Close to the book?....

[Quokka]

Originally Posted by ravenus

I loved Contact the film a good deal more than Contact the book, which suffered from Sagan's "all the nice good and inherently cool scientists of the world come together and try to bring about world peace and harmony" claptrap. The film made a right decision in concentrating on the heroine's personal journey.

A really good adaptation of Dune...in which I assume the word good stands for 'faithful' will just make for a very tedious film except for people who're obsessed with the source work and regard it as infallible.

Fair enough and each to their own but for me the movie of Contact lost alot when it ditched so many of the surrounding characters and ended up being an over simplified love story.

As for what I mean by 'good' I suppose as with my comments about Harry Potter and High Fidelity, it's more about keeping the feel of the book rather then a scene by scene translation. I like the main characters and plotline to be more or less the same but I suppose the change of medium should also be seen as an opportunity.

I actually think the original Dune movie achieved this much really well but it gave up to much in doing so, like a plot people who hadn't read the book could follow. The comment was kind of tongue in cheek as it was raised in another thread that it may well be getting another remake.

[ravenus]

Love story? For me there was no love story in Contact. It doesn't mater that the priest was played by Matthew McCoughnahey (or whichever way one actually spells the name ) and he has a sleepover moment with Ellie. It was entirely a story of personal faith as I saw it. And I thought most of the surrounding characters were pretty cardboard. The Indian scientist character IIRC had a very weird sounding name, something like it was pulled out of the hat by someone who just combined two random first and last names from somewhere, regardless of cultural origin.

The film is I believe a lot stronger for keeping its focus on Ellie and removing the redundancy of the other people's experiences.

[Briareus Delta]

Originally Posted by sanityassassin

A lot of Stephen Kings books and stories have been adapted some have been done well others are so far away from the story you wouldn't actually know it was the same story (the Running Man is a prime example)

The Stephen King adaptations are, as you say, of variable quality to say the least. But I've always thought Carrie was particularly well done - didn't stray at all from the plot and managed to capture some of the atmosphere of the book as well.

[j. d. worthington]

Ravenus... Yes, I've seen that particular one; and yes, Jones put in a very good performance (as he quite frequently did). As for the creature learning so... well, as Sir Walter Scott once put it:

But as we have consented to admit the leading incident of the work, perhaps some of our readers may be of opinion, that to stickle upon lesser improbabilities, is to incur the censure bestowed by the Scottish proverb on those who start at straws after swallowing windlings.

I do get your point, but given the utterly inane improbabilities they allow through in so many films, I hardly think that's the sticking point. Frankly, I'd say it's because they're conditioned to think of the creature as inarticulate, which certainly wasn't the case; good grief, even Karloff, I understand, objected to allowing the thing to speak....

[The_Warrior]

[quote=Allegra;923266]I agree with some King's films mentioned above, such as The Green Mile, The Shawshank Redemption, even The Shinning.

Speeking of Stphen King movies, the diretor from two of those directed the up coming film adaptionof The Mist. Which people have already probaly known about for a year (What dweep I am).

[Aerandir]

The Outsiders - Written by Susan Hinton and put on film by Francis Ford Copploa. With an all star cast, and a great transitional script it has remained one of my favorite books, and movies since I first came across it as a teen.

Stay gold Pony Boy.

[Aerandir]

The Outsiders - Written by Susan Hilton, and put on screen by Francis Ford Coppola the movie has an all star cast, and transitions nicely into film. With an all star cast, and a theme I could relate to it has been one of my favorite books and films since my early teens.

Stay gold pony boy.

[littlemissattitude]

True story about The Outsiders. I might have told it here before...The reason the movie got made was because a group of students at a school here locally voted the novel (which was actually written by S. E. Hinton) their favorite, and Francis Ford Coppola their favorite director. So they wrote a letter to him and asked him to direct a film version of the story. After he read their letter he read the book and agreed to direct the film. The really cool part is that if you watch the credits at the end of the film, he included the names of all the kids who signed the letter asking him to make the film.

[paranoid marvin]

Originally Posted by ravenus

Perhaps when you can convince movie makers that a being can get THAT articulate by learning language by overhearing a conversation and then discovering a happy treasure of philosophical tomes just when he needed to hone his newly learned art. Perhaps even THEY find it a difficult swallow

But but but...have you seen Hammer's Frankenstein must be destroyed? That film contains IMO one of the more articulate representations of the creature on celluloid (in a terrific performance by Freddie Jones)...although he is not created the classic way.

Surely the most artisitic monster is that depicted in Young Frankenstein. In how many other films is the creature able to tap dance whilst singing "Putting on the Ritz"?

[ravenus]

Gadzooks paranoid, you have made a most incisive point

[Spade]

The Prestige and Contact... only because they're actually better.

[clovis-man]

"I just had to look,.........having read the book"

I think I've been disappointed by just about every film version of a book I've read. Best example I can think of: "Lord Jim". A huge poduction with a boffo cast that didn't come close to capturing the angst of the book.

The only exception I can think of, and it's not a major one, is the novel "Sphinx" by Robin Cook. Pretty good read. Intrigue and Egyptian treasure and all that. The film of the same name was actually better. They changed the ending a little, adding some surprises and it worked quite well.

Regards,

Jim

[murphy]

Then there's the Horse Whisperer. The movie was better than the book.

[wanderer085]

It's been a long time since I read it, but Slaughterhouse Five the movie was quite different than the book as I remember, I think some characters names were even switched in the movie.

[Highlander II]

I was pretty happy with The Prestige - alterations were made to make the movie story work, but the 'flavor' of the book was still there - the main themes that make the story.

That's the only one I can think of off the top of my head.


ETA:

Originally Posted by Quokka

I haven't read The Princess Bride but I'm sure its been mentioned before that its very true to the book?

I've read The Princess Bride - and the book is different in that it's told as a 'storybook' - almost like the whole thing is from the grandfather's POV - but it follows pretty close. It's an odd book though -