Genres you enjoy in one form but not another

Cafe Society
#1

I’ve been thinking about this lately while trying to find new films on Netflix, and new books for the Kindle, and it’s kind of funny.

Thriller/Mystery: I love these in film (particularly the late 80’s through 90’s style), even the crappy ones with Chazz Palmanteri. But I tend to get bored easily reading thriller or detective novels. Does Joseph Wambaugh count? I do like his books, mostly, and The Choirboys film was great.

Documentary/pop science or sociology: Love the books, turn off most films. The films always seem either too ADD or dumbed-down, even if I enjoyed the original writing. This applies whether I agree with any ideological bent or not.

Science Fiction: I adore SF short fiction, and I have a little collection of vintage anthology magazines. But I usually get a headache from rolling my eyes every five minutes if I read a novel or watch a film. Exceptions include Arthur C Clarke, Phillip Dick, *some * Asimov, Bradbury…I guess the films tend to be better budget. I’ve read so much short fiction by lesser-known authors that I have a hard time keeping them straight, though.

Horror: See Science Fiction. Stephen King is kind of an exception, though I like him best when he’s channeling Bradbury. As far as his film adaptations, though, the ones I enjoy are from his short fiction (The Shining was good, though).

Comedy: I can’t remember the last comedic film I enjoyed. Again, the big comedies from the 80s (Eddie Murphy, John Candy, Aykroyd, et al.) were great, but I can’t get into the newer stuff. I still enjoy some modern stand-up, though. And I’ll always give a funny piece of writing a whirl.

Musicals: Generally, I can’t watch these for long as a film–going to the theater is a bit different. But I very much like some of the music out of context. Guilty pleasure: I still listen to the Dick Tracy soundtrack a few times a year.

I could go on, but those are the big ones for me. I can’t be the only one out there…how about you?

#2

I’m kind of the opposite–I love sci-fi in film and tv, but can’t sit down and read it. The only real exception to this were the first several Star Wars EU novels, but I also lost interest in those after a time.

Horror is kind of the same–adore the movies, haven’t tried to read any in quite some time.

I’m also a not-so-secret romance novel junkie (escapism at its most ridiculous, and I love every improbable page of it) but feel “meh” at best about most romantic movies.

#3

I tend to enjoy mystery/thriller movies, but can’t stand reading mystery novels.
I enjoy some horror novels but usually hate horror movies.
I like western movies and TV shows but I don’t care for the vast majority of western novels.
I enjoy reading superhero comic books and watching superhero movies, but don’t care for the majority of superhero novels.

#4

Science – love to watch, can’t read – too much like school, where my teachers couldn’t make any of the sciences interesting

Comedy – watch, but can’t think of a humorous book that I appreciated

Horror - can’t read or watch. For me, horror novels and films died in the 80’s.

History (including Westerns), Thrillers/Crime/Mystery/Espionage – read and watch, unless it’s a child/woman in danger, then neither

#5

non-fiction–love documentaries and science films. Nova is one of my favorite shows and I thoroughly enjoyed Saliger a documentary I saw on PBS last week. I can’t read it though. It rarely keeps my attention. I will admit to loving every book by Malcolm Gladwell I’ve read and a few other very much written for the best seller list non-fiction books.

#6

Same here, for the most part. I like comedy movies and I don’t mind some humor in a book, but if the book is solely humor, I just get really bored really quickly.

#7

Horror – I read it from time to time, but don’t care for horror movies. It’s far harder to create horror in the printed page, especially since film horror is so easy to do (one reason I suspect so many amateur filmmakers make horror is because it’s the easiest way to make an audience reaction, though, really, what is called “horror” in film is usually just “startlement”).

#8

Sci-Fi – I like sci-fi movies, but not TV shows and books

#9

Mysteries on TV. I can watch stupid mystery and police procedural shows on TV forever. But I really can’t tolerate them as books and am pretty meh about them as movies.