SciFi and Fantasy Book Club discussion

The Shawshank Redemption is a fantastic movie, and it's pretty close to the source material. There are a couple changes, but nothing that really impacts the story. For instance, in the book, Red is Irish. Still, both are excellent. You should read the story - it's in Different Seasons, and the book also includes the story The Body, which was adapted into Stand By Me - another really good adaptation, IMO.

The Green Mile is another one that was really well done and lives up to the source material.

As far as WORST adaptations... hmm... I might have to make some enemies here and say the Harry Potter series. The first one was really well done, I think, and the second was good, but from the 3rd one on, I just started liking the changes less and less. I still saw them, though. LOL I just don't think that they captured the essence of the books.

I'm usually a book-over-movie kind of girl, and prefer the original book over any adaptation... but there's one case where I seriously had to reverse that. Children of Men. OMG. The movie was really good, but the book was AWFUL.

Ooooo good topic. So hard to pick...

BEST = Children of Men. (runners up Minority Report and The Watchmen)

I really enjoyed the book, but the difference in angle with the film really solidified the long, persistent horror of the situation. I felt it improved upon the novel in a lot of ways despite making significant changes. I found the additions in characters easier to connect and sympathize for, and the film's stronger multicultural bend just made the world feel more lush.

WORST = I, Robot (runners up League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Starship Troopers, I am Legend, many others)

I gotta say, you have to get up really early in the morning to make a movie that manages to countermand and fail so significantly at adapting its source material in the manner I, Robot does. The talent was all there with an excellent director and Bridget Moynahan... but somewhere the studio wanted an action movie with Will Smith ( a good actor himself, certainly) and opted to take one of the greatest female protagonists in science fiction literature and make her eye candy so Will Smith can leap off of motorcycles while yelling 'HELL NAW' and firing guns akimbo.

Simply put, they took a novel from one genre, and tried to shove it into another genre. Astoundingly bad move. They should simply have made a different movie of a different Science Fiction tale that was more prone to an action adventure so that SOMEone would have gotten something out of it.

Becky wrote: "The Shawshank Redemption is a fantastic movie, and it's pretty close to the source material. There are a couple changes, but nothing that really impacts the story. For instance, in the book, Red is..."

Finally somebody who shares my opinion that the first two Harry Potter movies were the best. The majority of people consider them to be completely inferior to the rest.

For the worst movies, may I remind you about Battlefield Earth? The source material was not a classic by any standards, but the movie was atrocious. I am sorry if I invoked painful memories :(

I liked the movie version of the Green Mile. Wasn't fond of It's adaptation.

As far recent movie are concerned, I loved The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit (1 more movie to go for book). I watched a bit of Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief, and was very unimpressed. I haven't seen all of it though.

How did I not think of Lord of the Rings?! I think they are all good, but still not my best pick. Also, removing Tom Bombadil from Lord of the Rings was a very smart narrative choice since his presence undermines the main villain so significantly at the beginning of the tale.

The Hobbit adaptation I'm not as keen on. It's a shame that Del Toro didn't direct that film.

Hmmm... WORST SF movie based on an otherwise good book. I would have to say Starship Troopers (Hollywood butchery of Heinlein's old classic).

On the other hand, I thought Hunger Games was a well-done adaptation of Collins' first book. Haven't seen Catching Fire yet, so I don't know if they continued to do as well.

CORALINE was great in movie form -- exactly like the book.

Brenda wrote: "CORALINE was great in movie form -- exactly like the book."

I still haven't seen that. Definitely want to, have heard many good things about it.

My fav: A Scanner Darkly - immense on screen

a few others i thought were better or just as good as the book on screen:

Jaws
The Exorcist
No Country for Old Men
2001 & 2010
Let the Right One In
Rambo
WWZ
Misery
The Thing

I really didnt like A Fear in Loathing in Las Vegas, Battlefield Earth and many many more.

Best (no particular order):
Slaughterhouse Five (Really captured Vonnegut's work)
A Clockwork Orange (sure, it left off the final chapter, but honestly, I think the book would be better without that chapter as well...though I do wonder why it was left out of the American edition in the firt place)
Throne of Blood (Kurosawa's take on MacBeth...it's the prime example of how to get a book-movie translation right--if a play can count as a book--even though you radically change the tale's setting and language...you do it by preserving the written work's message, emotional content and character motivations/personalities)

Honorable Mention:
2001: A Space Oddyssey (I don't think you can really count it as an interpretation of the book since the book and movie were developed simultaneously by filmmaker and author)

Worst:
Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (My father used to read us the Ian Fleming book every year...it was a delightful mystery plus magical car story for juveniles...saw the Disney film in the theater when it came out--I was 10--I was so pissed off I tried to get the family to leave the movie.)
Starship Trooper (Yeah, WTF was that?)
Lord of the Rings Trilogy by Peter Jackson, The Pretender (See Throne of Blood above. This is its polar opposite. I know a lot of people love it, but I think a lot of people don't actually understand what makes the original so good. And I don't want to argue about it here, 'cause no one can convince me otherwise. Let's just say you have your tastes and I have mine and leave things on a friendly note, yeah? LOL)

Dishonorable Mention:
The Hobbit Trillogy by Peter Jackons, The Pretender (OK...so I haven't seen any of them...I just really hate his work! LOL X2)

Pickle wrote: "My fav: A Scanner Darkly "

It was quite a good PKD interpretation. It emphasized the comedic element a bit more than the book did, and mucked around with some of the plot (I thought unnecessarily), but overall I still count it as probably the best interpretation of Dick's work.

If you haven't seen Imposter (2001, staring Gary Senise), based on a PKD short story, then try to find the DVD with the extras on it. They have a 20 or 40 minute condensed version of the movie that was used during fund raising (they showed it to prospective investors). Turns out, it's almost EXACTLY the PKD story. The full movie just took that version and padded it to full movie length by adding gratuitous chase scenes.

Full movie...kinda OK, but kinda lame. Condensed version...spot on!

Two that come to mind as excellent are Fight Club and The Prestige, which both might have been better than the books.

For worst, besides the horrible Battlefield Earth, I'd also consider the incredibly boring Da Vinci Code, and the mess that was The Sum of All Fears. I had liked the previous Clancy adaptations, but that one was bad.

Yes, THE PRESTIGE was superb. (Hugh Jackman -and- Christian Bale, what more could you want?)

Oh, and World War Z. While it was a decent enough zombie movie on its own, it did very little to represent the source material other than generate movie tie in covers.

Then there was The Queen of the Damned, which did the same thing for vampires.

Stardust is a really good, book and movie!
One of my favorite books growing up was Blood and Chocolate. They could have made SUCH a good movie with it, but it ended up being absolutely terrible.

The Last Unicorn has long been one of my favorite movies. Having the author do the screenplay guaranteed a good adaptation. And I believe that author Diana Wynne Jones had issues with it, but I love the movie version of Howl's Moving Castle. I also loved the 2005 movie of Call of Cthulhu.

As far as bad adaptations... I've never seen a version of Dracula or Frankenstein that I've liked. Ditto with Wuthering Heights.

Evgeny wrote: "Finally somebody who shares my opinion that the first two Harry Potter movies were the best. The majority of people consider them to be completely inferior to the rest."

Yeah! High five! :D

I was so disappointed after watching movies 3-8 that I refuse to watch any of them again. Lily's freaking eyes being brown made me so mad that I vented for a week about that. I still don't think I'm over it. O_o

Evgeny wrote: "Becky wrote: "The Shawshank Redemption is a fantastic movie, and it's pretty close to the source material. There are a couple changes, but nothing that really impacts the story. For instance, in th..."

My generall comment is that I think they got better as movies, but worse as adaptations.

And while there are some things I like about the movies - and even some changes they made that I kinda liked, such as (view spoiler)[how they did Snape's Worth Memory as a reflected charm instead of Harry stupidly looking into the penseive, 'cause I always thought that was plot-needed stupidity - though the actual depiction of the memory left a lot to be desired (hide spoiler)] - I also don't tend to watch the movies much, because whenever I watch them I just want to reread the books to refresh myself on how it "really happened".

I do tend to "see" the actors in the roles, though, even when reading the books - which is odd when the character descriptions don't match the actors.

BEST: Bladerunner. Arguably better even than the book. Shawshank & Green Mile were also excellent. I can think of many more, but will stop there.

WORST: I won't pick Dan Brown or Clancy, or any book I thought itself was bad thus automatically damaging the film. I'll try to pick a great book with a bad adaptation. Instead I'll choose "Arthur". Could there be a worse, more hollywood interpretation of the classic English folklore hero than this? Especially when the film bills itself as the 'real story'. Ugh.

I'm glad Del Toro had nothing to do with The Hobbit in the end. His version would make Jackson's flawed affair look pristine. Look at his other films, like Hellboy. It is just wrong for Tolkien.

c.o.lleen ± (... never stop fighting) ± wrote: "Evgeny wrote: "Becky wrote: "The Shawshank Redemption is a fantastic movie, and it's pretty close to the source material. There are a couple changes, but nothing that really impacts the story. For ..."

The replacement of the actor who played Dumbledore was not the best choice, in my opinion. Better adaptations work better if you need a memory refreshment. The latter movies might be better, but my main criterion - being true to the source material - makes me prefer the first two. Why the hell did they change the producer?

c.o.lleen ± (... never stop fighting) ± wrote: "I do tend to "see" the actors in the roles, though, even when reading the books - which is odd when the character descriptions don't match the actors...."

Yes. I do this. I even did when re-reading Shawshank. Even though King said several times just how Irish and red-haired his character was, Morgan Freeman was stuck in my mind's eye. (and ear, for that matter)

Best - Rosemary's Baby. Ira Levin is actually on record as saying that if you had seen the film, then you've basically already read the book and vice-versa.

Worst - The miniseries of Stephen King's IT. Wretched on so many levels its hard for me to figure out where to begin. Horrid acting, so many important plot points left out, hackneyed Pennywise, substituting lame comedy over menace.....this really should have been on HBO or Showtime where they could have developed the more horrific and visceral points as opposed to the family-friendly ABC. IT is one of my favorite King novels, and this pathetic excuse of an adaptation still leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

Chris wrote: "Yes. I do this. I even did when re-reading Shawshank. Even though King said several times just how Irish and red-haired his character was, Morgan Freeman was stuck in my mind's eye. (and ear, for that matter)"

Everything's better in Morgan Freeman's voice. :)


@ Evgeny - Gambon was terrible as Dumbledore, especially in the first couple movies. I do think he got better, but I'm not sure I'd say he was ever "good". But the choosing scene in Goblet of Fire makes me cringe every time.

Maybe they should have just gotten Morgan Freeman to play Dumbledore.

Chris wrote: "Maybe they should have just gotten Morgan Freeman to play Dumbledore."

He probably would've been more Dumbledoreish.

c.o.lleen ± (... never stop fighting) ± wrote: "Chris wrote: "Yes. I do this. I even did when re-reading Shawshank. Even though King said several times just how Irish and red-haired his character was, Morgan Freeman was stuck in my mind's eye. ..."

THAT particular scene was the main reason I mentioned bad replacement choice.

Killian wrote: "I'm pretty sure the previous actor died so that was why they changed. Would've been pretty difficult not to. "


I know they had to do it, but Gambon was still a bad choice.

Killian wrote: "c.o.lleen ± (... never stop fighting) ± wrote: "Killian wrote: "I'm pretty sure the previous actor died so that was why they changed. Would've been pretty difficult not to. "


I know they had to d..."

As a person who just recently finished reading the graphic novel for the first time I can say I like the movie, but not the novel for exactly the reasons you described. The novel felt like an anarchy propaganda - and they did not make even a good case for it.

The movie cut off the boring parts and it actually made Evey 3-dimentional character instead of completely flat one in the comic book.

Evgeny wrote: "As a person who just recently finished reading the graphic novel for the first time I can say I like the movie, but not the novel for exactly the reasons you described. The novel felt like an anarchy propaganda - and they did not make even a good case for it.

The movie cut off the boring parts and it actually made Evey 3-dimentional character instead of completely flat one in the comic book. "

I actually prefer the movie, too - but I wonder how much of that is because I saw the movie first. I sometimes (often?) suffer from what I call "bias of first exposure", which is basically whichever medium I encounter something in first - if I liked it, I will be biased towards.

That said - I... I have issues with Moore. I find a lot of his writing to be more agenda based, and that the plotline and characters can suffer for it. Like, there's a whole subplot in the V comic that I'm glad they cut, 'cause it was so meandering and boring.

Now, if I were reading for polemic I'd probably be all for it, but I'm more a character/plot based reader - I just want a good story.

I realize this makes me a low-brow heathen, or something, amongst the Moore's fanbase - but I'm cool with that.

***

I actually also enjoy the movie version of League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, though it's a terrible adaptation. But, again, I saw the movie before I ever even knew about the comics, and I enjoyed it as a bit of cheesy fun.

The Narnia books were well served by films. Tilda Swinton was a perfect Queen Jadis.

John wrote: "Hmmm... WORST SF movie based on an otherwise good book. I would have to say Starship Troopers (Hollywood butchery of Heinlein's old classic).

On the other hand, I thought Hunger Games was a well-d..."

Oh yes - I remember watching Starship Troopers, with my jaw dropping further and further. Definite butchery there. About the only thing you can say, is that some of the names of the characters were the same, as long as you don't think about what sex they were, or if they actually died in the first chapter of the book and never appeared again. {rant over}

As far as best goes - non SFF - Swallows and Amazons, and SFF - I really do think the Hunger Games movies have been very well done. And Catching Fire in particular.

BEST: I recently saw The Fault in Our Stars and thought it was wonderful! (Not SF or fantasy, of course.)

WORST: Beautiful Creatures. Ethan's personality was all wrong in the movie. He wasn't goofy in the book.

Tough to pick a single favorite. The ones that stand out are Children of Men, The Godfather, The Shawshank Redemption, Goodfellas, and Die Hard.

Worst would be either Eragon or Gulliver's Travels.

I'm surprised no-one's mentioned Constantine yet. Bloody awful.

Best: John Carpenter's The Thing. It's surprisingly close to the original short story, and I think that it does a great job in emphasizing the solitude and claustrophobia of the story.

Worst: Simon Birch. A Prayer for Owen Meany is such a brilliant novel, and the movie manages to jettison or change most of what makes it great. To try to be fair, I'm not sure that the novel is really commercially filmable as written, but I wish that they hadn't tried.

Pat wrote: "I'm surprised no-one's mentioned Constantine yet. Bloody awful."

This is another one where I thought the movie was actually ok - *if* you can seperate it completely from it's source material.

But, yeah, as an adaption it's bloody awful.

Did you know they're doing a series of it... on NBC, I believe?

*goes to check*

Yep - NBC: http://www.nbc.com/constantine?__sour...

Oh, The Godfather. Perfect suggestion, James.

Pat wrote: "I'm surprised no-one's mentioned Constantine yet. Bloody awful."

I'd forgotten about the Constantine movie. The characters were bland and difficult to like, and the whole movie seemed like they were trying to ride on the coat tails of The Matrix, which I'm sure they were.

The new TV series looks a lot more enjoyable imo.

I'm not sure how to feel about edge of tommorow it is extremely different from the book but at the same time pretty darn enjoyable

I've seen that with a bunch of film adaptations, Aaron. I understand what you mean and find those surprises very pleasant.

It's how I felt with Where the Wild Things Are.

The best adaptation that immediately occurs to me is Truffaut's "Fahrenheit 451". There were differences, but this is the only movie I can think of where the movie left me feeling the same way the book did. It turned out very Bradbury. Oskar Werner was absolutely superb as Montag. One where the movie was infinitely better than the book is "Cat Ballou". I saw the movie, and it made me want to read the book. The book was total trash, an insult to the trees that died to make the paper on which it was printed.

For worst, the list is nearly endless. Every other movie based on a Bradbury work, no matter the quality of the cast, fell on its face. "The Illustrated Man" comes to mind as a horrible mangling of a literary masterpiece. I cannot comment on the "Martian Chronicles" miniseries, since I took what I believe to be good advice and never watched it.

Yes, The Godfather. I sometimes forget that was a book first.

Speaking of which, I'm surprised we haven't brought The Princess Bride into the conversation.

Chris wrote: "Speaking of which, I'm surprised we haven't brought The Princess Bride into the conversation."

Love the movie, but I don't remember how faithful it was. They did change the whole Zoo thing and cut it down into the Pit.

The screenplay for THE PRINCESS BRIDE was written by the author of the book, so it is very close to the printed version.

Brenda wrote: "The screenplay for THE PRINCESS BRIDE was written by the author of the book, so it is very close to the printed version."

I read the book before I saw the movie. It was very interesting how the author improved the storytelling from the book to the screenplay. I noticed several complications in the book that did not add much to the story that the author simplified or removed in the screenplay. In my opinion, with the addition of a great cast and a brilliant director, the result was one of the most entertaining and marvelous movies ever made.

Brenda wrote: "The Narnia books were well served by films. Tilda Swinton was a perfect Queen Jadis."

Tilda Swinton is perfect at everything.

Leslie wrote: "Brenda wrote: "The Narnia books were well served by films. Tilda Swinton was a perfect Queen Jadis."

Tilda Swinton is perfect at everything."


She was definitely the best part of the Constantine movie.

Tilda Swinton is the best part of pretty much anything.

Best: The Harry Potter movies stayed very close to the books and I liked them very much (all of the movies in the series!!)

Worst: I recently watched the 1984 movie of Dune. **shudders** Horrible, horrible. The characters stood around and recited lines to each other. I think they changed events from the book, too, since it doesn't match what I remember from reading Dune. Patrick Stewart as Gurney Halleck did an excellent job with what little bit the directors/writers gave him to do. Maybe this one would appeal to people who watch movies to make fun of them -- so bad it's good?

Best: To Kill a Mockingbird
Worst: The Disney version of The Three Musketeers (w Keifer Sutherland, et al). Even now, after lo these many years, my teeth grit to think of this disrespectful pile of celluloid excrement. A true travesty.