I loved the film The English Patient, which I saw before I read the book. IMHO, the book was far superior, but by reading it after seeing the film, I enjoyed them both. I don't know if I would have liked the film had I read the book first. I went on to read more of Michael Ondaatje's work, which I also enjoyed.

Hmmm... I read Out of Africa, but I don't remember her describing Denys as bald (maybe my mind automatically fills in Robert Redford because I saw the film before I read the book, and I read the book several years after the film was released). Does she provide that physical description in the book? I remember her describing his character more than his physical looks, and I remember OoA being interesting for what she doesn't tell us about Bror Blixen. Obviously, if you've read a lot of biographical information on that group, you'd know more than the book reveals.

Martin, of course, it's a girl book. I can see that Omar Sherif might not be your cup of tea!

Sorry fellow girls but I found Dr Zhivago to be one of the most tedious a boring films I have ever had the misfortune to sit through. Carolyn, Omar Sherif does absolutely nothing for me. :-(

Georgia, I don't recall whether Dinesen said anything about Denys's baldness in Out of Africa. Indeed, she was diplomatically discreet about many things. You're right that other biographical information is probably intruding on my impressions: the biographies I've read mention Finch Hatton keeping his hat on as much as possible, to protect his pate from the sun but also because he seems to have been self-conscious about his baldness. In his later years he was nearly always photographed with his hat on -- most photos of him were taken outdoors at that time. I vividly recall when I visited Karen (Dinesen's house in the suburb of Nairobi) seeing a latter-day photo of Finch Hatton sans hat, and it always stuck in my mind. Then when I saw Redford with all his hair playing Denys I thought: couldn't they get Redford to shave his head to play the part? Nah, that would've shocked the socks off movieviewers and could have hurt RR's image.

Jan, I can watch any adaptation of Dracula, even the silliest. I enjoyed the book, but as influential as Dracula is, Stoker was a clumsy writer at best and he's easy to parody. That matters little, though, because his vampire Count captured popular attention and gave free rein to the imagination and interpretation. My personal favorite "Dracula" film only uses the bare bones of the book as a basis - the one with Frank Langella. It's often absurd, but there's a certain scene with the young women sleeping high in a tower room with a mullioned window and you know somehow that Dracula is going to get in that room -- you know it and you're waiting for it and then you see at the window... Oops, I better not go any further. Gosh! I love that scene.

Georgia, I just re-read recently Erol Trzblinski's "Silence Will Speak". There are several photos of Denys with his hat on and the biographer makes it very clear that he lost his hair at a very early age. Apart from that, he had extremely handsome features and the ladies were usually quite taken with him.

My wife also loves Dr Zhivago.
Girl film?It's a woman's film only in the sense that many, many (but not all) women love it and many men won't watch it because they think it's a "girl film." My DH and both sons like the 1965 film very much. I recall my father taking my mother to see it at the movie theatre and then watching it on television a couple of times. Both of my brothers like it. No, I think the whole story is not so much a gender affinity as it is a Russian thing: Nobody loves poetry like a Russian. And if the Russians fascinate you, the book and the various films might, too.

> thought Like Water for Chocolate was a much better film than book

Oh I thought the opposite! The movie concentrated too much on some stupid secret recipe that was a very small part of the book. And the movie totally missed the point of the book by turning the bad guy from the priest to the mayor. One of the books themes was the power that the church can have over a community. It didn't make much sense to change it. And oh that scene of the priest breaking into the chocolate shop had me laughing hystericaly, a scene that was barely convered in the movie. And so many of the minor characters from the book were left off. I will admit tho, Johnny Depp as the main character was just lovely to watch...

> there are books I've avoided reading because I loved the film version and am afraid that I might downgrade the film when I finally read the book

I watched the movie Clockwork Orange ages ago, and I won't read the book because the movie freaked me out too much. I still can't hear 'singing in the rain' without that movie popping into my head. And I won't watch Jaws or Jurassic Park because I read them when they first came out, and just didn't want the movies to spoil what I was imagining.

Re Dr Zhivago - the movie was excellent. I've tried reading the book and quit not to long after. Not sure what it is about the style, but with few exceptions I don't like the 'classic' Russian authors.

siobhan, your experience with English Patient reminds me of Corelli's Mandolin. I loved the movie till I read the book and realized what a really poor adaptation it was.

>Classic Horror films from the numerous Draculas (my fav is the classic Hammer film) to the original tale .....Or how about Frankenstein? (with a nod and smile to Mel Brook's Young Frankenstein!)

My fav Dracula was Nosferatu. As far as Frankenstien - I read the book a few years back for a book group and was blown away by how much the movie (the original) just didn't get. Amazing book, much more than just a monster book (and yes Young Frankenstien is wonderful; I usually watch it every Halloween!)

Um, Cindy, I think you are mixing up Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquival with Chocolat by Joanne Harris. I don't ordinarily like magical realism, but I almost accepted it in Chocolat, the book. The movie was quite fun, I thought, but I agree with you that some of the changes -- the priest to the mayor, for one -- were strange.

Although Water for Chocolate is indeed a film/book adaption that would fit into this discussion. For some reason I remember the film well, and the book barely registers in my memory, except for a recipe for rose petal sauce. Oh, and start feeding geese walnuts three weeks before you slaughter them.

frieda, my bad. Please forgive my addled brain - my preschoolers were in rare form yesterday.....In the words of Emily Lattella 'never mind'. :)

Actually I read Water for Chocolate, and really liked it. I think it was the first book I read where I really noticed magic realism, and realized I liked it (and now realize it depends on the authors, as usual) Never saw the movie, for some reason - maybe because I couldn't imagine doing the book justice. Ive tried reading her other two books, and they just paled next to that first one.

ah, Cindy, you did that just to make me feel better about Becket and A Man for All Seasons didn't you? What a pal!

I did think of another book into movie that I thought worked very well-The Day of the Jackal

Becket and A Man for All Seasons

So I'm not the only one? I confused these two for years!

Rosefolly

cindy - I was reading your post and madly trying to remember a bad guy mayor or priest. Then I got to the part about the mayor breaking into the shop and I realized you were actually talking about Chocolat. That's one of my favorite scenes. Plus, I'll watch Johnny Depp in just about anything ... but not everything. I loved the book Water for Chocolate, thought the movie was okay. When I think back to the book I remember two main things -- the main character peeling onions, causing tears to overflow the kitchen, and the culture insisting that she must remain unmarried and take care of her mother.

I, too, tried other Esquival books but just couldn't get into them.

rose-yes, I dropped a clanger over on the Pillars of the Earth thread.

A movie that definitely DID NOT do the book justice was "84 Charing Cross Rd."...although the cast was lovely, it just didn't work. Hard to try to dramatize letters-and that is a great deal of the charm of the book.

what's a clanger?

A public mistake that "clangs"

I make them so often that they dont just clang, the reverberate....

ccr, that was one case of seeing the movie before reading the book. I think the former had a lot of charm, and its what made me interested in the book. I agree tho - even tho the book was better, I think both of them worked.

> the main character peeling onions, causing tears to overflow the kitchen

Ah, I'd forgotten that, and remember at the time being quite taken by it. May need to give it another read soon.

Read the above as:

I agree that the book was better, but I think both of them still worked.

Yes, I'm sure I would have loved the movie if I hadn't read the book several times.

Oooooooo -- yes indeed -- I LOVE the Frank Langella version of the classic Dracula! An excellent movie -- and that scene is truly sexy!

Jan

Jan, re your mention of Frankenstein: Whenever I think of the book or the various films, two historical-type films also come to my mind, Haunted Summer and Gothic, about what led up to Mary Shelley's creation of her iconic scientist and the monster. The former is the more conventional of the two and is based on a novel (that I haven't read). Gothic, though not strictly an adaptation of a particular book or books, incorporates information from biographies -- I recognized things from Muriel Spark's Child of Light: Mary Shelley, for instance. I like Haunted Summer, but it's the wild, excessive Ken Russell-directed Gothic that is indelibly imprinted in my mind: That gargoyle in Henry Fuseli's painting "Nightmare" is brought to life so creepily; the vastness and coldness of the Villa Deodati in that year without summer seeps from the screen making my skin clammy; and Mary's grief for her dead baby...well, it's a most effective way of understanding the genesis of M. Shelley's ever-fascinating story, I think.

Here are some other book-to-film adaptations that I've been quite taken with:

What do you think of these? Janet Frame's Autobiography => An Angel at My Table - both are stunning, in my opinion
Cornell Woolrich's The Bride Wore Black => François Truffaut's La Mariée était en noir
James Joyce's short story "The Dead" in Dubliners => John Huston's The Dead
Ken Follett's Eye of the Needle => Richard Marquand's Eye of the Needle
Thomas Hardy's Far from the Madding Crowd => there have been two or three adaptations but the one that made the biggest impression on me was the 1967 John Schlesinger-directed version
John Fowles's The French Lieutenant's Woman => the filmed version with Meryl Streep and Jeremy Irons - I thought the book was nigh unto unfilmmable but Harold Pinter's screenplay captured it quite well -- or at least some of it, I should say.

The only one of the above I've seen or read was French Lt's Woman. I saw the movie first, and I loved it (also my first view of Streep and have been a fan ever since). It was only last year that I read it, and it made me appreciate even more how that film came to pass, because I agree, it would be hard to visualize. Loved that book; haven't been able to enjoy any others by him.

A few others that I think were excellent adaptations: The Color Purple and The Shining

Interesting case about "The Shining" (the one with Jack Nicolson) -- even author Stephen King HATED that version of the movie!

To tell the truth -- I was bitterly disappointed in it too! Key ideas and scenes were simply changed or left out ..... thats why King insisted on making the TV miniseries ......

Yesterday I watched two film adaption of books. First, the adaption of Henry James's Turn of the Screw with Jodhi May and Colin Firth (he only has one scene, but gets top billing) was very creepy, creepy enough that I was glad I was watching it during the day. This adaption also leaves open the question - is this a ghost story, or the invention of a hysterical young woman?

Then I watched Possession with Gwyneth Paltrow. It was not nearly as enjoyable as the book, but preserved the story quite well. The poetry was excised, naturally, and many would find that a plus. Unfortunately Paltrow has nothing to do except look beautiful, and Aaron Eckhart is hopelessly miscast and somewhat ridiculous. But Jeremy Northam and Jennifer Ehle are wonderful as the Victorian-era lovers. If you couldn't make it through A.S. Byatt's tome, you might want to check out the film.

As the weather in our northern climes grows colder, we might be spending more time indoors and watching more films, so I looked up this thread and added a few to my Netflix queue.

I wasn't here when this thread was started :-(. This is very interesting. Mind if I add my opinion? Well too bad im giving it anyway.

First of all I DO belive that movies are a type of art form. Granted, many movies lack vision and originality. But there are some truly brilliant ones out there who's elemnts, like cinimatography, dialogue, actors, etc. work together to make a masterpiece.
But overall I have to say I like books better than movies. With movies you just sit there and be entertained; there is little thinking involved. But with books your mind is constantly working (which is more entertaining). With reading one has to visualize everthing for themselves, fill in any blanks the author left, and make their own assumptions.

RE. The Professor thing. Perhaps what he said was taken out of context.
Professors ARE allowed to have personal opinions too. But, if they are good teachers, and give a crap about their studens understanding, they will try to be as unbiased as possible. But the studens should also know how to form thier own opinions even if it does not agree with what they are being taught.

I firmly belive that one should always read the literature before seeing the film version of it. I think that seeing the film first can taint one's opionion of the book and give false impressions.
I also think that a movie should ALWAYS do justice to the book it is based on and preserve the original ideas of its author.

Oftentimes I have mixed feelings when I hear a movie is comming out that is based on a book. If it is a book I like I am often peeved because I worry the director, writers, etc. will make mincemeat out of the original story. But if it is a book I did not particularly like I say let em' have at it. They can only make it worse (which is sometimes not possible).
I do understand that movies can not always include everthing from the book. Time constraints and all that. Some directors do a wonderful job in editing out what is not essential to the movie and yet do not take away from the storyline at all.
On rare occasions the film is better than the book. Sometimes fiddling around with the sequence of things, and cutting out dull and complicated areas, makes all the diffrence. I think The Painted Veil is a good example. They redid parts of it and made it better than the book.

There have been several times when, while seeing the movie, I was so angry at the distortion of it that I wanted to launch the nearest thing to hand at the screen (which is not good if you are seeing it in the theater and the closest objects are buckets of popcorn and soda).
The Lion, Witch, Wardrobe was one that I had my doubts on. I was a bit dissapointed with the parts they did diffrently. I also would have liked there to have been a narrator. Memoirs of a Geisha is another I did not like so well as the book.
But there are times when the movie does a WONDERFUL job in representing the book it is based on. Bleak House (with Charles Dance...

Has he seen Shindler's List? I was emotionally wrung out after seeing the movie, even my husband shed tears. The book had none of the impact.

CMK, I'm glad you mentioned Bleak House. I am not much of a Dickens fan but really enjoyed the BBC TV adaptation.
They have just started showing Little Dorrit . . . another one I haven't read.
The first episode is one hour long (necessary to get to know all the characters) but the rest will be shown in half-hours twice a week.
I'm sure it will be shown in the US soon.

I'm still very much enjoying John Adams; a first class production. English/UK TV seems to be full of all things American at the moment pre-election. Simon Sharma has a series on US history, the actor Stephen Fry is driving through every state in a London cab, various 'correspondents' are giving their views on everything/everyone that moves. Luckily the news reports have to present a 'balanced' picture for/against the candidates. Is this true of TV companies in the US?

I bought the DVD pack of Bleak House as soon as it came out. It was a good investment! I thought they did a fantastic job at cutting out scenes. I rather wish the book had had the same parts cut out (Bleak House is the only Dickens I really like at all).
Thank you for mentioning Little Dorrit comming out! I will have to read the book before then.
I don't have anything to do with politics. But answereing your question, I think many of the TV stations are slanted in thier reporting. They are not blatant, but you certainly get some hints. I don't watch the news much, but I will sometimes when the BBC is on. I think they are objective and unbiased.
CMK

I think the TV election news coverage is pretty blatant, and I know our newspaper is.

Good news about Little Dorrit. I love Dickens.

>With movies you just sit there and be entertained; there is little thinking involved.I completely disagree. A good movie can make you think for months afterwards, just as a good book does. Shindler's List, Band of Brothers, Sleuth, The Red Violin, The Queen. Granted, there are fluff movies...but we have a whole thread about brain potato chip books, too.

Newspapers have historically taken a side-we have a morning, an evening, and a Sunday paper all owned and published by the same, family-owned company. The morning paper is known for its liberal editorials, the evening for its conservative editorials, and the Sunday paper lets it all rip. But most large city newspapers endorse a candidate in any major election.
I depend on the League of Women Voters for non-partisan information.

Speaking of books made into movies, was wondering if anyone has seen the Secret Life of Bees?

I think it used to be considered that the Christian Science Monitor reported the news with less biases than most journals. The TV news stations in the US, Vee, are slanted in one direction or the other. I also read the BBC,online, and disagree that they are objective and unbiased, CMK. Perhaps they try harder to be objective, but I have concluded that bias is an irradicable part of human nature....

I think the U.S. cable stations tend to be a bit more blatantly biased than the networks. If you know that going in, you just keep that in mind as you watch the reports. I like to watch them all, just to get all sides of the story -- even if it ups my blood pressure.

I also find it amusing how both sides can consider the same station or Website to be biased against their candidate.

Back to movies: I was watching Terry Pratchett's "Hogfather" just before I came upstairs. I turned it off halfway through because it wasn't grabbing my attention. I may or may not finish. It wasn't one of my favorites of his books either, though.

Saw "The Namesake" last night for the second time - what a good movie although I can't remember if it's close to the book or not. The costumes were wonderful and I loved the characters. Anyone else seen it? What did you thinK?

I saw "The Namesake" and thought it was a very poignant, moving story. I would definitely watch it again.

Did you like 'The Namesake' the book? I keep meaning to pick it up at the bookstore but never do.

Did any of you see Vanity Fair, with Reese Witherspoon? I was SO ANNOYED at that movie! It was, perhaps, one of the most distorted movies I have seen that was based on a book. I loved the book and the movie was only loosly based on it. They left out the best parts (and substituted with some misleading ones) and completely lost Thackeray's sarcastic and moralistic wit.
Witherspoon DID fit my imaginations idea of what Becky Sharpe would look like though. But the rest of the actors did not fit what I invisoned the characters in the book to look or sound like.
CMK

The DH and I just watched To Kill a Mockingbird with good result. While nothing could touch the book, the film is excellent. He wants to watch it again this afternoon.

I have been working on my movie-watching "skills" lately. Although I have watched hundreds of films, I have never really taken to the medium. I realized that I am unable to just let the story unfold on the screen in its own way. I constantly think ahead, wondering what is going to happen, how much of the film is left, etc. Books require a great deal more from the reader, in general, and I have approached films the way I do books. Now that I realize I need to be more in the moment, and let my expectations go, I am finally learning to enjoy films. I suppose this comes naturally to most people, but not to me!

I actually liked the "Vanity Fair" with R. Witherspoon! I know it was quirky and took some liberties, but I found it refreshing. So often I have considered that time period to be stuffy and this was decidedly not!

I realise that John Adams was not a movie but just thought I'd mention that I saw the final episode last week (we saw it in seven installments of just under two hours each)
Seriously good TV the like of which we seldom get from across 'the Pond'.
I can understand that the average Joe Public may have found it heavy going but serious research must have gone into the production.
To me the characters seemed so very English and interestingly none of them had 'American' accents, their 'English' accents seemed to range from West Country to Northern Irish and back. Even George III spoke with a 'country' voice.
And everyone ate using knives and forks! When did the habit of 'forks' take over? I loved one small scene where Jefferson watches with some displeasure as Adams finishes his dinner and wipes his mouth on the tablecloth. :-)

One of the many problems I had with this movie (Vanity Fair) was how they portrayed Becky Sharpe. In the book she was a complete shrew. In the movie they tried to make her look like she did what she did simply to survive.

A few weeks ago I rented some movies and was lucky enough to find a few 'book based' ones.
I saw The Tenant of Wildfell Hall and it was BEAUTIFUL! It started Toby Stephens and Tara Fitzgerald (both played in the new Jane Eyre too). I have yet to read the book, so I will not comment further. Did you think this movie was true to the book?

I also saw Emma, with Gwenyth Paltrow. SIMPLY GASTLY! I did not launch anything at the screen this time, but I did find at the end of the show that I had been chewing on the corner of a magazine in agony.
It was all wrong! The costumes, the dialogue, everything! And who did they get to decorate the scenes? Van Gogh? What was with all the bright colors?
The characters were all horrible. The worst was Mr. Knightly. He looked 'Americanized'. A straw hat?!? He could have been one of Tom Sawyer's gang just floatin' along the Mississippi...
The Emma movie with Cate Beckinsale is amazing! It actually made me appreciate the book more.

I just posted a thread about a new book based movie. It is on F. Scott Fitzgerald's 'The Strange Case of Benjamin Button'. Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchette are starring in it.
CMK

I don't know when forks came into usage in the Colonies. I would guess that this was a class thing. Remember Adams was also running a farm, so perhaps he dismissed the usage of forks while farming. On the other hand, Thos. Jefferson was quite aristocratic, well-traveled in high circles in France. He was an architect, an inventor, a gentleman farmer, a wine-grower (vintner), the founder of a great University (of VA). He would have used the best manners and the best vocabulary, given his posh background. Adams was a simpler sort of man, albeit a lawyer.

Of course, no one of that time period would have spoken with an "American" accent. It took generations to devolve where we all are today. ;-) (far from the King's English!)

Vee, so glad you got to see the entire series and enjoyed it so much!

Don't they have three-prong forks in the table settings at Colonial Williamsburg?

I was thinking about the accents, too. When those Declaration of Independence folks grew up, we were English.

yes, they do.
They considered themselves English up until the very last minute-Ben Franklin tried everything he knew to convince the British government that if they just treated the colonials as they did those living in England, all would be well. He was passionate about preserving and growing the British Empire. He went back to Philadelphia, very disheartened, after he realized that it wasn't going to happen-he was called "American" as if it were the worst insult going.

CMK, Regency rooms were often quite bright with gaudy colours. See for example some of the rooms in Sir John Soane's house at 13 Lincoln's Inn Fields in London, now a museum.

Here is a link that might be useful: Sir John Soane's house

Attached is Timeline of Eating Utensils. It says that Governor Winthrop of the Massachusetts Bay Colony brought over the first and only fork in Colonial America (as of 1630). Although forks probably weren't common by the Revolutionary War, it's reasonable to think households like Jefferson's and Adams' might have used them.

Here is a link that might be useful: Timeline of Eating Utensils

Getting back to the original theme of this thread:

I just saw the film version of Bernard Schlink's "The Reader." I thought it superb, in that the casting and directing enhanced the novel. I had thought the same about the movie "Atonement."

Anyone else a fan of "The Reader"?

An obvious point, but generally I think Books and Movies do quite different things, and as a result often succeed or fail for totally different reasons. I've often noticed that short stories seem to make for more successful films than long epics - a classic example being "The Shawshank Redemption", which is a good story, and a wonderful film (IMHO).

I seem to be in a minority in this...but, I thought that the movie of "Atonement" was utterly execrable - What was that irritating typing noise supposed to prove ? Why was the delicate jigsaw of the ending buldozed so ruthlessly ? Did Kiera Knightly have to pout and strop ALL the time ?
This movie has come close to spoiling the book for me. I doubt I'll be able to re-read it without those unwelcome images.

Perhaps the happiest result is where the books and films stand by themselves. I can enjoy both the Harry Potter books, and films without any impingement. Maybe this is due to JK Rowling's close involvement. The Lord of The Rings films seemed to pull this off too.

Then there are instances where the book and the film are very remote from each other. I occasionally meet people who believe that they've seen a movie of "The Heart of Darkness", as they've seen "Apocalypse Now". Well....yes, but no. An interesting area to explore.

At the moment, I am reading Gone with the Wind. We all know the movie. We all know that it won award after award. But I must say, the book is better than the movie, even in this case. Sure, Rhett and Scarlett were cast to perfection with Vivien Leigh and Clark Gable. But the book adds so much more depth to Scarlett. It covers her thoughts not only her deeds. Margaret Mitchell writes about the death of The South as it was before the war, the stark differences in pre- and post- war Atlanta, the changes and how they affected masses of people. This cannot be covered in a movie. I thought that this book would bore me in a sense because I already knew how it ended. Silly me. I broke the cardinal rule of reading... the book is always better. I'm not finished yet, but I am hopelessly hooked.

PAM

I usually lurk here, but I thought I'd jump in with a comment. I saw Atonement without having read the book. My thought was that I wasn't really impressed with the movie, but thought it would make a good book. So watching the movie prompted me to read the book (which I did like).

One movie that I liked better than the book was Dances With Wolves. I had always liked the movie, and then staying at a house one summer found the book on a shelf and read it. It was a short book, and the story is good, but the writing was a little hard to take.