Books into Movies

A rather belated Image hosted by Photobucket.com, but here it is!

"Jeanne suggested that we talk about books that have been made into movies. Great idea! Thank you, Jeanne."

1. When you think of books that have been made into movies, what one comes to mind first?
The first one that came to mind was Pride and Predjudice, probably because there's the new film out now.

2. Did the movie really capture the feeling of the book?
I haven't seen the film, and I don't think I'm going to. The BBC made a serialised version quite a few years ago, and to my mind this is the definite version. It's about 5 and a half hours long, so how can a 2-hour film compete with that? The acting is superb, the costumes are wonderful, and the whole thing is as near a perfect adaptation of a book as I think you can get. Whole chunks of dialogue are straight from the book. If you haven't seen it and you like the book, try to get hold of a copy!

3. What about other movies from books? Which movies do you feel really captured (or if you prefer, didn't capture) the feeling of the books they were based on?
I tend to avoid movies from books a bit, partly because once I've read the book I have a very visual image of the story, and usually a film doesn't correspond and I feel let down. I refuse to watch Captain Correlli's Mandolin as I don't like Nicholas Cage and just can't picture him in the main role. Having said that, some of my favourite movies are from books. I MUST mention Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings trilogy, which I think is fantastic. OK, it misses a few bits and tweaks the storyline more than a little in places, but it gets the whole idea perfectly and I've watched them all more times than I can count (I'm biased). And the Harry Potter films are pretty good too - looking forward to the next one. I love Last of the Mohicans, although it's completely different to the book in some major points! Also utterly different to the original is Baz Luhrman's Romeo and Juliet - but I love it, it captures the original perfectly. And so does Bride and Prejudice - I found it so funny and clever and it captured the story perfectly even if it was set in modern India! Ones I hated.... I can't stand Sense and Sensibility with Emma Thompson and Hugh Grant. Emma Thompson's too old for the part and Hugh Grant is just too Hugh Grant. And there are definitely others but I can't think of them and I've gone on long enough already...

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