If you read the book and saw the movie…why didn’t they clearly show what happened at the end? It wouldn’t have been that hard to show what happened. If you hadn’t read the book you would be confused as to why the earrings were delivered to her and what she did with them.
I think you’re probably not getting much of a response because most of the country, myself included, doesn’t know when we’re gonna get to see it. I’ve been looking forward to this movie for months and it looks like it’s only in five theaters or so at any given time. I’ve about resigned myself to having to wait for it to come out on DVD.
I expected to have to drive to the other side of town to see the movie (the theater where they show unusual movies) but it was in several theaters. We saw it the weekend after it came out because we were too busy that first weekend.
It is a slow and quiet movie, so it probably is not going to be very popular. But it was right up my alley.
I am also a Colin Firth fan so will see anything he is in. But Scarlett Johanssen (sp.?) is really wonderful in this movie.
I would be happy to drive to the other side of town to see this movie, but according to the entertainment guide of my newspaper’s online site it isn’t showing at any theater within at least 200 miles of here (Oklahoma City.)
I read the book thanks to my neice who had checked it out from the library and suggested that I read it too. I’ve been looking forward to seeing the movie since I first heard about it, and everything I’ve heard or read about it just raves about Scarlett Johanssen.
Don’t waste your time, its a complete bag. If you do go to see it take some matchsticks to prop open your eyelids.
Thanks for the advice. 
However, I’m primarily interested in the movie for several reasons that aren’t the usual reasons I go to see a movie. I enjoy art and admire Vermeer a great deal. It would be fun and interesting to get a glimpse into his studio and and way of life, which by all accounts the movie portrays very realistically. And like Lilith Fair, I would also enjoy seeing the portrayal of everyday life in Delft. This was one of the more enjoyable aspects of the book, IMO. And I’d like to see Scarlett Johanssen’s portrayal of Griet. Virtually every review or article I’ve read about this movie just raves about her.
I can’t answer the OP’s question because I haven’t read the book, but my feelings about this film were just “meh.” I adore Colin Firth, but there was nothing special at all about his performance–he was just sour and grumpy all the time. Scarlett Johanssen was somewhat better, but I grew tired of her downcast looks and stammering. The actress who played Vermeer’s wife gave the best performance. Mostly I enjoyed the set design and costumes. It was very interesting to see a vision of 17th century Holland.
Agree with Baby Fish Mouth; it was slow, but beautiful to look at. Whoever was in charge of lighting had clearly been studying their Vermeer, too.
Can’t help you on the plot; I didn’t read the book. My GF did read the book, and I recall her saying something about the end being different, but darned if I can remember what it was.
And by the way, I sympathize with those waiting for it to play their town; Memphis has improved a LOT on that front in the last few years, thank heaven. I got to see the restored “Metropolis” on the big screen, and we get a good range of foreign films here as well. When I lived in Des Moines, though, we had NOTHING. Even “Shakespeare in Love” was deemed too esoteric for the local crowd and we had to wait something like six months to see it.
Oddly enough, even though I live in the backwater of Wheeling West Virginia, I managed to catch this one.
The movie does indeed look good, but unless the you have read the book, much of the meaning of certain scenes is lost (for example the star that Griet pauses over when she passes it).
In the end I decided that both have to be taken together. The movie provides pictures for the book. Together they are a sort of "illustrated version." The picture are nice to look at, but to get the full experience, you have to read the words.
Does that make sense?I haven’t seen the movie yet, but Lilith Fair and I read the book and she went to see the movie…and she told me that the opening scene from the book, where Griet and Vermeer meet and she’s arranging the chopped vegetables…in the movie Vermeer isn’t there…never meets her, so how would he have any idea later that she has such an eye for color that he can trust her to grind his paints? Or that she’s so obsessive/complusive that she can be trusted to clean without moving anything out of place? Doesn’t that seem like a stupid change to make…something that to my mind completely set the stage for the rest of the story?
I saw the movie after reading the book and maybe it colored my perceptions, but…I think I could easily have waited for it on video. It was no great shakes. Lovely to look at, as has already been noted here, but not much beyond that.
Mmm…I gotta see it just for the Colin Firthiness of it. <lust lust lust>
I’ve seen the movie once (several months ago) and thought it was gorgeous. Scenes keep playing themselves in my mind and I have a desire to see it again. It’s playing as a double-feature with The Cooler at a theater in Evanston (just north of Chicago) and though I’ve seen that too, I’m going to go next week. (Aside, this same theater is running a double-feature with Lost In Translation and The Fog of War. I really like this theater, the Century 12/CineArts 6.)
I haven’t read the book but I will. As usual, I’m glad I saw the movie before reading the book so I didn’t have to deal with thoughts of “oh no! look what they changed!!” disrupting the movie.
What you say makes me want to read the book even more, but I didn’t see anything out of place when I watched the movie. He just sensed something in Griet. A scene when he asks her to tell him what colors the clouds are (and she sees colors most people wouldn’t notice) seems to have taken the place of the scene you describe.