Oh, come on. Even the board’s most immature, repetitive, boring PeterJackson hater didn’t go there.
I actually think the majority of books are/were better off being just books. I get a bit cranky when people go on about not being able to wait for the film of a book they liked. Okay, sometimes it is interesting to see someone’s interpretation and some books do make good films, but sometimes it is almost like people think “film” is the superlative of “book”; i.e. if the book is good then the film must be better. For me that’s just not so. Sorry about the rant, it’s probably a minority view but I feel strongly about this one. And yes, I was more than happy with Lord of the Rings as it was in my head.
As for the particular, if anyone makes any of Diana Wynne Jones’ Chrestomancy books in to a sub-Potter, kitchy, look-Americans-how-English-and-quaint film then I will, I will…well, I will not go and see it, obviously.
If you have not seen the recent silent Call of Cthulhu, you really should. It is well worth seeing.
My vote is Three Men in a Boat–beautiful, funny, brilliant, and utterly unfilmable.
But I did. Oh, yes, I did.
Not that I hated Jackson’s movies, by any means, but before those movies had come out I would have felt about them exactly like the thread title.
Goddamn, I love this place!
I was going to come in to say “A Father’s Story,” too. Failing that. . .god, honestly, probably Snow Crash. I think it’s a great book, and I think it could be a great movie in theory, but whoever did it would fuck it all up, and I would be murderous.
The Silent Gondoliers – they did justice to William Goldman’s* Princess Bride*, but The Silent Gondoliers is just way too brilliant to ever be filmed.
Anything done by Stephen King. His books and short stories just don’t translate well into movies.
The Hollows series. No way can a movie portray just how awesome Rachel, Ivy, Jenks, Bis, and Al are.
The Wheel of Time series. Maybe it’d work if the folks who did Avatar, Howl’s Moving Castle, or Macross did them as animated movies.
Confederacy of Dunces
Just a few short years ago, we came *very *close to having to suffer though a version starring Will Ferrell and Drew Barrymore. Thankfully, the project fell through.
I suppose Winter’s Tale could be a stunning movie but I’d still be reluctant to replace all the pretty pictures in my head.
I have been waiting for someone to post this—I can not think of a better example of a book that is as completely unsuitable for trying to make into a film.
The novel is SO perfectly written, and relies on the brilliance of JK Toole’s mastery of language to such an extent that any attempt to translate it onto the screen would be an abortion, and would demonstrate a shocking lack of taste and decency…
Oooh Wee!!! Woah!!!
(and Will Ferrell as IJR?!? It is to weep)
Neverending Story II was pretty much the second half of the novel. It actually wasn’t horribly bad other than changing the casting which is always annoying. I don’t know what NES3 was supposed to be.
Ted keeps getting recommended by IO9 and I’m also intrigued by his premises and by the fact that he comes from my hometown, but I haven’t read any of his stuff yet…
Supposedly in the works as a movie, then one season of tv of older Roland, then movie, then one series of tv of younger flashback Roland, then final movie.
I thought Even Cowgirls Get the Blues was fairly good despite the appearance of Keanu. Maybe his other novels are filmable…
Hmmm…
I certainly agree that film is not the superlative of book.
Moreover, films tend to be subject to much more limiting factors than books, making them often be the watered down version of books if money is any object…
OTOH assuming that holding off won’t result in a better film/tv/dvd adaption, might as well give it a try. After all, even the worst adaption doesn’t take away from the original.
I agree with previous poster that book I love isn’t fundamentally compromised by bad adaption, nor is it compromised by fundamentally unadaptable novel…
However I agree that certain novels are intrinsically hard to adapt (though not impossible to adapt, nor are bad adaptions somehow denigrating of the original good novel)!
My hard to adapt novels seem to consist of Diaspora (Greg Egan).
Yes. Remember the horrible movies that were made of *Carrie, The Shining, The Stand, and the absolute dreck of The Body, Misery, It, The Shawshank Redemption, and The Green Mile?
A Wrinkle in Time. It happened and I literally sat there and cried because it was SO awful!
Technically I should be chastising you for breaking the rule. Instead I will give you a big-brotherly pat on the back and offer you a hankie, because I feel your pain.
Not that I watched much of that movie. I didn’t think it would translate well to screen in the first place, as it was without action, swordplay, hot chicks, and explosions. I taped it, watched maybe half an hour of it, and was profoundly bored, so I never finished. it.
The Stand and *It *were not good adaptations at all. Misery was fairly well done, and The Shining was very good (not quite perfect, but very good). I haven’t read or seen Carrie nor read The Green Mile (saw it, it was all right as a movie), so have no comment on the congruity between film and page.
The Body (aka Stand By Me) and The Shawshank Redemption were both more or less spot-on. And notably, both short stories - the sort of work that is best adapted for film, especially for King’s stuff. I’d kind of like to see The Long Walk done as a film. But not by the klutzes who adapted The Running Man or Apt Pupil.
Your username reminds me…At Swim-Two-Birds would be an absolute disaster if anyone tried to adapt it for the screen.
Good choice.
Two very different nominations - Nabokov’s Pale Fire IMO is unadaptable; and I seriously hope they never attempt the Belgariad and The Malloreon by Eddings.
I’d go with The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. There’s no way Hollywood would keep with the anarchic themes of the book, and am certain that they’d never let a character like Bernardo de la Paz be a “good” guy. And indie film makers are even less likely.
And I’ll second Ender’s Game. Doesn’t seem likely that anyone could cast a group of 6-10 year olds to act as adult like as they are depicted in the book, and using older kids takes away from the point of the story.
I don’t know if any moviemakers could portray the Chronicles of Prydain onscreen, as it is the essential innocence of the characters and their growth that are the heart of the story, not all the swords and undead and rings of flame.
“The Secret Miracle” by Jorge Luis Borges – I’m afraid it would be rather too static to make a good film.
[d&r]
In the story, a failed writer is put up against the wall in front of a firing squad. Just before his execution, a secret miracle occurs – time stands still, just as in a cinematic freeze-frame! Only the writer’s interior life of the mind remains vital, so after the preliminary shock and confusion wears off, he sets to work finishing his novel, working entirely from memory and without use of any physical resources or movement at all.
Finally, he finishes his masterwork, and time fatefully (and fatally) resumes where it left off…