Stories that have been adapted into movies and mini-series the most

Cafe Society
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We’ve probably done this before, maybe more than once, but I’ve long been fascinated by the way different writers and directors will r-imagine a story, so that different versions come out looking completely differently. Inspired in part by the upcoming release of The Odyssey, which has itself been done more than once.

I’m looking here for cases where the movie is a rendering based on the original story, not just using the same characters. There are plenty of movies featuring Dracula, or Tarzan, or Sherlock Holmes. Most of them aren’t based on the original stories. Also, there will invariably be some ambiguity, because different versions significantly change things. The 1910 Frankenstein and the silent movie The Sea Beast I’d still count as versions of Frankenstein and Moby Dick. Also, I think Prospero’s Books is an adaptation of Shakespeare’s The Tempest, but Forbidden Planet isn’t. Some cases are adaptations-by-proxy. The animated Grendel is based on John Gardner’s book of that name, not on Beowulf. Similarly, The 13th Warrior is based on Michael Crichton’s Eaters of the Dead rather than directly on Beowulf. I’m inclined to include both as adaptations of the original, thpugh YMMV.

Also inspired by a page in the old Famous Monsters of Filmland from the in the 1960s that listed about 30 film versions of Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde. There have been many more since.

So, for a few examples:

Bram Stoker’s Dracula:
Nosferatu (1922)

Dracula (1931)

Dracula (Spanish version 1931)

Dracula/Horror of Dracula (Chhristopher Lee 1958)

Count Dracula (Christopher Lee 1970)

Hrabe Drakula (Czech 1971)

DRacula (Canada 1973)

Dracula (Jack Palance 1973)

Dracula (PBS, Louis Jordan) 1977)

Dracula (Frank Langella 1979)

Nosferatu (1979)

Bram Stoker’s Dracula (Coppola, Gary Oldman 1992)

Dracula (Italy 2002)

Dracula (India 2005)

DRacula (BBC 2006)

Dracula (India 2008)

Dracula (BBC 2020)

Nosferatu (2023)

Nosferatu 2024

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Do we get to count The Bible?

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Individual books from the bible, yes. I don’t know of any movie that claimed to do the whole Bible. But we’ve had lots of versions of the story of Moses and Exodus (I put in “at least x versions” several times and had to keep changing it), one version of events of Genesis (The Bible…in the Beginning) as well as several versions of Noah’s flood. I note, though, that seveal of these took inspiration from other works, by their own admission.

As for the New Testament, there are lots of versions of the life of Jesus, but the only version I know of that claim to adapt a single book is Pier Paolo Pasolini’s The Gospel According to St. Matthew, and that title is accurate.

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For some reason, as I’ve noted before, there are virtually no adaptation of Beowulf before about 2000, the sole exception I know of being the animated Grendel Grendel Grendel (1981), and that was based on John Gardner’s book. But then we got, in rapid succession, several variations:

Beowulf (1999 – Christopher Lambert) – weird futurist version. First to feature CGI creatures, and anticipates the twist in the 2007 version

The 13th Warrior (Antonio Banderas 1999) Based on Michael Crichton’s novel Eaters of the Dead, but really a retelling of the story of Beowulf. Very nicely done, rationalizing the events of the story.

Beowulf and Grendel (2005 – Gerard Butler) – filmed in Iceland; Grendel and his mom appear to be Neanderthals or something

Beowulf (2007 – Robert Zemeckis animated) – screenplay partly by Neil Gaiman. My favorite

Beowulf, Prince of the Geats (2007) – low-budget version

Grendel (2007) – made for the SCience Fiction Channel (SciFi or SyFy), with low-budget CGI monster effects. It’s got Marina Sirtis as the Queen. Not terrific.

Outlander (2008) – not to be confused with the Diana Gabaldon time trav el series. This one is another scienc e fiction version where the “Beowulf” character crash-lands on Earth in the Viking era with a monster that becomes “Grendel”. Interesting

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Leaving aside all the single-episode TV reworkings, A Christmas Carol has to be in the running.

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Journey to the West must be up there too. At least the Wikipedia list of adaptations was longer than I felt like counting. Though I’m not sure how faithful any of those are to the original story.

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Sherlock Holmes has got to be right up there.

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As I mentioned in the OP, there are LOTS of Sherlock Holmes films, but the number of those based on actual Sherlock Holmes stories is much lower. Probably there are more versions of The Hound of the Baskervilles than of any other story, but a lot of the old Basil Rathbomne movies weren’t based on any Doyle stories (and even when they supposedly were, the connection was pretty flimsy). The Robert Downey Jr. movies weren’t. The two Sherlock Holmes vs, Jack the Ripper movies weren’t, etc.

Wikipedia lists 30 adaptations of “Hound”, and some of them aren’t really adaptations of the original story.

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Filmmakers have been adapting Cinderella since the invention of moving pictures.

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Wikipedia also lists 24 films based on the story of Bluebeard, dating back to another George Méliès adaptation from 1901.

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It ould help to at least give the number of versions

IMDB lists 31 versions here

https://www.imdb.com/list/ls094014696/

But lists 40 here

https://www.imdb.com/list/ls081012055/

Wikipedia lists 24:

But the Wikipedia page on “Cinderella” says that ther are hundreds of film and TV versions, and lists a lot more than 24

This page gives 72

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Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. In Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver, First a Surgeon, and then a Captain of Several Ships by Jonathan Swift has been adapted numerous times as well.

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Hamlet and Romeo & Juliet have to be firmly in the top 10, especially if we can broaden “adaptation” to include films such as The Northman and the animated Gnomeo & Juliet **. Regrettably, I don’t have the time right now to research number of film versions.

** Haven’t seen “Gnomeo” – I don’t know if it’s just a punny title or at least a passing adaptation.

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Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde has, according to Wikipedia, been adapted into 35 films and 10 television versions

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Again, how many? Offhand, I know of an animated Russian version, the Fleischer Studio cartoon, the Ray Harryhausen film, and the Hallmark TV movie, and the Jack Black version. That’s 5 I know of personally. Usyally thy only give one or two lands, although the Hallmark version (with Ted Danson as Gulliver) is ambitious and tries to do each of the places he visited.

Wikipedia lists 16 films (not all of them really adaptations of the book) and 6 TV versions.

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Wikipedia lists 15 “direct” and 15 “derivative” film adaptations of A Christmas Carol, with one more of the latter in pre-production (Disney’s Marley).

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Fair warning – responses below are courtesy of Google Gemini. I know we frown on AI here, but for casual discussion of trivia, it can at least provide a starting point. Plus, Gemini gives many citations (the links in the text below).

How many feature film versions have their been of Hamlet, including both American and foreign productions?

There have been over 50 to 90 film adaptations of Hamlet globally. Because the text is in the public domain, the exact number depends on how loosely one defines “feature film” and “adaptation” (e.g., including silent films, television feature releases, foreign translations, and modern reimaginings). [1, 2, 3, 4]

…

In addition to direct adaptations, the play has heavily inspired numerous offshoot features and reinterpretations—such as the 2014 Indian film Haider and Disney’s The Lion King. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

How many feature film versions have their been of Romeo & Juliet, including both American and foreign productions?

There are approximately 12 to 15 major feature film adaptations of Shakespeare’s classic play. However, counting silent films, foreign language versions, and modern reinterpretations, there are over 50 direct feature film adaptations and well over 100 indirect cinematic retellings globally.

…

In addition to these, hundreds of foreign productions, animated features, and indirect cinematic parallels (like Warm Bodies or Romeo Must Die) exist in the global film catalog. You can explore an exhaustive list of these releases on the Wikipedia List of films based on Romeo and Juliet. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

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I mean, you can make the case that Matthew and Luke are just adaptations of Mark.

What of movies based on real-life events (and I realize that with that timing, I’m inviting questions about how much the Gospels are based on real events)? Like, there are a ton of movies about D-Day. They’re all the same story, but there isn’t any one definitive book about D-Day. Or maybe they’re not the same story: Is the story about America finally entering full-force into the war by (along with Britain and Canada) making a large amphibious invasion into northern France, or is the story about what one particular grunt did during that operation?

What Shakespeare work would be the most adapted? I’m guessing Romeo and Juliet.

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I’m only looking foradaptations of literary works, because in those cases you can see how the filmmakers approached the same starting material. Add in real-life events and things get extremely loose. As you say, there are lots of different films based on D-Day, or which take D-Day as background, but they have different emphases and characters. To me it’s what they do with the same basis that’s fascinating.

When you come down to it, there’s really only one starting point for Aladdin - Antoine Galland’s text, based on Hanna Diyab’s outline. Every written version we have derives from that.

IMDB lists a mere 8 versions in movies

Wiikipedia lists 22 movies and 12 animated versions.

The Wikipedia article on Aladdin lists a more believable total of 74 version of films and TV, animated and not, English and other languages

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The Most Dangerous Game is certainly up there! There are more than 60, not even counting the “other” category.