The Truman Show (1998)

The Accusation: Peter Weir and Andrew Niccol's reality TV satire arrived two years before Big Brother debuted in the States... but nearly a decade after the relaunched The Twilight Zone did the story in 1989 episode Special Service .

The Spark Of Originality: Weir's decision to film the story neither as thriller nor satir༺e g♎ives Truman's journey its staying power as an existential odyssey.

American Gigolo (1980)

The Accusation: Not an accusation - writer/director Paul Schrader has been upfront about the influence of Robert Besson's Pickpocket on Richard Gere's existential, perfecti🔜onist anti-hero, and both films have the same ending.

The Spark Of Originality: The slick, superficial surface of Ar♏mani suits and Moroder's music provides the perfect mirror to early-80s American narcissism.

Obsession (1976)

The Accusation: When does borrowing a film's plot and themes become an obsession? In Brian De Palma's case, when he hired Bernard Herrmann to compose the score to his update of Hitchcock's Vertigo .

The Spark Of Originality: The twist, which avoids aping the lookalike's backstory in Vertigo in favour of something even more﷽ twisted and subversive.

Kill Bill (2003-4)

The Accusation: For all Quentin Tarantino's assertions that his two-parter was a compendium of dozens of grindhouse homages, the main storyline - not to mention the swordfights - were stolen from 1973 Japanese thriller Lady Snowblood .

The Spark Of Originality: The space given to The Bride's victims to develop their characters before their inevitable bloody demise makes the whole th๊ing as much of an ensemble ▨drama as a straightforward action romp.

Nosferatu (1922)

The Accusation: There have been many adaptations of Bram Stoker's Dracula, but none so cavalier as F.W. Murnau's tactic of💧 simply changing the names and hoping nob🅷ody would notice. They did notice, and Stoker's estate successfully sued for copyright infringement. Fortunately for film history, one print survived the court-ordered burning.

The Spark Of Originality: Freed from Stoker🗹's text, Murnau transformed Nosferatu into cinema's first g𝄹reat monster, aided by the creepy performance of Max Schreck.

Monsters, Inc. (2001)

The Accusation: Pixar's attempt to find a plausible rationale for why monsters invade children's bedrooms owed much to 1989 comedy Little Monsters . One uses wardrobe doors as magic portals to the monster worl🌼d; the other has staircꦏases that emerge under kids' beds.

Both star blue monsters, with very similar horns sproatinꦚg from their respective heads.

The Spark Of Originality : The reason Monstropolis needs (or thinks it needs) the kids' screams, which provides a satisfying resolution when they discover an alternative sou꧑rce of energy.

The Big Chill (1983)

The Accusation: John Sayles made his name as an independent director with The Return Of The Secaucus 7 , a 1980 drama about a reunion of college friends. Three years later, Columbia Pictures released Lawrence Kasdan's similar The Big Chill . Coincidence? According to Kasdan, yes.

The Spark Of Originality: Something on𒆙ly a major studio could afford - a wall-to-wall soundtrack of baby boomer golden oldies that un𒉰derscores the film's elegiac reflection on lives loved and lost.

Chicken Run (2000)

The Accusation: Rather than a neo-realist evocation of the plight of poultry, Aardman Animation's feature-length debut is instead an action adventure modelled conspicuously on John Sturges' WWII classic The Great Escape .

The Spark Of Originality: The surprisingly robust coop/camp metaphor.

Some Like It Hot (1959)

The Accusation: Billy Wilder admitted that the central 'men in drag' premise of his classic comedy was purloined from 1935 French movie Fanfare d'Amour .

The Spark Of Originality: The introduction of the real-life St Valentine's Day Massacre to provide Joe and Jerry with a compelling reason for draggi﷽ng up.