Its Novel Adaptation Friday MKF 4/4/03

[The Angry Lion]

this thread is devoted to novel to movie adaptatons, what are your favorites, what were the worst? is it possible to have a good adaptation at all?
Red Dragon was a good adaptation I thought, It was a good movie but paled to the book. Shawshank Redemption on the otherhand surpassed Stephen Kings writing. Im going to leave lotr alone......

What would Willow and Tara think was a good adaptation?

[themagicpixie]

I think W & T would probably like the Harry Potter books, but I don't know if they would think the films were good adaptations!

[oneyedchicklet]

Morning Everyone,
My favorite novel adaption to movie would have to be "Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe". I have both the book and the video. One of the clients whose dog I care for when she's away named her dog "Idgie". She said that I was the only person who knew where she got the name from.
I've read the book about 4 times and I can't even count how many times I've watched the movie.
Well, I'm off to get ready for work. It's payday so big woo hoo!!!
Have a good day everyone!!

Love to all,
Barb

[SJ]

Thought The Dead Zone was pretty good

[Kirby]

OMG. There are so many that I think deserve kudos. Emma is one of my faves but then I really loved Mansfield Park too. I think they did a good job with Red Dragon. I'm hearing wonderful things about Tipping the Velvet. I tend to have a classic book to movie bent so forgive me. I also think that they did a good adaptation of Girl Interupted but that could be just me.

As for W/T - I'm not sure that they would care as long as they got to see it together.

Now a new question what book have you read that you would like to see become a movie?

[darkmagicwillow]

I was happily surprised with the quality of SciFi's recent adaptation Children of Dune. It necessarily simplified the books, but not to the extent that it damaged the story and the visuals of Dune were beautiful.

[Bookcat]

My favorite movie adaptations would have to be: Adaptation (which probably shouldn't count) and Fight Club.

Oh, semi-related: A funny line on the Simpsons went as follows:

Apu: Quickly, tell me the name of your favorite movie book and food.
Manjula: The answer to all three would have to be Fried Green Tomatoes!

[Willster]

I think Shawshank Redemption was a good adaptation from a Stephen King novel.

Might be hard to adapt something.. the books are generally so much better..!

[Strapping Lass]

Great Thread!

I'd go for Fight Club too, possibly the best book adaptation ever. I am Jacks wasted life indeed!

Also Silence of the Lambs, Manhunter (coz it was first and although Red Dragon was faithful I found it plodding, atmosphereless and less scary than this 80's classic) and of course the Lord of the Rings films (so far).

I'll be interested to see how the films of Phillip Pullman's Dark Materials Trilogy turn out if they ever get out of pre-production hell.

Strapping Lass
(I could also get into a whole long thread about comic adaptations too but I'll behave for now! )

[Kalita]

Well, I'm back and forth on Peter Jackson and co.'s adaptation of Lord of the Rings. It still has Tolkien's spirit, but there were points (during the Two Towers in particular) that just had me cringing.

On the whole, though, they are covering the story - and despite some aspects of the characters, the visual reproduction of Middle-Earth is simply stunning.

Still horrid weather here in Toronto, freezing rain and ice pellets making everything a mess. I'm sure glad I'm home today.

[Nix42]

I'll go for James Ellroy's LA Confidential. The film is one of my favourites, but the book is even better.

And on a completely different subject, how cute is this

[darkmagicwillow]

I thought they did a great job on Fellowship, but only a good job on adapting TTT. I still can't understand why they inserted the additional scenes with Frodo at the end. They don't add anything to the journey, and there's plenty of material in the books that they skipped.

[La]

I really liked the adaptation of the Cider House Rules. A lot was changed or altered from the book, but John Irving himself worked on the screenplay and I think they did a really good job for a very complex book. They did leave a lot out, but if they hadn't, the movie would have been like 5 hours long.

As for Shawshank Redemption (one of my absolute favorite movies), it was based on a short story/novella of Stephen King's called Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption, much like the movie Stand by Me was based on a short story called The Body. It seems to me that a lot of the great movies made from Stephen Kings novels have been altered a bit (The Shining ... Carrie ... many others) but I think that's necessary because the plots of his books are so detailed that you can't make a normal feature-length movie from it. Many of his books have been made into TV mini-series instead (It, The Stand, The Langoliers).

[Penrose Orleans]

I'm a big fan of Trainspotting, even if the movie did make some (necessary) changes to the narrative style and deleted a LOT of characters... for a 2-hour time slot, it was a great interpretation! --Nora

[AmberEyedDragon]

I'm thinking I should probably talk about some good adaptations I've seen....but I cant...for two reasons...

Queen of the Damned

A Walk to Remember

2 amazing novels. I adore most of Anne Rice's work, her erotica novels are stunning. I follow her vampire chronicles quite closely, and I detest the queen of the damned movie. I dont think any of the people who worked on the movie even read the damn book.

And the same goes for a walk to remember. I'm normally a very composed person, but I can still pick that book up and read it from any point, and be in tears by the end. Nicholas Sparks has an amazing talent for manipulating your emotions throughout his novels....the only emotional effect I felt during the movie was the intense need to scream and empty the contents of my stomach.

sorry, done with the rant now...

[Bookcat]

I'm sort of obsessed with John Irving here.

The Cider House Rules movie was the best they could've done adapting it. I just don't think his books are suited to movie form. They're too complex and... written. That doesn't make sense, but its what I think.

Sort of related: They're making a movie of the first third of Irving's A Widow for One Year. That's personally my least favorite part, but I guess its the most adaptable.

[WiccansIllusion]

Willow would probably love Hitchikers Guide to the Galaxy, and have found the BBC tv adaption on line and ordered it.

I think Tara loved the Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, both the novels and the BBC movie.

As for my own views:

I think The Hours by Michael Cunnigham was a stunning novel as well as a movie. Kudos to the actresses who helped make it possible as well the others who worked on the film.

Whomever made the statement about QtD was right. I rented it and couldn't even finish the movie, since that book is my favourite of hers, as well as the MayFair Witches.

As for Fried Green Tomato's, the movie was better stand alone then the book. I love both, but at least in the novel Fannie Flag had the courage to state Ruth and Idgie's relationship as to where the movie played it as Subtext.

[Gatito Grande]

A few months ago I saw "The Innocents," a 1961 adaptation (starring Deborah Kerr) of Henry James' The Turn of the Screw.

It was excellent. The book is eery (if over-wrought in that 19th century way---see Willow's library comment in Doomed!), but the film is flat out creepy. Black-n-white adds to the effect (sort of like Hitchcock in "Psycho"). Turns out the script was co-written by Truman Capote. Anyway, I really recommend it, for a good scare.

GG For those Kittens w/ DirecTV, remember it's Total Choice Free Preview Weekend---all premium channels for free! Out

[voxanglsm]

I'd have to agree with saying that the adaptations for Emma and Harry Potter were both good. Also, I liked the movie adaptation of The Princess Diaries, even though they like completely changed the story. What can I say, I'm a big sucker for that movie. Plus, Anne Hathaway is a cutie, and she's all geeky in the movie, and that's always a plus for me. Oh, and the Anne of Green Gables movies. Those were good adaptations.

I think Willow and Tara would also enjoy Harry Potter, and mabye The Princess Diaries too. It seems like one of those cute things they would like.

-Kristin

[Laika 27]

My favourite adaptations are...

The Birds
The Talented Mr Ripley
Chocolat
Bridget Jones's Diary
Like Water For Chocolate
101 Dalmations (animation)
Brighton Rock

The bad ones are a bit too numerous to mention. One book I'd really like to see adapted is To The Lighthouse, but then as is often the case some things are best left to the imagination.

[xita]

My brain is friend but I really though the adaptation of The Color Purple was really good.

[Nix42]

The Color Purple was one of the books that I had to study for A levels, and probably the only one that I really enjoyed. Whoopi Goldberg was great in the film, wasn't Oprah in it as well?

[xita]

Yeah oprah was in it. I loved the book and the movie didn't disappoint really.

[MadeinNZ]

[quote:53389eb408]Quote:

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My brain is friend

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[/quote:53389eb408] Aww - that's so sweet Xita. Makling friends out of body parts. I have a "friend" myself. We don't really see each other but we sure keep in touch.

ETA: OK - now I sound like an 80's sitcom. Sexual innuendo is sooo tacky. And yet I can't help myself. Speaking of "helping myself ..." Ok - stopping now.

[xita]

lol nicky, jet lag right? I have nothing to blame for my typos , oh my keyboard! My keyboard did it!

[maudmac]

The Color Purple, yeah. That's actually the one thing that always comes to mind when people make comments about movies never being as good as the book. Because I think the film The Color Purple is far and away better than the book. I just don't care much for Alice Walker's writing, in general, but I thought the film was brilliant. Beautiful and amazing and it blew me away in a way the book just couldn't. It didn't get to me. And it's not just that films are more visceral, because, to me, they usually aren't. When I'm reading, it's like watching a film in my mind.

That said, I didn't care for the toning down of the Celie/Shug stuff, just as the Ruth/Idgie stuff was toned down for Fried Green Tomatoes. That bothers me. Both those books sold well enough to a broad enough readership, it should have been obvious that it wasn't necessary to water the intensity of those relationships down for the film audience. But they did it anyway, of course.

I know something always has to go, but still. The Color Purple, the film, stayed much truer to the nature of Celie and Shug's relationship than Fried Green Tomatoes did to Ruth and Idgie's, though. I remember reading somewhere about Fannie Flagg getting some kind of gay award thing for the book, and insisting even then that Ruth and Idgie were just really good friends. I'm pretty sure I didn't dream that. It boggled my mind at the time.

I almost hate seeing film versions of books I've read. Because I know the details are going to drive me insane. Like, I know in the beginning of the film Misery, Paul is driving a different model of car from the one he drives in the book. That bugs me. I know, I know, it's very much nitpicking, but it bothers me. Because I've got a film version of the book in my head already, from having read it, so when that's contradicted on the screen, it makes my brain itch. Don't even get me started on The Shining. I hate that movie with a profoundly irrational passion.

So, all in all, honestly, I'd rather either see the movie or read the book, not both, except perhaps when the author her/himself writes or co-writes the screenplay, as Amy Tan did with The Joy Luck Club.

It seems to me that it must be a Gargantuan task to adapt a novel that way whether you wrote the original or not. To condense a story that should take six or eight or ten or more hours to tell into two? If it's ever done well at all, that's pretty amazing, really.

[La]

About a Boy.

I haven't read the book, but I've spoken to people who have and many people and reviews have said that while the book is really good, the movie may even be better.

[Zippy]

La, the book is better than the film in my opinion but the film is still pretty good.

[oneyedchicklet]

Stephen King's "The Shining" was another great book that was made into a movie. I'm talking about the original movie with Jack Nicholson not the remake last year. Both the book and the film were great.
My favorite all time classic book and film is "To Kill A Mockingbird". I think it was the only book I was forced to read in school that I really enjoyed. And I so love young Gregory Peck. I remember after reading it the first time I wanted to name a son Atticus. My mom thought it was strange so we named our bird that instead.

Love to All,
Barb

[Consolata]

The Color Purple is one of my favorite movies/books
The Hours-I actually liked the movie a bunch better than the book
Stand By Me and Shawshank Redemption-loved the movies as much as the stories..while we're on Mr. King...I really liked Carrie.
Fried Green Tomatoes-though my stomach hurts a bit for all the discussions I've had to have about Idgie and Ruth being a couple, blast the author for that ambiguity.
Jackie Brown-I think from Rum Punch
I also liked Practical Magic the book much better than the movie.
The Hotel New Hampshire--one of my absolute favorite books and movies.
my least fav adaption-The Great Gatsby-I just loathe the film