I thought it was because the movie images dominate over your imagination, but someone told me that wasn't it. How then?
Chiefly because they leave so much out. Films will of course go for the visual impact. This is completely different from the impact that the written word gives--the latter relies much more on the imagination.
When you read a book, the images that the book makes you think of are yours. No one else can see them, which in a way makes it something special. When you watch the movie that the book was turned into, those are the director's images. They are more avrage and comercial than the book would be to you, so in a way seeing the movie only makes the book cheep and meaningless.
Movies don't ruin books. They are often a letdown after having read a good book, for the reasons given above - but they do not ruin books, per se. If you find that after having seen a movie, you can't read the book or get bored with it - then I'd say the problem is a little closer to home.
I agree with Marquis. An interpretation of a book can only ruin itself, not the book. If you find, after watching a Movie adaptation, that you can't read the book, perhaps it's simply that you actually preferred the movie interpretation over what was your own. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
not true. my younger sister in middle school was recently given the task of reading a book for a book report. she blew thru a couple of "a series of unfortunate events" books, but her teacher told her these were unacceptable, because they were made into movies, and because she could read them well inside of the time frame she was given (four weeks). i told her to read Huckleberry Finn. this is in my estimation the greatest american novel written to date. her dummy teacher turned it down as well, as it was made into a movie as well. for fuck's sake, anyone who has read the book and has seen the movie, will recognize the travesty of this assertion...
alot of important bits of books are cut when turned into movies, as directors are for the most part out to make money, not to do justice to the book they tend to keep the action scenes and remove the scenes that tie a movie together, and make the plot work well
Yes, it is about imagination. And yes, it is about compression. And it is also marketing and commercial concerns. Nothing wrecks classic literature like the latest edition with the movie actors on the cover. Even crappy authors like Dean Koontz and Brett Easton Ellis see their books wrecked even further. Watchers? Less Than Zero? Okay, I will concede to Marquis and Glaucon's hair-splitting: it is the story that is wrecked, not the physical volume of the book itself. Although seeing actors on the cover does screw up the book itself.
fight club: never read it, but i can imagine. which leads to another sham; turning a movie into a book.
Many years ago, as a college freshman, I went to see “tea and sympathy” a story about a sensitive boy, whose father was a “jock” and forced him to tryout for the college team, whose coach and members questioned his "manhood" etc. The coach’s wife gave him “tea and sympathy.“ Near the end of the film it was clear that soon her gifts might be more personnel, but then there was a discontinuous change in her feelings towards the boy, and the required "moral ending" came. It was so false to all that went before, that I got the book and read it. In the book the ending was far more true and for me moral, but not the one the sensors of Hollywood at that time, long ago, had demanded.
I normally prefer the book to the movie. But in the case of "The Shining", I preferred the movie to the book. I didn't see the remake, which was closer to the book, I'm told, but of the original movie with Jack Nicholson, I just found it to be more entertaining. I also didn't care for the ending in the book. I preferred the movie ending. Anyone who's seen the remake, how did it stack up to the book and the original movie? Also, how did "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" compare in it's three incarnations? I've only seen the two movies.
Ultimately the extent to which something has been ruined depends on what style of storytelling you prefer methinks. Those who favour the Story, and prefer to envision it for themselves, will no doubt prefer the book over the movie. Those who favour the style/mood/look, and deem the story to be secondary to this vision, will no doubt prefer the movie to the book. It's a rare occasion where these two aspects complement each other well. A good book tells a story that allows you to envision it, flesh it out for yourself. Sometimes (usually), when adapted for a movie, the vision will be different from yours. This is why a movie that has both an enjoyable story and an exciting look, when not adapted from a book, is usually the most effective.
I found "The 13th Warrior" to be good both in film and print. In fact I thought that they kind of enhanced each other.
A book and a movie are two different mediums for telling a story, and they aren't as compatible as people would think. For one, a book is slower paced and more lazy, letting the story subtly unwind with subplots, extra scenes, intresting prose and observations, while a movie is a direct story with no more then one subplot usually and no irrelevant scenes, ect. To adapt a movie to a book weakens the movie because it loses its focus, and to adapt a book to a movie to a book merely turns the book into a pop thriller book. The only way to do a movie adaption well is to radically change it.
Please. How naive. Movies represent the Lowest Common Denominator of media entertainment. It serves well for those who wish to sit idly while they are passively 'entertained' (sic). A book engages the reader in an entertaining and dynamic experience.
If you make a 250+ page book into a two-and-a-half-hour film, you'd have to cut a lot out. Sometimes these are minor things, and sometimes these are major subplots. Making the film longer can fix this problem, but who wants to sit through a five-hour movie?
Not only that, but it would be twice as hard to film. It is ridiculous that a director should have to work twice as hard as an author would just to adapt a book.
I'm going to risk some blasphemy here. I've both read and seen "Lord of the Rings" and found so many scenes that added absolutely nothing to the plot and mindless ramblings that I have to rank the book just a little bit behind "Crime and Punishment" as being in need of some serious editting. Once the story gets started again after some whimsical little flashback or side scene (that goes absolutley nowhere) it becomes a great read. I think Tolkein's big hang-up is that it looks like he was creating Middle Earth as he went. Instead of traditional description passages, he halts the story to give a history lesson on the current setting. Very thorough, but also very distracting from the main plot. ON the other hand, through the movies, while you get a sense that the realm you're in is very old, there is nothing to really drive home the grandeur and majesty of the local cultures, etc. except for the spectacular cinematography, and unless you're at least an armchair geologist, a picture of a mountain can tell you nothing of the history of place.
fight club was a book first,one of the few book to film transistions which does the book justice.they only left out about two things from the book.same with fear and loathing in las vegas.
