Books2Movies Club discussion

Considering this novel was adapted once and quite recently just the same as previous one, The Silver Linings Playbook, it doesn't make much sense to separate the topics about the novel and the movie -- unless you wish to avoid spoilers for each. In that case, I would kindly ask you all to put in your text spoiler tags whenever you feel you might spoil something important (for an example, the end ;) for those who haven't read the book or seen the movie.

To skip long introductions, here are nice quotes about both:

Rotten Tomatoes about the movie: "Funny, moving, and beautifully acted, The Descendants captures the unpredictable messiness of life with eloquence and uncommon grace."

NY Times Critic Joanna Kavenna about the book: “The Descendants” is a Pandora’s box-style tragicomedy in which a swirl of emotional debris is flung at the narrator, who is smashed and pounded and yet each time rises to be smashed and pounded again.
...
Hemmings is a determinedly unsentimental writer, and she manages her hazardous subject matter — all of it ripe for strenuous melodrama — in a dry, understated way, subverting her characters without reducing them utterly. (The main character) King’s schemes are gently deflated, his notions of family bonding and grand occasion shown to be consoling fantasies, not fit for the real world.

Trying to not put spoilers:
I read the book a few months ago and then saw the movie for a movie/bookclub. I could really see George Clooney in the role of father. I liked his his sensitivity in not knowing the right thing to do with his kids and his own pain in what was being revealed to him about his marriage. Of course the book offered more than the movie could but overall I felt the movie did a good job.

I just started reading it. I have seen the movie few months ago and really liked it, and the book actually has the same overtones. I mean, it is not really comic, but has a healthy dose of grown-up humor, that Clooney delivers superbly in the movie. Without that, such serious themes as are in the book and in the movie, would be hard to handle.

P.S. There are even scenes in the book that seem quite unintentionally funny, from different perspective, now the movie's out -- (view spoiler)[in one of them, walking beside her father, Scottie, the younger daughter, wears a shirt tagged "Mrs Clooney" :D (hide spoiler)]

I just started this one. I'm afraid it's just going to be yet another depressing dysfunctional family epic a la Oprah Book Club, but I'm willing to try it a while. I swear, at least three out of five books I've picked up recently (or, anything I haven't actually selected for a group) has been about, or at least hinted at, a cheating spouse. I don't know if this is just suddenly a popular topic in books or that's what people have been gravitating toward lately or if I'm just more attuned to it due to my own recent experiences, but it's getting to where I hear even a hint of it in a book and I just roll my eyes and pretty much give up on the book even if I keep reading it. I will try to give this one a chance, though, as it may not be what it appears to be initially.

Alana wrote: "I just started this one. I'm afraid it's just going to be yet another depressing dysfunctional family epic a la Oprah Book Club, but I'm willing to try it a while. I swear, at least three out of fi..."

I wouldn't say it's depressing, but definitely dysfunctional. I just finished the book last night. I thought it was pretty good. Although, I was rather appalled at the way these children talk around their father and he allows it.

I know! It's been much better after the first few chapters, but most of time I'm thinking "Why is he moping around about how bad of a parent he is instead of DOING something about it?" If I spoke to my father like that...well, I don't even want to think about it. However, I wonder how much of this is due to the mother's bad parenting, as well?

They both seem to have failed in raising their children well (at least in the beginning of the novel). I saw the movie first and actually liked it more than the book, which doesn't happen often. I think it (kind of) makes sense that he allows his children to talk to him the way they do, because he has basically been absent as a father. He doesn't know these kids and they don't know him. They have no respect for him because he hasn't given them a reason to respect him. He is lost as a parent and just learning how to navigate what is okay and what isn't.

It's interesting how unexpected circumstances force until into roles with which we are unfamiliar and we learn the kind of people we really can be. I'm almost done with it now, and while he's certainly not perfect, he is beginning to take steps to actually be a father, not just a buddy. Sid even comments on this, "Sorry, I forgot you're like, a dad." I thought that was a very profound statement.

I found it a very engaging read looking at family and the various relationships within - how we overcome so many life shattering events in life and ultimately become stronger for it.

The film was a good adaptation of the book. I enjoyed both almost equally.