blood. | Capote came out first, with Philip Seymour Hoffman winning an Oscar for his performance, along dozens of other awards and nominations for the film. Infamous opened a year later, and was largely ignored save for an Onion article about a slew of new films about Capote coming out. | Capote |
| Big | 18 Again and Vice Versa | A teenager is trapped in the body of an adult. | Big got the Oscar nods and made Tom Hanks a star, but 18 Again has a Zac Efron remake. It should be noted, however, that the Italian comedy Da grande, about a 9 year old boy turning into an adult, predated Big by one year. | Big, by a long shot. |
| Nutty Professor II: The Klumps | Big Momma's House | Once edgy black comedians in fat drag. | The Klumps made more money but Big Momma's House got a sequel in 2006. Eddie Murphy made Norbit in 2007. God help us. |
| Mission to Mars | Red Planet and Ghosts of Mars | Disaster movies set on Mars | M 2 M was 2001''-lite, but the other two were b-movie fare. |
| Gordy | Babe | Live action talking pigs, both released in 1995. | Gordy was released first and was not very successful critically or commercially. | Babe ended up being a smash hit. It was nominated for seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture, and won the Oscar for Best Visual Effects. |
| Gamer | }}Surrogates}} | Computer game concepts brought into Real Life with interesting consequences. | Gamer is first because its trailer was first. Both movies have a similar set up but different plots: Gamer deals with prisoners being forced to lend their bodies to teenaged gamers for real, deadly shooting matches while Surrogates is what happens when an entire population of humans who have become effectively immortal thanks to idealized android bodies, is suddenly threatened by a murderer. | Neither, both opened to low reviews. |
| Ocean's Eleven | The Italian Job | Remakes of movies about a crew of thieves pulling off a complicated heist against dangerous enemies. | While both had good reviews, Ocean's Eleven was much more successful and spawned two sequels. The Italian Job's sequel is still in development hell. |
| The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button | The Time Traveler's Wife | Fantasy/romance adapted from a written source in which an otherwise perfect couple is tested by the man's "chronological disorder." | Button is based on a short story where a man "merely" ages backwards while Wife's protagonist bounces around time in a Trauma Conga Line. Interestingly, both films were produced by Brad Pitt, who also starred in Button. | While Wife was a modest hit, Button made tons of money and won Oscars for its Uncanny Valley-defying special effects work. |
| Sherlock Holmes | "Untitled Sherlock Holmes project" | Sherlock Holmes with an injection of action and comedy, respectively. | The former stars Robert Downey Jr. as Holmes and Jude Law as Watson; the latter has yet to be made, but will star Will Ferrel and Sascha Baron-Cohen. |
| Delgo | Avatar | Sci-fi films about two ethnic groups of separate species fighting each other and how two of the separate species attempt to stop the fighting and fall for each other in the process. They also feature extensive computer animation. | While both have been in production for years, Delgo did come out first. A lawsuit has even been prompted by the makers of Delgo against Avatar. | Delgo had an infamously low reception and many guess that the lawsuit is an attempt to somehow recoup Delgo's budget after its epic failure at the box office. Avatar is the highest grossing movie of all time. 'Nuff said. |
| Catch-22 | MASH | Deconstructive black comedy war movies released in 1970, with not much combat but a surprising amount of blood, starring ensemble casts of screwballs, and most certainly not using earlier wars as stand-ins for Vietnam | Catch-22, despite an all-star cast, got tepid reviews and failed at the box office. MASH was a huge success, made Robert Altman famous, inspired an even more successful TV series, and helped usher in the 70's auteur era in general. |
| Million Dollar Baby | Cinderella Man | Two emotional and evocative stories involving boxing, released in 2005. Both movies feature underdog stories of fighters trying to succeed where others would have them fail, each with the support of an engaging mentor. One ends happy, while the other one? Not so much. | This is a rare case of two excellent movies that happened to be released in the same year, instead of a studio quickly greenlighting a cheap imitation of the first. Both were directed by powerhouse directors (Clint Eastwood and Ron Howard), both with stellar casts and critical acclaim. Poor promotion doomed Cinderella Man at the box-office, while Million Dollar Baby was released during a more opportune time of the year, and was far more successful. Million Dollar Baby took home the Oscar, while Cinderella Man was mostly forgotten by the time nominations came around. | Million Dollar Baby, though really, everyone wins. See both movies. |
| Prefontaine | Without Limits | Late 90's biographical films about Steve Prefontaine. | Billy Crudup's depiction of the title character in Without Limits is generally better regarded, as is the directing and production; Prefontaine stands mostly on the basis of greater historical accuracy and a standout performance by R. Lee Ermey. | Without Limits, although neither was much of a box office or critical success. |
| Paranormal Activity | The Fourth Kind | (very) Loosely-Based On A True Story films that use videotaped sequences to enhance the realism. | Paranormal is a Faux Documentary while Fourth is a more conventional film. | Winner: In terms of cost:earnings Paranormal is the clear winner, being a $15,000 You Tube series that earned millions. |
| Open Season | Over The Hedge | All Star Cast CGI films about wild vs. tame/cosmopolitan animals, (vaguely) based on Newspaper Comics (Seasons character designs are rather The Far Side-esque). | Season deals with a tame bear being introduced to the wild while Hedge deals with wild animals being introduced to the suburbs. Interestingly, both films have bears as the catalyst for their respective plots. |
| The Legend Of The Titanic | Titanic The Legend Goes On | Two So Bad Its Good movies VERY LOOSELY based on the Titanic disaster, and the movie Titanic. The fact that they both seem to consider the tragedy of the Titanic to be a "Legend" is very telling. | Both of them include talking animals and happy endings | Both lose. One of them got reviewed by Nostalgia Critic, but the other one got a sequel! |
| An American Werewolf In London | The Howling | Two 1981 horror/comedy movies about werewolves. They were the first of their kind to show an "actual" trasformation scene of men turning into wolves. | The Howling has five or so sequels, all crappy stuff; AAWIL only has one, An American Werewolf In Paris | "An American Werewolf" is the better remembered of the two and became something of a cult classic, although "The Howling" came first by a couple of months. |
| Percy Jackson And The Lightning Thief | Clash Of The Titans | Two action-adventure movies with very different target audiences, but both are very loosely based on Classical Mythology, up to having an overlapping character roster. Percy Jackson is based on a YA book series; Clash is a remake of the 1981 movie. | The sequel for the Percy Jackson movie has already been announced. Clash has very good prospects, given Sam Worthington's instant climb to superstardom. | No winner; films are not out yet, though fans are already arguing on who makes a better Zeus, Sean Bean or Liam Neeson. |
| Chasing Liberty | First Daughter | Could these two movies, both released in 2004, have a more similar plot? They're both romantic comedies about a First Daughter who falls in love with a seemingly ordinary young man, only to discover that he's actually an undercover Secret Service. | It's unclear which movie is a copy of which; Chasing Liberty was released in January, eight months before the September release of First Daughter, but it's uncertain which entered development and production first. | Neither; both films were easily forgettable romantic comedies which made little impact at the box office. |
| The Book Of Eli | Legion | Both are Apocalypse-themed movies with very different takes on their source material: The former is Fallout with the protagonist keeping the last Bible on earth from a Corrupt priest. The latter: Eva meets Terminator meets Dawnof The Dead | Your Mileage May Vary, but while Legion's premise has been done again and again much better, at least The Book Of Eli does something different by holding onto the book rather than destroying it. | The Book Of Eli with a better gross and Rotten Tomatoes score. |
| The A-Team | The Losers | Both are capital “A” action movies based on series from other mediums about rag tag groups of government agents who come together to clear their name: The former is The Film Of The Series. The latter: An adaptation of Andy Diggle and Jock’s re-imagining of a classic WWII DC comic as a group of Special Forces operatives during the War on Terror. The Expendables can also be considered a third contender. | The Losers basically is the The A-Team, there's never been any doubt or denial that it played a major role in its re-imagining, the timing of the film releases are just unfortunate. | |
