Oh, and the first guy to observe that the new ending was justified to update Orwell’s allegory of Communist Russia to a post-cold war era gets a punch in the mouth.
Gunter Grass’ “The Tin Drum”. I think part of the reason the film version was so well done was that they didn’t try to film the entire novel – they would have needed a trilogy to do it properly. The self-contained part of the book that they did film was done “just right”.
Of course there is also my choice for a film that was done better than the original novel – Milan Kundera’s “The Unbearable Lightness of Being”.
Number Six,
Which character from the book was dropped in the translation to film?
Just wondering if you meant J. D. Salinger from Shoeless Joe who became a fictional, though similar (a recluse) writer in Fields of Dreams, played by James Earl Jones.
Sir Rhosis
Changing J. D. Salinger was one of the “wholesale changes” to which I referred. The major character that was dropped was Ray’s identical twin brother, who had become a carnival barker, and couldn’t see the players at first.
Please, allow me to differ, and rant a little…
When I was ten or eleven, I snuck downstairs one night to watch the 2 A.M. showing of 1984. I found the ending to be truly inspiring deep within my snotty prepubescent soul; the indomitable spirit of the individual will triumphs!
A few years later I actually read the novel. I discovered the film’s black & white grittiness invoked the atmosphere of the novel and that the lead casting of pudgy Edmund O’Brien with his pasty-white skin blew a chill grade-B movie wind that heightened the verisimilitude even further. All things considered, I found the film remarkably faithful to the spirit of the novel…up until the last page.
[Cue: Final Scene]
Edmund O’Brien is sitting in the cafe when he suddenly decides he can’t take it anymore, jumps up denouncing Big Brother & get machine gunned by instruments of the State (aka, the cops).
That’s not quite how the book ends. I was absolutely appalled & outraged as only a teenager can be that I had been lied to and manipulated in such a manner. And they expected me to register to be drafted for their stinking little war? I’ve never completely trusted anyone since then.
I just looked on the IMDb and apparently the hack who directed the film is still alive (and making crap for 40 years). I hope he lives forever making straight-to-video Disney movies.
I’d like to add something to the discussion. I don’t think that being faithful to the source material–be it a book, play, song, or whatever–is what determines the quality of a movie. Indeed, I would go so far as to say that how faithfully a movie replicates the plot of the book on which it is based is entirely irrelevant to the movie’s quality. A movie owes nothing to its source material. It should be judged solely on the basis of whether it is a good movie, not in comparison to the book. If you are going to compare it to something, compare it to other movies of the same type.
In my list, some of the movies are very faithful (Silence of the Lambs, Matilda), some are very different (Field of Dreams), and some take a basic idea, and use it for an entirely new story (Chainsaw, Body Snatchers). All three approaches can produce good movies.
Which isn’t to say that comparing a book to a movie isn’t a worthy exercise. It’s often quite revealing about the movie-making process to see what was kept and what was discarded in making a movie from a book. To identify changes from the page to the screen is informative and a worthy intellectual exercise. To say that a movie is bad because it was different from the book is unfair. A movie should be judged entirely on its own merits.
That said, I can’t always follow my own advice. Having read twice and loved the brilliant A Prayer for Owen Meany, I am incapable of fairly evaluating “Simon Birch”. “Simon Birch” may be a good movie for those who haven’t read the book, but it can’t help but pale in comparison to one of the great literary works of the 20th century. But I recognize this, and so I disqualify myself from making judgements about it, because I know that I can’t see it as a movie by itself, only as a very weak adaptation. I suspect that I would have liked it had I never read the novel.
Let me use another example. “What Dreams May Come” uses many elements of the Richard Matheson book on which it is based, but makes big changes to the plot and the ending. In nearly every case, the changes impove the story. I liked the book a lot, and I like the movie, although I think the alternate ending included on the dvd is a lot better than the one finally used.
GWF, you seemed to like the movie 1984 before you read the book. Doesn’t this indicate that the movie, when judged just as a movie and not in comparison to the book, is a good movie? Does having read the book later invalidate your initial enjoyment of the movie?
To summarize, I believe that “The movie was bad because it was different from the book,” is not a valid criticism, nor is “The movie was faithful to the book,” necessarily a good thing.
Actually, there are two movie versions of 1984. The one closest to the book (and the best one) is the movie starring John Hurt and Richard Burton (in his last movie). The black and white one is real obscure. When Orwell’s widow, Sonia Orwell, saw that one, she demanded it to be wiped clean from the shelves, which is why it’s so rare today. I’m surprised it was on TV.
Allow me to nitpick for a second. 
Actually, TCM and the character of BB was not inspired by the book Psycho. The character of Norman Bates, Buffalo Bill, and the family in TCM were inspired by serial killer Ed Gein from Wisconsin. Gein was the son of a fanatical mother. When she died, he was alone and began his bizarre lifestyle (to say the least). He robbed graves and skinned the corpses (all the corpses were of middle-aged women–like his mother had been) and made things out of the skins or bones (lampshades, a belt out of the nipples, made a bowl out of the top half of skulls, etc.). He was charged with two deaths, I believe, sent away for insanity and died in 1984. Techinically he’s not a serial killer, as they only found two bodies, but it is believed that he did indeed kill other women as well as dig up bodies from the graves.
-bean_shadow, who knows too much about the most morbid of things
I haven’t seen that movie, but I was at the video store last night and spotted it in the FAMILY section. I almost passed out.
I don’t dispute your main point. The characters in TCM and TSOTL are not based on the book Psycho. All of the characters were directly based on Ed Gein, as you so ably demonstrate in your post. But I never claimed that the characters were based on Psycho. I think that Bloch’s book also had an influence, which is why I wrote that Psycho inspired the characters. I make a distinction between “inspired by” and “based on”, but rereading my post, that isn’t clear. I use “inspired by” to mean an indirect or weaker influence on, and “based on” to indicate that the plot and characters come directly from the book. Much of the publicity about the Ed Gein case comes from Psycho, so I think it can be fairly said that any character based on Mr. Gein has to some degree been influenced by the Bloch book.
I quite like the novel “2001: A Space Odyssey”. I understand the movie is generally thought of well, too.
I hope to heck we can add “The Lord of the Rings” to this list when Peter Jackson’s movies come out.
The film and later novel were based on Sir Arthur C’s wonderful short story “Sentinal”. Of the three I felt the novel (novelization?) was the weakest. Yes, I know, Sir Arthur felt the film left questions unanswered, but is that necessarily bad?
May I agree with the earlier mentioned Maltese Falcon as great in both catagories and add The Longest Day.
May I suggest as good books and pretty good movies:
The Dirty Dozen, Six (movie Three) Days of the Condor and Marathon Man.
Side note nere-For the longest time I was bound and determined to not like the film, The Princess Bride because I so loved the book. Eventually I warmed to it.
It was a very good book and a charming film.
TV
I’ll go with Charles Dickens’s novel Great Expectations, along with the 1930s (?) film featuring John Mill and Alec Guiness. Very well done.
I much enjoyed the adaptions of E.M. Forster’s novels A Room With a View and A Passage to India.
I haven’t read Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption, but the film was so good that I’ll mention it anyway.
The Day of the Jackal– Frederick Forsyth’s novel was excellent, and Fred Zinneman’s 1972 adaptation of it was very faithful, considering the time limits imposed by a standard movie.
(We will not even deign to mention the Richard Gere-Bruce Willis monstrosity.)
My all-time favorite thriller. By the end you’re rooting for both the assasin and detective inspector Lebel to win.
My choices are all from the same author: Stephen King. I’m not fond of the majority of his horror stuff because I’m too much of a chicken. Hiding under the covers with night sweats still plagues me occasionally as an adult. :o
Stand By Me from the novella The Body was the first Stephen King work that I really appreciated. It was because of this movie that I bought Different Seasons which also opened the door for…
The Shawshank Redemption - The first incident I can remember of reading a book and actually enjoying the movie afterwards. The movie stuck pretty close to the book.
The Green Mile actually made me cry, and I don’t cry when I read books. I can cry at the drop of a hat, otherwise, so I knew the movie would be a boo-hoo fest. Once again, the movie was pretty close to the book. Loved it.
I’ll probably get slammed for the next one, but The Stand was a good one. I never quite made it all the way through the book, and I didn’t read it until after I saw the movie. I know the actors and lines are often cheesy, and the special effects weren’t that great IMHO, but I liked the plot of the movie so much that I bought the DVD.
The Last Detail
FUCKING excellent FUCKING book, FUCKING out-FUCKingstanding FUCKing movie. Starring Jack FUCKing Nicholson.
All kidding aside, this is a true to life story of what it was like to be a sailor in the late sixties to early seventies. Also one of those rare cases where the movie is actually better than the book.
Dear Number 6
Imagine, if you will, a film faithful to your namesake’s TV series except at the very end he becomes #1, a boot-licking employee of the CIA or MI6, and just plays at being #6 to better subvert others in the village…
I believe that “The movie was bad because it was different from the book,” is a valid criticism when the difference depicts an aspect of human nature that is the diametric opposite of the philosophical intent of the novel (and just happens to serve the political ends of the powers that be in Hollywood and further afield). The original filming of 1984 was a complete betrayal Orwell’s point and at the same time a perfect example of doublethink (as defined in the novel) and thus a validation of Orwell’s warning; anything/everything can/will/must be converted into bread and circuses for the entertainment/distraction of the masses. There are times when art must be judged in the context of society.
SPOILERS FOR THE PRISONER
GWF: Well, it is revealed in the end that Number 6 is Number 1, so that part of your example would be a faithful reproduction of the series. Also, there are no others in the village to subvert. They are there for the sole purpose of subverting Number 6. However, it wouldn’t bother me a bit if they decided to change those aspects for the purpose of making a good movie. I don’t think that it would necessarily be a bad thing if a movie version showed Number 6 eventually being turned by Number 2 and revealing the circumstances of his resignation (which was what Number 2 wanted), if it was done well. I don’t think the ambiguous ending of the series would make a good ending for a film version. Different isn’t always worse, nor is it always better. It’s just different.
So a change from the book to the movie is bad when it subverts the purpose of the story? I agree. What I said was that different all by itself isn’t bad. In the case you list, which I agree with completely, the ending isn’t bad because it is different, it’s bad because it doesn’t serve the needs of the story that came before. That is, the ending is bad because it is bad for this story in this movie.
Imagine if the novel ended the same way. The ending of the movie would then match the novel. Would this make the ending a good one just because it matched the book? Of course not. Imagine if the movie existed on its own and wasn’t an adaptation of a book. The ending would still be bad. It is a bad ending beacuase it doesn’t serve the needs of the story being told.
It isn’t being faithful to the book that makes a movie good, it is being faithful to the needs of the story being told in the movie, which may be different from the book.
I agree.
My point, which I may have expressed poorly, is that a movie has an existence that is separate from the material on which it is based. The example above, (1984) is a poor example because the change was harmful to the story, so it seems to support the idea that different is bad. It that case, different was worse. Let’s look at a couple of other examples.
In Betty Letts Where the Heart Is, the main character has a phobia about the number 7, and indeed, terrible things seem to happen to her daughter Americus on dates involving the number 7. For the movie, this was changed to the number 5. Fans of the book criticized this change. But the story works just as well with 5 as with 7, so this a difference that is neither better nor worse.
In Shoeless Joe, exactly who the field will eventually bring back is revealed in the first chapter. Ray’s wife Annie is one-dimensional. It takes many years to complete the field, and the players are brought back one by one. The writer Ray kidnaps is J. D. Salinger. There is a fence in the outfield through which the players arrive and depart.
All of these things were changed for the moveie Field of Dreams. The person the field is to bring back is revealed at the end. Annie becomes a rounded character. The field is comleted in a single season, and the team comes back in a group. The writer was fictionalized, and the fence was eliminated. In every case, the change improved the story as it appeared on the screen. In this case, different was better. By the way, W. P. Kinsella agrees that the changes improved the story.
Again, I will say that “The movie was bad because it was different” is not a valid criticism. But I will further say that “The movie was bad because changes were made that detracted from the story” is a legitimate criticism, and that’s exactly the kind of criticism that GWF was aiming at the first 1984. And it is one that I agree with.
Different isn’t always bad, it’s just different.
I second this and also add Conrad’s “Heart of Darkness” with Coppola’s “Apocalypse Now”.
IIRC, isn’t Puzo’s the Godfather generally considered to be best-selling, Harold-Robbins-like trash? The fact that Coppola found the heart of it and turned it into the movie(s) he did speaks much more to his skills that to Puzo’s…
As for “Heart of Darkness” and “Apocalypse” now THERE you go with a true 1 - 2 punch…
To Kill a Mockingbird pretty much set the standard, though, a long with The Maltese Falcon…
What about The Wizard of Oz?