A River Runs Through It: Bringing a Classic to the Screen

by Richard Friedenberg, Robert Redford (Introduction By)

The screenplay for the film is accompanied by the screenwriter's comments on the difficulty in adapting the story

199 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 1992

Reviews

[Realini Ionescu · Rating 4 out of 5]

A River Runs Through It, based on the story by Norman Maclean
9.4 out of 10


Apart from marvelous story by Norman Maclean and the charming performances of the lead actors, it probably the spectacular, magnificent scenery of The Gallatin and Boulder Rivers that make this motion picture such a pleasure to see…reminding one of the more accomplished, classic and one of the Top 100 Movies, Deliverance - http://realini.blogspot.com/2017/05/d...

Indeed, quite often this seems more like The Story of The River That Runs Through It, in its majesty, emphasized by Reverend Maclean aka excellent Tom Skerritt, when he explains to his two sons, Norman aka formidable Craig Sheffer and Paul aka the recent Academy Award winner Brad Pitt, about the immemorial age of the rocks, which sets him apart, for there are so many foolish fundamentalist evangelicals who believe in the ‘literal’ word of the Bible, as creationists and maintain that the world is only so young as the holy book says…they do other, more damaging things, such as voting with an immense scoundrel.
Reverend Maclean offers a very strict education to his children, teaching them parsimony…in one amusing and relevant scene, one of them has a short story to write and he presents it to his father, who keeps asking for the writing to be shorter and then…to be thrown away…

Norman spends five tears East, attending college, though to the dissatisfaction of his father, he will have not made up his mind about what he wants to do, what his calling might be, if it is teaching or something else…for this, he could consult the online courses of Harvard professor Tal Ben-Shahar, who explains that there are three domains, one of the things we like to do, another of the activities we are good at and finally, the third contains what has meaning for us and where these groups intersect we can find our calling…
As his brother spends time in the East, Paul becomes very different, if not the complete opposite of his sibling, involved as he is in gambling, accumulating so much debt with the wrong people as to place his physical integrity, perhaps even his life in danger, though he is otherwise a charming, brave, kind, devoted young man and what is crucial for many of those who live in this small town and similar places, he is an excellent fly fisherman…

One of the mirthful passages takes place as Norman has to take his would be brother-in-law, Neal Burns, fishing, together with Paul, but Neal is the extremely obnoxious character, arrogant and infatuated with his supposed glamorous life in California, who arrives late – though this appears to be anathema for those that love this sport – in the company of Rawhide, a woman with an established reputation in the community, both of them drunk.

If they are initially infuriated with the attitude of this moron, they are greatly avenged by the fact that the two fall asleep in the sun and get severely burnt…though that attracts the wrath of the Burns family, when the prodigal son is returned and Jessie Burns, the one that Norman loves; herself would pay him back…
As she has to drive him back to town, for he has driven in their car, to brink the burnt by the sun drunkard, they meet with an impassable obstacle on the road and thus she decides with suicidal conviction to get on…the train lines and enter a tunnel, where it was evidently impossible to tell – given that there were no lights inside it at that time, at the beginning of the twentieth century – if a train is coming to crush and destroy them…

The script of the motion picture directed by Robert Redford and the story by Norman Maclean are not very different and this is where I have written the note on the original material:

http://realini.blogspot.com/2018/07/a...

Posted 6th April 2020 by realini

[Rebecca Cecil · Rating 5 out of 5]

WHAT AN AWESOME CLASSIC. A BOOK ABOUT FAMILY, FRIENDSHIP. LOVE AND BROTHERS. THIS BOOK WAS REALLY GREAT. LOVED THE MEN FLY FISHING, WHERE FATHERS AND SONS NEVER OUTGREW EACH OTHER AND SPENT TIME TOGETHER FISHING. ONE BROTHER GOES OFF TO COLLEGE AND BECOME A PROFESSOR. HE COMES HOME AND FINDS LOVE. HE ALSO LOVES HIS FAMILY. HE AND HIS BROTHER ARE VERY CLOSE.HIS BROTHER HAS BECOME SOMEWHAT OF A FISHING KING WHILE HE WAS GONE AND IS ALSO A JOURNALIST.
VERY NICE STORY ABOUT HOMELIFE. LOVE AND FAMILY. REALLY ENJOYED IT.

[Roger · Rating 5 out of 5]

A classic.