spiderwort
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Post by spiderwort on Dec 20, 2018 0:42:19 GMT
Inspired by kijii 's Faulker thread. What are some of your favorite films based upon novels you have read? I tend to go for the more classic writers. Among my favorites: John Steinbeck's East of Eden (out of 600+ pages, they wisely adapted only the last quarter) - adapted by Paul Osborn Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited (1981 TV version) - adapted by John Mortimer ( Emily Mortimer's father)
Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird - adapted by Horton Foote C. S. Forester's The African Queen - adapted by James Agee
Betty Smith's A Tree Grows in Brooklyn - adapted by Tess Slesinger and Frank Davis E. M. Forster's Howards End - adapted by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala
James M. Cain's Double Indemnity - adapted by Billy Wilder and Raymond Chandler Booth Tarkington's The Magnificent Ambersons - adapted by Orson Welles Jack Schaefer's Shane - adapted by A. B. Guthrie Jr.
Larry McMurtry's "Horseman, Pass By," which became the film, Hud - adapted by Irving Ravetch and Harriet Frank Jr.
Out of many more. . . |
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Post by politicidal on Dec 20, 2018 0:55:12 GMT
Jurassic Park
To Kill a Mockingbird
Watership Down
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
The Grapes of Wrath
The Invisible Man
The Chronicles of Narnia: the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
The Disaster Artist
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
Frankenstein
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Post by OldAussie on Dec 20, 2018 0:58:08 GMT
Movie was better -
The Godfather
Jaws
2001: A Space Odyssey
The Graduate
The Cincinnati Kid
Movie and novel both great -
King Rat
The Caine Mutiny
The Bridge on the River Kwai
Special mention - Catch-22 --- great book, movie gets better each time I watch it.
Probably forgetting a bunch.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 20, 2018 1:18:23 GMT
The Chronicles of Narnia: the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
Frankenstein
The Lord of the Rings
Holes
The Outsiders
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Post by Rufus-T on Dec 20, 2018 4:11:28 GMT
Gone with the Wind
The Godfather (A rare case which a good book with a better movie)
The Grapes of Wrath
Of Mice and Men (1939 version)
The Exorcist
Invasion of the Body Snatcher
The Dead Zone
The Odessa File
To Kill a Mockingbird
Looking for Mr. Goodbar (terrible book, but great movie)
The Martian Chronicles (1980 TV series)
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Post by london777 on Dec 20, 2018 4:30:44 GMT
The OP has asked for favorite films based on novels. This may be a very different thing from the best interpretation of a novel. A film can faithfully follow a great novel and be as dull as ditch-water.
I imagine most of us would agree that it is almost impossible for a movie to re-create a great novel, but it can be a great work of art in its own right by taking the novel as its starting point and then plotting its own course. As Spiderwort has remarked, they were "wise" to only film a small part of "East of Eden" (though I am undecided whether it is ethical to retain the same name in such cases).
I was going to ask for examples of the rare cases where a movie is better than the novel (or maybe short story) on which it is based. Not so rare in Film Noir, where many of the original novels are pretty trashy, and would have been largely forgotten by now were it not for the films.
Old Aussie also quotes the famous case of "The Godfather" which was a mediocre novel.
"Kwai" is an interesting case. The film-makers took enormous liberties with the novel, but this was poetic justice since the novelist had taken equal liberties with the historical facts.
I like:
Far from the Madding Crowd (1967) dir: John Schlesinger from a screenplay by Frederic Raphael (himself no mean novelist.) I have not seen the 2015 version directed by Thomas Vinterberg. It could be more faithful to the original.
Great Expectations (1946) dir: David Lean. No less than five people contributed to the screenplay. I do not know if that was all amicable, or a result of development problems, but IMHO it all worked out just fine.
My favorite Brit movie (apart from certain Powell & Pressburger and David Lean films) is It Always Rains on Sunday (1947) dir: John Hamer, and is based on a novel by Arthur La Bern, totally forgotten as a novelist these days, though he did also write the novel on which Hitchcock's Frenzy (1972) is based.
Gerald Kersh's novel Night and the City was primarily about Jewish criminals in 1930s London. Very little of that aspect remains in Jo Eisinger's script for Jules Dassin's stunning movie (1950) which has a post-war setting and an American as protagonist.
One of my favorite novelists when young was John Cowper Powys but on checking now with IMDb I see that no-one has attempted to film any of his works. Wiki says that John Boorman once contemplated filming "A Glastonbury Romance". Now that I would have liked to have seen!
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Post by OldAussie on Dec 20, 2018 4:42:10 GMT
Mention of The Odessa File reminds me of great novel and film - Day of the Jackal.
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Post by Rufus-T on Dec 20, 2018 5:03:54 GMT
Mention of The Odessa File reminds me of great novel and film - Day of the Jackal. I have wanted to read Day of the Jackal, but never got to it. The Jackal was mentioned a lot in the Robert Ludlum's Jason Bourne books. Unfortunately, the recent Jason Bourne movies were a disappointment for not being faithful to the book. I did not see the earlier Richard Chamberlain and Jaclyn Smith version. Talking about spy books/movies which reminds me Dr. No is my favorite James Bond book and still one of the best Bond movies. |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 20, 2018 7:23:01 GMT
All Quiet on the Western Front
The Cider House Rules
The World According to Garp
Of Mice and Men
The Grapes of Wrath
Love in the Time of Cholera
The Old Man and the Sea
To Have and Have Not
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Post by Fox in the Snow on Dec 20, 2018 12:00:50 GMT
I need to read more:
A Scanner Darkly
The Trial
Lolita
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Post by london777 on Dec 20, 2018 14:22:43 GMT
Unfortunately, the recent Jason Bourne movies were a disappointment for not being faithful to the book. I did not see the earlier Richard Chamberlain and Jaclyn Smith version. I watched it a couple of weeks ago on YouTube. The Jackal features heavily in the plot so it may be closer to the novel. Feeble movie, though. |
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Post by Lebowskidoo 🦞 on Dec 20, 2018 14:52:36 GMT
Jaws
To Kill A Mockingbird
Shane
The Outsiders
Tex
Rumble Fish
That Was Then, This Is Now
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
The Shining
Secret Window
Misery
Carrie (1976)
The Firm
Bram Stoker's Dracula
Forrest Gump
The Silence of the Lambs
Red Dragon
Manhunter
Hannibal
Hannibal Rising
Harry Potter series
Phantoms
William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet
The Birds
Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
James and the Giant Peach
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spiderwort
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@spiderwort
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Post by spiderwort on Dec 20, 2018 15:12:09 GMT
Glad to see another fan of Shane. I read it in college (for pleasure) and loved it and especially loved the beauty of the final sentence after all that had come before:
"He was the man who rode into our little valley out of the heart of the great glowing West and when his work was done road back whence he had come and he was Shane."
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Post by taylorfirst1 on Dec 20, 2018 16:57:50 GMT
I don't read very much fiction but here are a couple. Treasure Island 1950 The Invisible Man 1933 Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde 1941 Multiple versions of Dracula True Grit 1969 Jaws 1975
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Post by koskiewicz on Dec 20, 2018 18:51:07 GMT
On of my all time favorites is Shakespeare's "Henry V" with Branaugh or Olivier...take your pick.
A few more:
The Pit and the Pendulum
The Masque of the Red Death
Journey to the Center of the Earth
All Quiet on the Western Front (original)
Last of the Mohicans (Daniel Day Lewis)
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Post by teleadm on Dec 20, 2018 20:00:17 GMT
I've read a lot of novels and short stories, but not seen the movie versions of them.
When I've seen a movie, I've never felt the urge to read the books they are based on.
For some reason it's become like that.
The few I've read and seen:
Dr No by Ian Fleming
Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie
Jamaica Inn by Daphne Du Maurier
Before the Facts by Francis Iles (filmed as Suspicion 1941)
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Post by bravomailer on Dec 20, 2018 20:20:40 GMT
Books I read before seeing the movie:
Catch-22
The Exorcist
The Godfather
Jaws
The Thin Red Line
Corelli's Mandolin
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Post by Rufus-T on Dec 20, 2018 21:02:59 GMT
If you count novelization of a film, I read these before seeing the films
The China Syndrome
Alien
The Empire Strikes Back (Yes, I knew the huge spoiler before seeing the movie. It didn't ruin the enjoyment of the film)
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Post by manfromplanetx on Dec 20, 2018 21:50:29 GMT
The novel Gone to Earth was published in 1917 it was written by English romantic novelist and poet Mary Webb. Webb's writing is set mainly in the Shropshire countryside of her childhood. Notable in her written works are her poetic descriptions of the natural world, her characters are drawn from the country people whom she knew, a strong aspect throughout her work was her focused and fatalistic view on human psychology... The novel was an unknown find at a charity shop many years ago in my youth, It was the title that attracted me. The read was a most unusual story, vividly descriptive, I have never forgotten the wild child Hazel, and was thrilled to discover an English film from the esteemed filmmaking duo of Powell & Pressburger. They produced a beautifully filmed on location adaptation, with great performances it is a dramatically entertaining film, however I felt it never quite reaches the depths the picturesque & evocative tone of Mary Webb's novel.. Gone to Earth (1950) was filmed by the director-writer team of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger and stars Jennifer Jones, David Farrar, and Cyril Cusack. Jones stars as Hazel born from a gypsy mother she is a free spirited child of nature. Hazel lives in the Shropshire countryside the setting era is the late 1890s . Hazel believes in the spells & charms learnt from her mother, she loves wild creatures and understands her natural environment far more than those around her. Local squire Jack Reddin (David Farrar) desires Hazel and wants her, but she has already promised herself to the Baptist minister, Edward Marston (Cyril Cusack). A struggle for her body and soul ensues... "What a beautiful woman, great-hearted girl, inspired actress, restless soul!’” M.Powell
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Post by teleadm on Dec 21, 2018 18:44:16 GMT
bravomailer It's quite okay to name a film you've seen before you read the novel upon which it's based, if you like. teleadm Like you, I'm generally disinclined to read the novel after I've seen the film - though not always, especially with classical literature. Most often, in my experience, the novels always add something that the films can't. I actually read "Jamaica Inn" and "Before the Facts" many years after I watched the movies, and as you wrote gives more depth to the story than the movies gave, incidentially those mentioned were by Hitchcock. "Jamaica Inn" book and movie have different "villains". When I was young I thought that when I get older I will have all the time in the world, sitting by a sparkling fireside reading Dickens, Hugo and other great writers, but things haven't turned out that way yet. |
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