handheld to big screen

[dannyk]

hey guys,

skipthisone made a comment in another thread

http://www.pixies-place.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=9450

basically saying that the movie versions of stephen king books suck (and we're not just talking vampires here!). I've always believed that books should not be made into movies and vice versa. something always seems lost in the translation. a friend mentioned that the only thing Crichton's 'Jurassic Park' had in common with the movie was that they both dealt with dinosaurs. :p

what's your take? do you prefer to read, or wait for the movie? if you knew a movie was based on a book, would you hunt out the book first?

[Sharni]

I love both books and the movie versions...

Lord of the Rings is an brilliant example of an excellent book and an excellent movie being made based on that

[Lilith]

The Chrichton books were much better in my mind than on the screen

[skipthisone]

Sharni, that is a great example of a good one, but took 5 tries. The first 4 versions (all animated or semi-animated mind you) were all horrid, but the movie just needed the right level of special effects and they just got there.

I am an avid book reader and as you all know am a movie nut. I will make an attempt to always read the book first if available. The biggest problem with the conversions are two things in my opinion.

1st biggest loss from book to movie, getting into peoples heads. One of the few movies that did this successfully was The Shipping News. Good series of day dreams that let you really know what was going on in the characters mind.

2nd is the tragedy, there are a lot of books with death and or unhappy endings. Hollywood just cant handle that well and change most books to fit thereselves. Pretty woman the best example, popular movie, but in the book she died of an overdose in the end....more shakspearian, but that isnt what sells nowadays....

Long winded...shutting up now

[FussyPucker]

I have to say that I don't agree that books should never be made into movies. I'm a great fan of movies and enjoy them.......I know lots of people that read books and that's what they enjoy.... and whatever you enjoy most is what you should be happy with.

I can't read books......so movies are the only way I can get to see an interpretation of a book.

I would say:-

If you're a book reader enjoy your book
If you're a movie buff enjoy your movie

Don't complain about eachother's pleasures...........where's the enjoyment in that ?

:)

[dannyk]

skipthisone - a man after my own heart! we should compare notes some day

fussypucker - while i agree with you about 'to each his own', the problem is that people tend to be... uneducated.. about relevant facts. let me explian.

i'm a huge comicbook fan (not ashamed!), and i try to keep abreast of what's going on. while 'spiderman' was indeed a wonderful visual effect, $800 million plus of viewers believe that mary jane was pete's first love! does it matter? it does to me! am i being told that what i have known and believed for the past forty years is wrong? same thing with the 'x-men' movies.

on a somewhat related note, for the old-tv-nuts like myself, how would you feel if people started arguing with you that "I, Spy" was about a spy teamed with a boxer (Eddie Murphy)? Bill Cosby was a tennis player!

i know, i know. i'm ranting. sorry. :(

[Aqua]

Oh Man, Jurrasic Park... Do not get me started! Or on Grisham's The Firm for that matter! However, there are a few movies that are done well from books. So far Lord of the Rings is good. They did change some things that I think didn't need to be, but I still loved the film. Crichton's Andromeda Strain, while not a big budget blockbuster, was pretty damn right on with the book. I always love the idea of a book to film project, usually until I see the end result. My solution.... I should be in charge of it!
So if some movie house buys the rights to King's Gunslinger series, PM me... :p :D

[PantyFanatic]

Why the same name?
I’ve seen lot of this done over the years and they are just two different medias of communication. Each provides a separate means of brain registry and interpretation. Each has limits and advantages. Even if one means of story telling inspires the other, why don’t they use a different name and pretend it’s not related. (I know- LAWYERS:redghost:!) Then it may be more acceptable to find major changes.


(:rolleyes:listen to me- I went to see Contact and got pissed:mad:!) lmao

[vampeyes]

I am an avid reader and I love movies.. and maybe its just me but I don't get too upset when the movie is different from the book. I try to think of them as two entirely different things. There are movies that I hated the book and loved the movie and vice versa. No matter what the screen writer or the author does in the adaptation there will probably always be someone who will dislike it.

[PantyFanatic]

Is it who get us first?
We seem to start with a blank, then we think we know how it SHOULD be.

[Sharni]

The crux of this question is that everyone interprets what they see and read differently.....The author and the film director are no different....

I judge both books and films as individuals...and like vampeyes...dont get too upset when they vary greatly

The Highlander films and tv shows are a perfect example...

None of them really run together....for an avid fan like myself the timelines are just not right (and they're not aliens dammit)...but still i loved the films and shows taken on their own merits..and now excitedly await the 5th movie...

[legend]

If you read the book, then you get the whole story. Obviously not everything in the book can be put in the movie.

[Booger]

I allways like to go find the movie after I've read the book just to see how good or bad it is od what is left out. I know there are a lot of things they can't do in movies that can be done in books (due to the fact some one had desided that a movie should run for 90 minutes to 2 hours and there are somethings you just can show in a movie and not get an X rating and there are somethings that just won't work on screen). But Ive seen then kill some good books by making them movies like they did with John Irvings A Prayer For Owen Meany when they made Simon Birch not sure if they even read the book when they wrote the screen play they seem to take one or two of the things from the book and dump the rest and then change things how ever they wanted. I can understand changing a few thing and leaving out soime stuff but wehn it's over 1/2 the book there is something wrong. I have to agree so far the Lord of the Rings has been good and The Godfather was also done very well. Ok have to stop this I could go on like this all day.

[Devillishgirl]

I always read the book first.....I'm a bookaholic(second only to that is my Pixie's addiction but that is for a different thread...). 98% of the time, the movie lets me down. The Lord of the Rings was one of the rare examples of books being translated well onto the screen

[dzbuster]

many years ago in high school while too high to go to class i hid in the library and read war of the worlds. after a couple of pages i was gone and instead of seeing the book i saw a visual based on the descriptions. best movie i ever saw. when i see a movie based on a book i realize that i'm seeing someone else's visualization. between budget, tech limitations and just differance in people i don't always see what i'd have done ( or at least think i would have). i try to not compare the two forms. actually it's better if they don't exactly match or it gets old quickly