"the book is better than the movie"...
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Topic: "the book is better than the movie"...
Posted By: The T
Subject: "the book is better than the movie"...
Date Posted: April 02 2007 at 10:33
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By the way ben prog-"I'll die if I don't post 500 messagges every day-ismylife, this is not about your comment but it gave me the idea. Don't you people hate it when other people that just saw a movie based on a book say "oh, but the book was better"...wouldn't you say it is a ridiculous comparison, when you have two different artistic languages where things that work in one don't do so in the other and viceversa, when the resources and the "color palette" is totally different? When you adapt a movie from a book, the book ENDS the moment a screenplay based on it exists. The book is a separate entity from the movie, and sometimes for artistic purposes changes are made to the story in the book.
What do you say?
What do you think?
Is it already May?
Is that hair on your sink?
There won't be a day
when Ben doesn't post
what is your pay,
that you post the most????
 ------------- 
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Replies:
Posted By: Trickster F.
Date Posted: April 02 2007 at 10:43
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A literary work is made to convey a particular idea or plot. It is the original that matters in the end. A film based around a literary work may have its own ideas and aims but it will never succeed in doing it the same the book did. To hear it from the exact source, read the original. I stopped watching films a few years ago anyway, so I may not be the right person to ask. ------------- sig |
Posted By: clarke2001
Date Posted: April 02 2007 at 11:08
I don't hate it, actually, I agree with that point of view. You know, we, progheads, are a little bit snobbish sometimes. Jokes aside, the books are better than movies, in the majority of cases. I agree that two different artistic languages are using two different color palettes, so to say, but I have a certain respect for the original. Of course, we can argue which one is better: Queen's Fairy Feller's Masterstroke or the original painting? Camel's Snow Goose or the novel? A film is a very specific art sub-genre. Nowadays it's too commercial, too crowd-pleasing. Hollywood is pop of art called cinematography. For example: Stanislaw Lem's Solaris is a masterpiece of literature, hands down. Tarkovsky's movie is a masterpiece too! But Hollywood's remake of Solaris with Clooney is just a pile of special effects and sh!t. Another example: I really doubt there is one Tolkien fan in this world who thinks that Lord Of The Rings is better as movie trilogy than book trilogy. Of course, they are two different media, and movie trilogy as a standalone piece is working just fine, but you can't avoid comparisons, they are sharing the same core idea, for God's sake! There are cases when a book and a movie are equally good: Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey and Arthur C. Clarke's book (although he wrote the book after he wrote the screenplay). The cases when a movie based upon a book is better than a book itself are very rare in my opinion, the only example that I could think of right now is Forrest Gump. ------------- |
The T wrote:Posted By: Eetu Pellonpaa
Date Posted: April 02 2007 at 11:24
| I often like the version of which I see first, especially if it maks a big impression on me. F.Ex. "Solaris" and "Stalker" are better as films, as I was enchanted by the vision of Andrey Tarkovski, and the books felt quite flat after reading them with the memory of the film in my head. Also "Dune" works better me as Lynch's film than the book. |
Posted By: sleeper
Date Posted: April 02 2007 at 17:16
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I am definitely guilty of saying this on the few occaisions that I have seen a film and have read the literary source its from. Film can be an astounding mediem to convey ideas but I find only truly works best when using original ideas rather than those taken from a book. Basically a book can pack in more to get across the ideas and have them take far longer to progress, or to diverge down many different paths than a film can phisically do, unless you want a 12 hour film. I'm not saying that its impossible to get a book successfully converted to a film but it will always be an uphill struggle unless the source material isnt that good.
------------- Spending more than I should on Prog since 2005 
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Posted By: NutterAlert
Date Posted: April 02 2007 at 17:17
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Has to be Deep Throat, such a lovely book.
------------- Proud to be an un-banned member since 2005 |
Posted By: progismylife
Date Posted: April 02 2007 at 17:24
I see my name has changed to prog-"I'll die if I don't post 500 messagges every day-ismylife.  As the inspiration of this thread I am guilty of saying this. a lot. The reason I say this is because when I read a book I let my imagination run wild with enjoyment and picture it anyway I feel like it (sometimes very different images when rereading a book). Movies sort of hamper that process for me as the director has shown his view of the novel and most people accept it that way and don't give the book a chance to give a different perspective to how the author planned it. I enjoy the movies but I like being imaginative when reading books such as LOTR. It was a good adaptation of the movie and I liked it a lot (so much so that I got the special edition DVDs for all three movies and watched everything on them) |
Posted By: clarke2001
Date Posted: April 03 2007 at 13:05
With you on that. And the worst possible thing is, after you watched a movie, you are not able to imagine a scenery from a book in a different way any more! Somehow, your vision of the story will always be spoiled with the scenery from the movie, and that sucks.  ------------- |
Posted By: progismylife
Date Posted: April 03 2007 at 13:07
Yeah I know.  But if I abstain from stuff relating to the book I usually can get my imagination to work properly when I pick the book up again |
Posted By: VanderGraafKommandöh
Date Posted: April 03 2007 at 13:53
Don't forget Debbie Does Dallas.  -------------   
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Posted By: rockitmarty
Date Posted: April 04 2007 at 13:53
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[QUOTE=The T]By the way ben prog-"I'll die if I don't post 500 messagges every day-ismylife, this is not about your comment but it gave me the idea. Don't you people hate it when other people that just saw a movie based on a book say "oh, but the book was better"...wouldn't you say it is a ridiculous comparison, when you have two different artistic languages where things that work in one don't do so in the other and viceversa, when the resources and the "color palette" is totally different? When you adapt a movie from a book, the book ENDS the moment a screenplay based on it exists. The book is a separate entity from the movie, and sometimes for artistic purposes changes are made to the story in the book.
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Posted By: el böthy
Date Posted: September 19 2007 at 23:14
I liked the Lord of the rings better than the books... 
------------- "You want me to play what, Robert?" 
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Posted By: moreitsythanyou
Date Posted: September 19 2007 at 23:19
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Most blatant and striking example, the fifth Hary Potter Book. It wasn't even that strong to begin with, but the movie was an embarassment. -------------  <font color=white>butts, lol[/COLOR] |
Posted By: stonebeard
Date Posted: September 19 2007 at 23:21
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Dune. Dune. And more Dune
Oh, I almost forgot Dune. ------------- http://soundcloud.com/drewagler" rel="nofollow - My soundcloud. Please give feedback if you want! |
Posted By: bluetailfly
Date Posted: September 19 2007 at 23:50
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It depends on how the screen writer adapts the story to film. That is what will determine if the movie should be judged on its own merits.
If a screenwriter merely edits the story down and presents it in a straightfoward way, i.e., simply "illustrates" the written word with a camera like an unimaginative comic book, then the movie does allow for a comparison to the written work and those who know the written work can rightly say that the movie didn't do the book justice or whatever.
However, if the screen writer and director and cinematographer took the time to adapt the story--it's themes, motifs, character struggles, etc--artistically into cinematic language, then I believe the movie stands on it's own as an artistic work and a one-for-one comparison of the book to movie isn't really a relevant approach to judging the movie. ------------- "The red polygon's only desire / is to get to the blue triangle." |
Posted By: Sean Trane
Date Posted: September 20 2007 at 05:46
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the book is always better than the movie.
The only exception I can think of are
Stand By Me >> adaptation of Stephen King's The Body novella in Dofferent Seasons
Shawshank Redemption >> about as excellent as the novella also from the same book
The Shining is very different from the book, but poarticularly good as well. ------------- let's just stay above the moral melee prefer the sink to the gutter keep our sand-castle virtues content to be a doer as well as a thinker, prefer lifting our pen rather than un-sheath our sword |
Posted By: Shakespeare
Date Posted: September 20 2007 at 08:40
I was young when I read it...Didn't enjoy it to its full extent, didn't understand everything, and I totally forget most of it now. But my mom told me the movies were terrible so I never bothered to jog my memory that way... Oh yes, the books are always better, by a very large margin. Look at Harry Potter: BOOKS: WTF IS THIS TRASH?!?!?! MOVIES: *Chameleon's suicide smiley* |
Posted By: andu
Date Posted: September 20 2007 at 08:48
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I remember saying this on another thread dealing with the same subject
- we all must remember that a movie is not and can not be the
equivalent of a novel, because of the completely different amount of
"time and space" they can "contain". It's not fair comparing a movie to
a novel, and very few movies managed to have the complexity of a novel.
They are just to limited by constraints - it has often happened to me
to take a novel in hand and only leave it when finished, a day (or a
night) after. But who could ever sit through an 8 hours film? The film
is the equivalent of the short story (a novella). One example is "The
Duellists" - Joseph Conrad's story is superb, but Ridley Scott's film
is a masterpiece. We should also look for those great movies who are not based on famous books, of course it's difficult to surpass a great novel. Many of great films, however, are based on books that are not really that good - that's a good start for thinking of some examples. How many people would say "Heart of Darkness" (the book) is better that "Apocalypse Now" (the movie)? Anyone here read "The Leopard" and "Death in Venice"? I'm curious, as Visconti's films are incredible masterpieces. ------------- "PA's own GI Joe!" 
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Posted By: Raff
Date Posted: September 20 2007 at 08:52
I've read them both, and I would say that the movies are probably on a par with the books in terms of artistic quality. Mind you, the media are vastly different, so a comparison in terms of "better" and "worse" probably would not hold. Both books are great, but their visual translations are perfect. |
Posted By: cuncuna
Date Posted: September 20 2007 at 12:53
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Orlando. The movie is a good effort, though. Uhm... I saw a movie version of "El llano en llamas", but that was just anecdotic... it's impossible to pass that book to any other format. ------------- ¡Beware of the Bee! |
Posted By: Equality 7-2521
Date Posted: September 20 2007 at 18:11
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They may be apples and oranges but you can certainly compare them and
decide which you prefer. Nothing wrong with saying you find the book
better.
------------- "One had to be a Newton to notice that the moon is falling, when everyone sees that it doesn't fall. " |
Posted By: Dean
Date Posted: September 20 2007 at 18:27
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If you are talking about faithful translations of the printed word onto the screen then I think it is subjective - either the director shares your imagined images of the characters and events or he doesn't. I am willing to accept that they will have to change somethings and leave bits out to fit even the shortest novel into a 2 hour film (many of the great films were based upon short stories and novella's), but I tend to emit the "The Book Was Better" line if they change too much.
Case in point - War of the Worlds.  ------------- What? |
Posted By: Komodo dragon
Date Posted: September 20 2007 at 18:56
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sometimes the case is that the book is bad written and boring but movie is better and interesting, for example someones acting can be so good that cast aside how much story is badly shaped. what I am trying to say this two can collaborate and refill one another’s weak spaces and that is what fascinate me the most! ------------- 
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Posted By: sircosick
Date Posted: September 20 2007 at 22:12
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I simply cannot watch a movie having read the respective book before....
------------- The best you can is good enough... |
Posted By: fungusucantkill
Date Posted: September 20 2007 at 22:48
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Running with Scissors. Even though the movie was great, it didnt match up with the awesomenesstisity of the book -------------  
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Posted By: Man Overboard
Date Posted: September 21 2007 at 02:44
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Movies based on novels are almost universally appalling in comparison to the source material. To say otherwise reveals either a lack of imagination or a lack of ability to grasp the written word, it's as simple as that. Adding images where there were once none can only create entropy. Can you name a movie based on an album that stands above the album? Now, movies based on short stories have a better chance of success, if only because instead of compressing and truncating, they're expanding and interpreting. I generally cannot -finish- a movie based on a novel if I've previous read the novel. It feels like a horrible dub-job on a foreign film, the characters are always all wrong in my eyes. Is it because the characters -are- all wrong? Well, in today's Hollywood, probably But in the past, it was because what I got out of the book was much different than what the director did. Hell, I loathed the screen adaption of The Shining, and it's universally applauded.With that said... if any of you like the modern "I, Robot" film with Will Smith over the original book, you deserve to be put out of your sad, sad misery. I mean it. ------------- https://soundcloud.com/erin-susan-jennings" rel="nofollow - Bedroom guitarist". Composer, Arranger, Producer. Perfection may not exist, but I may still choose to serve Perfection. Commissions considered. |
Posted By: MikeEnRegalia
Date Posted: September 21 2007 at 03:27
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^ maybe a little more open-mindedness would do you good? I mean, you don't have to like movies about books, but to say that they're objectively bad just because they don't match *your* perception of the book ... BTW: How is interpreting and expanding adding any less entropia than interpreting and summarizing? ------------- https://awesomeprog.com/release-polls/pa" rel="nofollow - Release Polls Listened to: 
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Posted By: Sean Trane
Date Posted: September 21 2007 at 08:55
I'm the opposite!! I will probably never read the book if I saw the film before, no matter how different it is
I remember reading this trashy novel called "Cocaine and blue eyes", than (would you believe it) OJ "return to jail" Simpson did a film of this book. It was an exact copy of the book almost down to the last word >> stunk as bad as the book!!
Although I refuse to see TLOR movies, I'm glad I read the books. But there is no way I would've done it the other way: movies first and books next. ------------- let's just stay above the moral melee prefer the sink to the gutter keep our sand-castle virtues content to be a doer as well as a thinker, prefer lifting our pen rather than un-sheath our sword |
Posted By: Man Overboard
Date Posted: September 21 2007 at 13:42
I didn't say they were objectively bad because they didn't match -my- perception of the book... ...all one has to do is watch I, Robot, and wonder when Asimov's novel spent most of its pages describing product placement and making mass culture references. ------------- https://soundcloud.com/erin-susan-jennings" rel="nofollow - Bedroom guitarist". Composer, Arranger, Producer. Perfection may not exist, but I may still choose to serve Perfection. Commissions considered. |
Posted By: A B Negative
Date Posted: September 27 2007 at 11:37
Books are better than films for the same reason radio is better than TV: the pictures are better.  ------------- "The disgusting stink of a too-loud electric guitar.... Now, that's my idea of a good time." |
Posted By: Ghandi 2
Date Posted: September 28 2007 at 00:27
Hey, I love Heart of Darkness! I haven't seen Apocolypse Now, but Heart of Darkness is a damn good novella.
Using I, Robot as an example of why book movies suck isn't even fair. It's not even about the book! They just got the rights to the title, somehow.
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Posted By: Dean
Date Posted: October 01 2007 at 21:28
I am hoping that http://www.stardustmovie.com/ - Stardust is at least as good as the book. I've waited a long time to see a Neil Gaiman book translated to the big screen and don't want to be too disaponted. (The Dimmu Bogir track in the trailer is probably enough to keep me happy until it's released in the UK  )------------- What? |
Posted By: Zargus
Date Posted: October 02 2007 at 13:48
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Never seen a movie that was beter then the book. I hues it dpends if you read the book first and watch the movie after or the movie first and then read the book meby, i always read the book before i see the movie, and the movies are mostly good but never as good as the book was always to much left out. ------------- 
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