# Books that should not be made into movies **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 26, 2011, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-should-not-be-made-into-movies/594208 "2011-08-26T19:32:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![woodstockbirdybird](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/woodstockbirdybird/32/7905_2.png) [@woodstockbirdybird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/woodstockbirdybird)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-should-not-be-made-into-movies/594208/1 "2011-08-26T19:32:14Z")
I understand Hollywood can’t bear the thought of passing up a work that has proven itself profitable in another medium, but really, not everything needs to be made into a movie (such as the board game Battleship, for example). Case in point: They’re working on a production of [Cloud Atlas](http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/cloud-atlas-wachowski-brothers-tom-tykwer-225835), possibly the least filmable novel of the past decade or so (IMO). The fact that they’ve got Tom Hanks and Halle Berry attached only strengthens my belief that they’re going to totally fuck it up. Another example is **Naked Lunch** , though I guess that was so loosely based upon the book it was more like “inspired by” than a faithful adaptation. Any books/graphic novels/etc. you think shouldn’t be (or shouldn’t have been) made into films? ---
**Author:** ![Argent\_Towers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e8c25b/32.png) [@Argent\_Towers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Argent_Towers)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-should-not-be-made-into-movies/594208/2 "2011-08-26T19:34:27Z")
No Tom Wolfe book should ever be made into a film - they would all work much better as a mini-series. _Bonfire of the Vanities_ would have been an outstanding mini-series, yet this epic, sprawling tome was compressed into one highly flawed movie. ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-should-not-be-made-into-movies/594208/3 "2011-08-26T20:43:08Z")
_Mein Kampf_ _Das Kapital_ _Quotations From Chairman Mao-Tse Tung_ ---
**Author:** ![detop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bcef8e/32.png) [@detop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/detop)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-should-not-be-made-into-movies/594208/4 "2011-08-26T21:29:23Z")
The phone book ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-should-not-be-made-into-movies/594208/5 "2011-08-26T21:31:11Z")
2nd Chronicles ---
**Author:** ![Morbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/morbo/32/389_2.png) [@Morbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morbo)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-should-not-be-made-into-movies/594208/6 "2011-08-26T21:55:39Z")
The only way they could even touch **A Fire Upon The Deep** or **A Deepness In The Sky** would be as animation, which will never happen b/c kids would never be able to understand it, and Hollywood would never release an adult hard sci-fi cartoon. **A Fire Upon The Deep** - there’s just way too much crazy shit for CGI to handle it. Sentient potted plants on little jet packs, dog-like aliens with shared pack-minds, FTL space-warping attacks where the missles are sent to where they think the other ship will un-zip, the blight, the zones of thought, the AI nanobot network countermeasures, the benign transcendant “Power” - no way. And one of the great surprises of **A Deepness In The Sky** was the very-late reveal of the…“nature” of the Spider culture, which would be pretty unfilmable. ---
**Author:** ![RikWriter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/49beb7/32.png) [@RikWriter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RikWriter)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2011, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-should-not-be-made-into-movies/594208/7 "2011-08-26T22:10:32Z")
> [@Argent\_Towers](#): > > No Tom Wolfe book should ever be made into a film - they would all work much better as a mini-series. _Bonfire of the Vanities_ would have been an outstanding mini-series, yet this epic, sprawling tome was compressed into one highly flawed movie. The Right Stuff was an awesome movie. ---
**Author:** ![cerberus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/71e660/32.png) [@cerberus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cerberus)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2011, 12:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-should-not-be-made-into-movies/594208/8 "2011-08-27T00:07:40Z")
World War Z should be a cable series: one episode per chapter.