# "Based on a story by..." should mean more than the main character has the same name! **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [January 3, 2009, 1:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656 "2009-01-03T01:42:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Angel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d26b3c/32.png) [@Johnny\_Angel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Angel)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2009, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/21 "2009-01-03T17:48:55Z")
The WGA should codify the proper advisory as, “Bastardized from…” ---
**Author:** ![Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/half_man_half_wit/32/21766_2.png) [@Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Half_Man_Half_Wit)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2009, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/22 "2009-01-03T18:16:06Z")
> [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](#): > > I guess the part of this that I don’t get is–did anyone really hear about John Nash’s backstory before the movie came out? I hadn’t. I saw it because it was Russell Crowe, and Ron Howard and it was supposed to be good. i couldn’t care less whether it was true or not, or whether it was based on a real person, not based on a real person, semi-based…That was no part of the attraction for me. I would have shelled out my $8.50 in any event. Did you ever, in your life, say, “No! Absolutely not! I want to see THIS one because it’s based on a true story”? I do think that the ‘true story’ label is a draw, in general – just look at all those ‘reality’ soaps, I believe they appeal to the same common denominator of voyeurism, albeit at a much shallower level (btw., I saw _Beautiful Mind_ because it was about Nash, so I’m not gonna claim to be free of that desire to watch). Point being, it’s probably not necessarily a known name that interests the audience, but merely a – however tenuous – connection to a reality different from their own. It does have a different draw than just being billed as straight fiction. The question raised by that, though, is – why not make an outright biopic, then? Well, it’s probably simply because actual reality doesn’t necessarily conform to our notions of entertainment; and when it comes straight down to it, every biographical account is fictionalized to some degree, even if it restricts itself to merely reporting the bare facts – there is still an issue of things being left out, and of decisions being made as to what is and isn’t shown, so we are in fact faced with a continuum between entirely fictional and as close to factual as possible accounts (and actually, the converse is true, as well: rarely are all elements of a story complete and utter fiction; every writer draws from personal experience and other sources of inspiration). Viewed from this perspective, I don’t think it’s all that surprising any more that there are data points on every part of this spectrum. ---
**Author:** ![puppygod](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ce7236/32.png) [@puppygod](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puppygod)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2009, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/23 "2009-01-03T20:41:30Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > The original novel HAS a love interest, only no American studio could have filmed it before the 1970s: Captain Good and the native girl he rescues, Foulata, fall for each other. I read it years ago and my memory is hazy, but wasn’t that more of an one-sided crush? ---
**Author:** ![Don\_t\_fight\_the\_hypothetical](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/59ef9b/32.png) [@Don\_t\_fight\_the\_hypothetical](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Don_t_fight_the_hypothetical)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2009, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/24 "2009-01-03T20:50:07Z")
I was under the impression it was a legal thing. You want to base your character on a literary fictional character, buy the rights then write whatever you want. Crediting the original source is a WGA requirement. IIRC. ---
**Author:** ![pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pseudotriton_ruber_ruber)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2009, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/25 "2009-01-03T22:06:37Z")
> [@Don\_t\_fight\_the\_hypothetical](#): > > I was under the impression it was a legal thing. You want to base your character on a literary fictional character, buy the rights then write whatever you want. Crediting the original source is a WGA requirement. IIRC. And what legal requirement is preventing from you from changing the name of your characters once you’ve purchased the rights to their story? ---
**Author:** ![KGS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/90ced4/32.png) [@KGS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KGS)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2009, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/26 "2009-01-03T22:23:18Z")
What really bugs me is movies that say, “Inspired by actual events.” Umm, ALL movies are inspired by actual events! Doesn’t matter if it’s a WWII drama or a vampire holocaust. ---
**Author:** ![Hockey\_Monkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a183cd/32.png) [@Hockey\_Monkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hockey_Monkey)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2009, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/27 "2009-01-04T00:04:28Z")
> [@Wendell\_Wagner](#): > > You think that version was bad? Have you seen the 1985 version? It’s rated even worse on on the IMDb. I was gonna say “so you haven’t seen the Richard Chamberlain version then?” Ha! I love that movie, but because it is campy, not for good acting and plot points. ---
**Author:** ![Baldwin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baldwin/32/7264_2.png) [@Baldwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baldwin)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2009, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/28 "2009-01-04T00:26:28Z")
> [@Martini\_Enfield](#): > > The funny thing is that after we’d switched off the TV last night, I turned to my wife and said “Well, that’s settled. I need to win Lotto and use some of the winnings to make an absolutely faithful film adaptation of the novel. I’m thinking Simon Pegg or Clive Owen as Quatermain.” 😃 > > You’re right, though, the book would be an awesome film as is- I really wish the Film Industry would stop insisting on Love Interests in almost every adventure movie. They’re not really needed, IMHO. More power to you. Oddly enough, I’ve never read _King Solomon’s Mines_. I know that Haggard’s _The Saga of Eric Brighteyes_ would make a kickass movie without changing the story. (Seriously; never mind the silly-sounding title. Great characters, adventure, sorcery and a tragic romantic triangle.) But if you want to have some true rage about a bastardized adaptation, save it for the 1988 movie _Nightfall_, “based on” Isaac Asimov’s great story. I think this movie may have given Dr. Asimov AIDS. (Actually it was a blood transfusion.) (There was also a 2000 movie of _Nightfall_; I didn’t see that one, but apparently it was also wretched. Why does one of the best sf stories ever get turned into horrible crap twice?) ---
**Author:** ![Baldwin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baldwin/32/7264_2.png) [@Baldwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baldwin)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2009, 12:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/29 "2009-01-04T00:28:05Z")
> [@Hockey\_Monkey](#): > > I was gonna say “so you haven’t seen the Richard Chamberlain version then?” Ha! I love that movie, but because it is campy, not for good acting and plot points. I didn’t see that movie, but I did see one scene on tv that actually made me laugh. A villainous character breaks a big rock in half with his forehead; Chamberlain says, “How does a person find out he can do that?” ---
**Author:** ![Baldwin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baldwin/32/7264_2.png) [@Baldwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baldwin)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2009, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/30 "2009-01-04T00:34:23Z")
Y’know, this thread is making me want to write a screenplay adaptation of Damon Knight’s great story “In the Country of the Kind”. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2009, 12:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/31 "2009-01-04T00:48:06Z")
C’mon – Hollywood has been doing this for years. I’ve never seen a good (not necessarily literal) version of **King Solomon’s Mines**. Or of **A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court**. Or **The Puppet Masters** or **starship Troopers** pr **Martians, Go Home** or **Visit to a Small Planet** or **The Osterman Weekend** or **Ice Station Zebra**. Most of the James Bond films don’t even have a passing acquaintance with the books they’re nominally based on. Ftrdtic Brown and Herman Wouk complained that there was nothing of their books left by the time they hit the screen. Adaptations of Robert Sheckley’s stuff are the pits. This is news? ---
**Author:** ![Huerta88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/82dd89/32.png) [@Huerta88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Huerta88)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2009, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/32 "2009-01-04T01:08:25Z")
> [@Martini\_Enfield](#): > > I really wish the Film Industry would stop insisting on Love Interests in almost every adventure movie. They’re not really needed, IMHO. They think it’s needed to avoid guaranteeing that one half of the population won’t show up, and with some women, that’s true. I’ve always complained that no one feels compelled to shoehorn a car chase or barroom brawl into every Meg Ryan romantic comedy (not that I demand that, which I suppose is the point). I admired the guys who did **Master and Commander** because they avoided the love interest temptation, despite what I am sure was pressure from the studio. Of course that cuts both ways because I hear no talk about filming another of those. Does any of this why-bother-buying-the-rights-if-you’re-just-going-to-change-the-story? relate to what we hear about the schizophrenic nature of the movie business and its denizens? Haven’t I heard stories about how common it is for everyone to fight to buy an option on a script, only to sit on it for years? Is some of it also that they need the big name of the original story/author to line up funding, but once they start filming, the auteur’s hubris leads him to be convinced that he can improve on the original? ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2009, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/33 "2009-01-04T01:09:16Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > C’mon – Hollywood has been doing this for years. I’ve never seen a good (not necessarily literal) version of **King Solomon’s Mines**. Or of **A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court**. Or **The Puppet Masters** or **starship Troopers** pr **Martians, Go Home** or **Visit to a Small Planet** or **The Osterman Weekend** or **Ice Station Zebra**. Most of the James Bond films don’t even have a passing acquaintance with the books they’re nominally based on. Ftrdtic Brown and Herman Wouk complained that there was nothing of their books left by the time they hit the screen. Adaptations of Robert Sheckley’s stuff are the pits. > This is news? You forgot any adaptation of Philip K. Dick’s works. ---
**Author:** ![Martini\_Enfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/martini_enfield/32/11123_2.png) [@Martini\_Enfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martini_Enfield)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2009, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/34 "2009-01-04T01:14:37Z")
> [@puppygod](#): > > I read it years ago and my memory is hazy, but wasn’t that more of an one-sided crush? And Captain Good isn’t the main character- Quatermain himself doesn’t have a “love interest” during the novel, which is usually how these things work. ---
**Author:** ![Huerta88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/82dd89/32.png) [@Huerta88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Huerta88)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2009, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/35 "2009-01-04T01:33:04Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > You forgot any adaptation of Philip K. Dick’s works. Some of which were not awful in their own right. And some of which was inevitable when (in some of those cases) short stories that kind of just boil down to one “big concept” idea/gimmick (not to be derogatory) has to be stretched into a 90 minute story with characters, story development, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Martini\_Enfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/martini_enfield/32/11123_2.png) [@Martini\_Enfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martini_Enfield)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2009, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/36 "2009-01-04T01:51:47Z")
> [@Huerta88](#): > > They think it’s needed to avoid guaranteeing that one half of the population won’t show up, and with some women, that’s true. I’ve always complained that no one feels compelled to shoehorn a car chase or barroom brawl into every Meg Ryan romantic comedy (not that I demand that, which I suppose is the point). That’s an interesting point and I agree with you. But given that the film distribution market has changed with the advent of DVD, I have to ask: “So what if some women won’t go and see it?” It’ll be out on DVD in due course and guys (and women who don’t care about love interests) can rent or purchase it and watch it themselves anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Don\_t\_fight\_the\_hypothetical](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/59ef9b/32.png) [@Don\_t\_fight\_the\_hypothetical](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Don_t_fight_the_hypothetical)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2009, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/37 "2009-01-04T02:11:16Z")
> [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](#): > > And what legal requirement is preventing from you from changing the name of your characters once you’ve purchased the rights to their story? Sorry, I’m not sure what you are asking. ---
**Author:** ![Martini\_Enfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/martini_enfield/32/11123_2.png) [@Martini\_Enfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martini_Enfield)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2009, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/38 "2009-01-04T02:18:09Z")
> [@Don\_t\_fight\_the\_hypothetical](#): > > Sorry, I’m not sure what you are asking. I’m pretty sure he’s saying (much as I am) “If you’re going to completely ignore the source material, but still acknowledge the fact your work isn’t entirely original, then what’s stopping you from buying the rights to the story itself from the original author (or estate) and then changing the names of the main characters? At least then you’re not mis-representing your work as being anything like the source material when it clearly isn’t.” ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2009, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/39 "2009-01-04T02:19:38Z")
> [@](#): > > You forgot any adaptation of Philip K. Dick’s works. Believe me, that list was by no means intended to be exhaustive. It was just an off-the-top-of-my-head quickie. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2009, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656/40 "2009-01-04T16:26:59Z")
Baldwin writes: \> (There was also a 2000 movie of Nightfall; I didn’t see that one, but apparently \> it was also wretched. Why does one of the best sf stories ever get turned into \> horrible crap twice?) Because once you’ve bought the rights to title the movie \*Nightfall \*and put “From the story by Isaac Asimov” on the poster, you’ve already broken even on profits from the film you’ll be making (assuming you aren’t trying to make a blockbuster by hiring big stars). “Nightfall” isn’t particularly a very cinematic story. It might be possible to turn it into a good film without huge changes, but it would take a very good screenwriter. You have a better chance of making a decent profit by hiring a second-rate screenwriter for cheap (and go cheap on everything else on the film) and letting him use obvious movie cliches in the script. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/based-on-a-story-by-should-mean-more-than-the-main-character-has-the-same-name/479656.md?page=3)