When movies come close to the book.

[Babytoxie]

The Right Stuff was as close to Tom Wolfe's book as it could be, but I guess when you're dealing with historical non-fiction, that's not too surprising.

The Last Picture Show was a good one - although it did alter one event, it wasn't essential to the plot.

As for Jaws, that's one of those cases where the movie completely transcends the source material. I read it just a couple of years ago and was shocked... the novel is horrible, IMO. As Peter Benchley assisted with the screenplay, I could picture him after the movie's completion thinking "wow, my book really sucked".

Some other movies that I feel are much better than their books are:

2001
Bladerunner (DADOES)
The 7 Faces of Dr. Lao

[JLM]

Originally Posted by protector2814

Sorry. man - I snuck the book from a DrugFair when I was 11. I remember that there were dirty parts and that Brody lived. Too much time has passed for me to compare.

No problem.

[protector2814]

Originally Posted by Babytoxie

...The Right Stuff was as close to Tom Wolfe's book as it could be, but I guess when you're dealing with historical non-fiction, that's not too surprising. ...

Great call Both were fantastic.

[wktf]

The movie that most closely stays faithful to the book, to me, was "Sofie's Choice." An absolutely brutal and gut-wrenching read as well as film, which brought the book faithfully to life.

"To Kill A Mockingbird" also is incredibly faithful to the source material.

[Teague]

Originally Posted by wktf

"To Kill A Mockingbird" also is incredibly faithful to the source material.

It is, I agree, and I'd never want to say anything negative about that movie. It's just awesome.

Still, even in that example, I'd give the nod to the book. Harper Lee creates such a world in that novel that the film doesn't have time to more than skim. That's the limitation of the form, though--it's still a classic, and one of my favorites.

The only way this usually happens, IMHO, is when a book is good but has some flaws of its own that the film can then smooth out. Honestly, I think Field of Dreams did this pretty damn well. The book drags on a little bit, I think, but the film picks and chooses the highlights, delves deeply enough to make me feel like I'm not missing anything, and has a wonderful wholeness to it.

[RichBamf]

I've got it-The Green Mile.

ANYONE who reads the book and watched the film will see just how alike they are-bar one or two incredibly minor scenes, they are identical.

[superdoug]

I rather thought that the LOTR movies were as close as they could be and still be watchable. Also on the list:

Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe. I swear, that movie is almost exactly what I pictured in my head while reading it all those years ago. They followed the major plot points and only juggled a couple of things around, mostly the Real World stuff.

The Princess Bride. Despite missing some parts from the novel that would have only slowed things down, this followed the plot and characterizations of William Goldberg's novel very well. Mostly because he wrote the screenplay.

Pet Semetary. This movie was extra-scary when I first saw it, precisely because it followed the book so well, and I knew -exactly- what was about to happen.

Howard's End, Room With a View, and Maurice. Trust Merchant-Ivory to follow E.M. Forester's books lovingly and still keep them lively and interesting.

All great movies. If you haven't seen them, I totally recommend them.

One movie that deviates sharply from the source material, but is still a hell of a lot of fun to watch: Stardust. Despite Gaiman only taking a producer credit and not writing the screenplay himself, the changes made between book and film (while large and highly noticeable) did not dimish from the film overall. I enjoy both equally.

[RichBamf]

Originally Posted by wktf

"To Kill A Mockingbird" also is incredibly faithful to the source material.

While I agree that the events in the book are reflected faithfully in the film, it seems the film loses some of the book's ability to draw you into the events with the childlike innocence of Scout and Jem.


Although that is probably to do with the attention drawing of an outstanding Gregory Peck performance more than anything else...

[rychehitman]

BASEketball!

[Teague]

Originally Posted by RichBamf

I've got it-The Green Mile.

ANYONE who reads the book and watched the film will see just how alike they are-bar one or two incredibly minor scenes, they are identical.

The Green Mile movie was good, but still lacked the depth of the books. How long was that series? It was huge, wasn't it? I remember getting a really lovely sense of the era from the books, which was mostly missing from the movie, fine as it was.