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24/11/2013

Books To Movies?

I'm not entirely sure if I want practically every book I read to be turned into a movie. Sometimes I like the fact that I can imagine how things are just by a few words on a page, it becomes personal and that's really comforting for me. When books are made into movies, 99.9% of the time they are completely ruined. (I'm looking at you TWILIGHT).

Why is it so necessary for every book to be made into a movie?! I have a feeling it's just for money. Anything to make a whole bunch of money right?

Most of the time the actors who are playing these characters, cannot act. In a good book, you have a connection with the characters, you feel for them, you understand how they feel and what they're going through and you want them to succeed in every way. But in the movies, you don't feel that connection, you can kind of tell they're speaking their memorised lines and in some poor cases, you can see that they're not even connecting with their character as well and that's so off-putting.

I can list you a whole bunch of movies that are book adaptations that have completely failed and did not bring justice to the book at all, but then again, I'm sure you can come up with an equally huge list so I won't bother.

How many book adaptations have actually succeeded? Not many at all! Don't you think the big movie people would either step it up a bit or just not bother?

It's annoying, because it ruins the entire book/series for me. When Twilight first came out, I literally thought that it was the biggest waste of my time because it was so terrible. But everytime I try and read the books again, I keep picturing Kristin Stewarts non-existing facial expressions and it puts me off!

2 comments:

  1. Annie, I think it's a natural thing that books to movies cannot really work for a number of reasons.....often movies are slated at two hours max, but a book takes longer to read, so to condense it for a movie length means much is lost. The Hobbit has the other problem, they are just stretching it out when there is no need! Twilight the movie seemed more rushed than the book! I wish the movie houses would take note!

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  2. Books to movies often help screenwriters get a foot on the ladder and increase their notoriety and hence the money they are able to generate. In particular adapting the classic novels (The Great Gatsby for example) helps screenwriters earn more money that writing an original film idea which could end up failing outright. And the reason why we see the same actors in roles is because there is less of a chance that the film will go awry as a large audience will invest anyway just to see the top industry performers (though this isn't something I personally agree is a good think, I'm someone that likes to see a range of well-known and less well-known actors.) Anyway when a film is made, it is done so mainly with the intention of earning back the huge investments that are put into the film in the production/commission stages, sadly nothing much to do with doing justice for the author of a great novel.

    My favourite book to movie adaptation is John Marsden's Tomorrow when the War Began. Stuart Beatie does justice in his adaptation of the novel and the cast is excellent. I actually feel the movie is somewhat better than the book mainly as it is a children's series but the film is targeted at a slightly more age-mature level.

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