# UN-faithful movie adaptations of novels **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 11, 2013, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647 "2013-03-11T18:12:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2013, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/61 "2013-03-12T17:16:35Z")
> [@DCnDC](#): > > Now _that’s_ a movie I’d want to see. **Candide, Gulliver’s Travels** and **A Handful of Dust** all have the best stuff Robert Zemickis trimmed from FG ---
**Author:** ![TBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c89c15/32.png) [@TBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TBG)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2013, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/62 "2013-03-12T23:22:49Z")
> [@edwards\_beard](#): > > I know he’s been mentioned a few times in the thread already, but I wanted to mention “We Can Remember it For you Wholesale” (Total Recall) - The short story has about four pages after Quail/Quaid leaves Rekall. Nothing after the Johnny Cab comes from the story. As for the 2012 remake…I don’t think they even mentioned Mars in that version, but kept the whole Cohagen story. Nope, no Mars in the 2012 version, instead there’s a tube through the center of the Earth. :rolleyes: > [@DCnDC](#): > > Now _that’s_ a movie I’d want to see. Seconded. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Labtrash](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/labtrash/32/528_2.png) [@Labtrash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Labtrash)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2013, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/63 "2013-03-12T23:48:29Z")
> [@Quimby](#): > > It wasn’t a novel but The Lawnmower Man is the poster child for this. I’ll see you, and raise you **The Mist**. ---
**Author:** ![Sister\_Vigilante](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9de0a6/32.png) [@Sister\_Vigilante](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sister_Vigilante)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2013, 1:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/64 "2013-03-13T01:27:51Z")
I read _The Hunger_ just to understand the ending of the movie. It didn’t help, because the two are so different. And I’ll agree that Bladerunner has absolutely no resemblance to the novel and the novel was probably the most boring thing I’ve ever read, next to Frankenstein and Dracula. If I may be allowed to go in reverse, Star Trek III the movie bears little resemblance to the book that came after, where Saavik is shown to be Romulan and is having an affair with David. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2013, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/65 "2013-03-13T03:30:33Z")
> [@Sister\_Vigilante](#): > > …If I may be allowed to go in reverse, Star Trek III the movie bears little resemblance to the book that came after, where Saavik is shown to be Romulan and is having an affair with David. Half-Romulan, if memory serves. ---
**Author:** ![Antinor01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecae2f/32.png) [@Antinor01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Antinor01)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2013, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/66 "2013-03-13T04:30:45Z")
Memoirs of an invisible man. Interesting sci-fi story turned into a freaking Chevy Chase comedy. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2013, 12:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/67 "2013-03-13T12:10:16Z")
> [@Sister\_Vigilante](#): > > I read _The Hunger_ just to understand the ending of the movie. It didn’t help, because the two are so different. And I’ll agree that Bladerunner has absolutely no resemblance to the novel and the novel was probably the most boring thing I’ve ever read, next to Frankenstein and Dracula. > > If I may be allowed to go in reverse, Star Trek III the movie bears little resemblance to the book that came after, where Saavik is shown to be Romulan and is having an affair with David. If you can, read the novelization of Forbidden Planet by “W.J. Stuart”, which significantly changes things. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2013, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/68 "2013-03-13T12:51:36Z")
There is a Star Trek episode “Arena” that bears little resemblance to the short story. “Die Hard” is quite a bit different than the novel from which it was taken. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2013, 12:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/69 "2013-03-13T12:54:37Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#): > > One of my favorite books, _The 39 Steps_, has been made into two bad films. The first time was by none other than Alfred Hitchcock. When a new PBS version was announced a few years ago, I had high hopes, but it, too, took a clever, suspenseful plot and “improved” it. I wish someone would just make a movie of this simple, exciting book as it was written. Only two? There are at least four. There was a terrible version with Robert Powell and David Warner from 1978 in which Big Ben played a part in the climax which apparently spawned a TV show. The recent Rupert Penry-Jones version was marginally better but still took some interesting liberties. Mind you, the original books are full of turn-of-the-century colonialist racism which would not go down very well today at all, and the climax of the book features the protagonist sitting quietly and playing cards for hours on end which is not very cinematic. > [@Precambrianmollusc](#): > > The Count of Monte Cristo 2002 version. > Admitedly it is quite a long boook to get into a single film without a whole lot of editing. Maybe P Jackson could give it a whirl and make 6 films out of it , getting some additional source material from The 3 Musketeers _Any_ version. Part of the problem is that the Count never directly kills anybody (although several die as a result of his machinations) and that makes for a boring revenge flick. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2013, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/70 "2013-03-13T13:04:06Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > There is a Star Trek episode “Arena” that bears little resemblance to the short story. > > . I understand that they had already started writing the script when the similarity between it and Fredric Brown’s clasaic story “Arena” was pointed out, so they bought the rights to it. At any rate, that’s the story they tell. One of these days I’d like to see someone shoot _Arena_ straight, as a short film with CGI. Properly done, it would be great. I’ve heard this excuse often about cases (especially in science fiction) where the work bears the title of some more vfamous work, but departs from it – that it started out as an independent work that was later discovered to resemble a more famous work, so the title (but not the entirety of the content) was co-opted. This pretty clearly happened in the case of **I, Robot**. I’ve heard it suggested that Paul Veerhoeven wanted to make a Space Marines vs. Bug movie before he ever heard of Heinlein’s **Starship Troopers** , which he probably still hasn’t read. (Hard to believe screenwriter Ed Neumeier hadn’t read it, though). ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2013, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/71 "2013-03-13T13:30:07Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > I understand that they had already started writing the script when the similarity between it and Fredric Brown’s clasaic story “Arena” was pointed out, so they bought the rights to it. I believe you are correct. ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2013, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/72 "2013-03-13T13:59:21Z")
[The Quiet Earth (1985)](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089869/combined) There’s a VERY detailed synopsis on the IMDB page for the movie. I’ll post this much here: > [@](#): > > There is a general similarity netween the film and the book in terms of various set pieces…the clock phenomena, the crashed airliner, finding Perrin’s corpse at the lab, the hero’s surname being Hobson etc. But, other than that, book and film diverge wildly. If you’d like the rest of it, [lookee here](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089869/board/thread/211877630). ---
**Author:** ![Enigma42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/87869e/32.png) [@Enigma42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enigma42)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2013, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/73 "2013-03-13T14:09:58Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > I understand that they had already started writing the script when the similarity between it and Fredric Brown’s clasaic story “Arena” was pointed out, so they bought the rights to it. At any rate, that’s the story they tell. One of these days I’d like to see someone shoot _Arena_ straight, as a short film with CGI. Properly done, it would be great. Years ago, I tracked down \*Arena \*specifically because I’d heard about the ST:TOS episode being based on the story. I was surprised at how different the ‘source’ material was, but it was a pleasant surprise! What a great story. . . In hindsight, it totally makes sense that they acquired the rights after starting the writing, given the nature of the differences. I’ve read it several times over the years and I too think it would make an excellent short film. And it would be well within reach of current special FX technology to handle this. ---
**Author:** ![mbh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2013, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/74 "2013-03-13T19:16:04Z")
In the movie _Logan’s Run_, three scenes have events and dialog copied near-verbatim from the book. The rest of the film is drastically different. My copy of the book had several pages of photographs from the movie, so I knew from the beginning that the movie would be different. So, years later, when I finally got around to watching the film, I didn’t mind the changes. The film was fairly expensive by 1976 standards; a faithful adaptation would have been financially impossible. The book has a lot of young teenagers having sex; a faithful adaptation would have been legally impossible. Neither the book nor the film is an Immortal Classic. But both are good entertainment. I enjoy them both. [spoiler] Book: you die at age 21. Movie: you die at age 30. Book: the civilization spans the globe. Movie: the world is a nuclear wasteland, and civilization is confined to a single city. Book: the oldest man in the world secretly runs a vast underground network of dissidents. Movie: the oldest man in the world is a crazy old hermit.[/spoiler] ---
**Author:** ![Quimby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/22d042/32.png) [@Quimby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quimby)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2013, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/75 "2013-03-13T19:45:45Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > “Die Hard” is quite a bit different than the novel from which it was taken. Interestingly, the Die Hard that just came out was the first Die Hard movie specifically written as a Die Hard Movie. The first two were based on unrelated novels, the third was a Lethal Weapon script that was changed, and the fourth was adapted from a script that was based on a news article. ---
**Author:** ![Lightnin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lightnin/32/180_2.png) [@Lightnin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lightnin)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2013, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/76 "2013-03-13T19:54:08Z")
_Jumper_. There are only two things the movie has in common with the (far superior) book: a guy named Davy who can teleport, and a girl named Millie. That’s it. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2013, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/77 "2013-03-13T20:01:16Z")
[The Thing from Another World](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Thing_from_Another_World) has only small resemblances to _Who Goes There?_, the story it was based on. Both had the idea of an alien creature being found frozen in Antarctica in common, but that’s about it. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2013, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/78 "2013-03-13T21:02:24Z")
Virtually no science fiction films really fit in here. In fact, it’s amazing how unfaithful they are. **This Island Earth** – although they get some of the beginning right – Cal Meacham (love that name) does build the Interociter from components in the short story that later became the opening chapters of the book. But they didn’t send him the plans – he had to dope out how to put together the Interociter from the descriptions of the parts and clues in the catalog. If they gave him a schematic he’d only be proving that he was a good technician, not a scientist. It gets worse after that point, because they essentially jettisoned Raymond F. Jones’ story and wrote a new one based on (it seems) a perusal of pulp SF covers. The novel has no Metalunan Mutants, or turning Metaluna into a sun. \*\* The Day the Eatrth Stood Still\*\* – I don’t really mind that they chsanged the story from Harry Bates’ “Farewell to the Master”, because it was scientifically screwy and relied on its odd twist. The film is a much more mature work. **The Time Machine** – If you “got” that the Morlocks and the Eloi were the result of the social ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Miskatonic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr.miskatonic/32/310_2.png) [@Mr.Miskatonic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Miskatonic)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2013, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/79 "2013-03-13T21:17:49Z")
A Cock and Bull Story was based on Tristam Shandy. However the movie goes meta on how the book is unfilmable. Damnation Alley - Beyond the big rigs there was little resemblance to the short story. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2013, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647/80 "2013-03-13T21:21:18Z")
> [@Mr.Miskatonic](#): > > Damnation Alley - Beyond the big rigs there was little resemblance to the short story. I believe it is a novel. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/un-faithful-movie-adaptations-of-novels/652647.md?page=5)