I’m looking here for well-known novels that were made into movies with very different titles.
Examples: “Shoeless Joe” became “Field of Dreams.”
“The Short-TImers” became “Full Metal Jacket”
“Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?” became “Blade Runner.”
More examples? Please?
“We Can Remember it for You Wholesale” became “Total Recall”
“Red Dragon” became “Manhunter”
“Lost Moon” became “Apollo 13”
“My Posse Don’t Do Homework” became “Dangerous Minds”
“Great Debates” became “MPSIMS”…
Well, since short stories have already been broached (we’ll remember it for you wholesale):
Who Goes There? -> The Thing
The Monolith -> 2001: A Space Oddesy
Herbert West: Reanimator -> Reanimator
The Racer -> Death Race 2000
(You didn’t say they had to be ACCURATE adaptations…)
Richard Matheson’s I Am Legend becomes “adapted” into Omega Man.
How is this not IMHO or MPSIMS?
Here are some more:
Flowers for Algernon into Charley.
“Trucks” (an SK story) into Maximum Overdrive.
There’s The Haunting of Hill House into just plain, “The Haunting” but that’s not too different, I suppose.
All I can think of for now…
Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption was shortened to just The Shawshank Redemption.
The Black Ferris became Something Wicked This Way Comes.
Cabal became Nightbreed.
I’m sure I can think of more…
“The Wizard of Oz” was shortened to “Oz” for the HBO version.
Two quick things:
Thanks to everyone who came up with answers.
I actually THOUGHT I was in General Questions when I posted this… it obviously doesn’t belong in Great Debates, and I apologize for the inconvenience to the moderator who’ll have to clean up the mess.
Tengu wrote:
I think you mean:
“The Sentinel” -> 2001: A Space Odyssey
grumblegrumble Eaters of the Dead stupidly became The Thirteenth Warrior./grumblegrumble
Richard Matheson’s I AM LEGEND was adapted twice: first as The Last Man on Earth, and then later as The Omega Man.
*The movie Frankie Starlight was adapted from a book called The Dork of Cork. (I think the book’s title was much better, but it didn’t stand a chance here in the U.S.)
here’s another:
El Club Dumas (book) became The Ninth Gate (book).
The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love" (a brilliant novel, IMHO) was shortened to “The Mambo Kings.”
“Second Variety” became “Screamers.” (P. K. Dick)
“Monkey Planet” (translated from the original French) became “Planet of The Apes.” Thereafter the novel was released as “Planet of The Apes.”
“Cyborg” became “The Six Million Dollar Man” (I’m using TV as well as feature films). Interestingly enough, “Cyborg” was credited as the source of “The Bionic Woman” as well, though it was just a spin-off of TSMDM.
“Farewell To The Master” became “The Day The Earth Stood Still”
“MASH” became “MAS*H” (stretching it, I know)
And the words “On” and “Over” from “The Bridge ____ The River Kwai” are interchanged, but I forget which is which.
Sir
The Body -> Stand By Me
A Prayer for Owen Meany -> Simon Birch
Emma---->Clueless
Sweet Thursday---->Cannery Row
“Animal Husbandry” became “Someone Like You”
I may be misremembering, and the IMDB has no mention of a “Black Ferris”, but I believe that “Something Wicked This Way Comes” was based on the Bradbury novel “Something Wicked This Way Comes.” In fact, Ray Bradbury wrote the screenplay.