ITT we chit chat about "The Books" vs. "The Movies"
 

I've only read two books that later came out as movies. Pet Sematary, and Misery. Pet Sematary was very similar to the movie, which I loved. When I read Misery, I enjoyed the book, but when the movie came out, I actually thought the movie was more gruesome than the book. Most people I've talked to about Misery said the opposite. I mean, I think the book was more suspenseful, but the movie was just more "painful"?

I really like Stephen King books, and I've heard that "Christine" the book was better than the movie. I thought the movie was awful which is why I never read the book.

What about you? Are there any movies you've seen that were based on a book or vice versa? Comparison?

Virgin Suicides is a good movie. Virgin Suicides is a FREAKING INCREDIBLE AWESOME book.

There have been lots of bad book to movie translations, but the worst I can think of has to be Endless Love. It was turned into a vehicle for Brooke Shields and her "talents" when the book was really more about the boy...plus they changed the time period, got rid of all the stuff about his parents being Communists, etc etc etc. I'd love to see someone try to redo it and stay true to the book, which is one of my favorites and has a writing style unlike anything else.

I'm an avid reader, and I make sure to read the books before the movies...which generally ruins the movies for me, but whatever.
-All the King's Men (the movie) is awful compared to ATKM (the book). Not the most exciting book in general, but a great piece of literature compared to the movie. I had such high hopes for it too
-Hunt for Red October followed the book fairly closely
-the Bourne books and the movies are great in their own ways. Books are much more detailed and lengthy than the movies, but the movies make you notice things the books don't emphasize

I loved the Hunger Games book series, but seriously didn't like the movie. The character of Peeta did nothing but stand around with his mouth open. I really think they should have did a voice over and it would have helped tremendously.

The best best EVER is The Princess Bride. Both the book and the movie are awesome. But William Goldman very wisely heavily adapted his own book. While it has obvious similarities he changed the screenplay in significant ways in order to make the movie as great as it is.
While the author may not agree with me, I really liked The Shining in both forms.
The First Wives Club was a FANTASTIC book that was made into an appalling movie. Really if you're going to make a movie from a book that is partially about a middle aged woman coming to terms with realizing she's a lesbian, you probably shouldn't edit that part out. The movie really made no sense once it was turned into a chick flick instead of a really dark really hard core revenge piece. This was no rom com vehicle for 4 middle aged actresses. And thus it bombed. The same author did a book called Flavor of the Month. It's also really interesting and REALLY bizarre. I'd love to see it on film, but it will never happen because of the subject matter.
Of course, the most recent example, and a favorite book of mine is Team of Rivals by our favorite Tri Delta Doris Kearns-Goodwin, and the movie Lincoln. It's only loosely based on her book, but I still loved both pieces.

I thought it was a fairly good adaption, but thry did have the POV issue to address which they did mostly well I think.

I think that would be a FANTASTIC film!

@cheerfulgreek: you need to read "Christine". The movie was unbelievably awful and I hated it so much that I didn't read the book until my mom kept bugging me about it. But the book.....let's just say that I didn't think a book about a possessed Plymouth could scare the isht out of me but it did!!!

I thought it was a very good adaptation, too, as did son, who typically hates what happens to books when they're adapted to movies. Don't get him, or me, started on how badly adapted Percy Jackson-The Lightening Thief or Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows were.

Then there's the movie of Ian Fleming's Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, where about the only thing the two stories have in common is the flying car.

I guess that when I think of really good adaptations, To Kill a Mockingbird is the first movie to come to mind.

I don't see many movies, but I've been disappointed so often by movies where I've read the book that I often now actively avoid the movie. Either they leave out my favorite part, or it's so different than the scene was in my mind's eye that I'm irked, or the actors look and sound nothing like they did in my mind's eye. It is for this reason that I've read all of the Harry Potters, but haven't seen a frame of the movies. I know what those characters look and sound like; I'll just be mad when Chris Columbus or whoever gets it wrong (by my standards).

But the works where I've read the book and seen the movie include:

*Romeo and Juliet
*To Kill a Mockingbird
*A Separate Peace
*The Firm
*The Pelican Brief
*The Rainmaker
*The Client
*Girl, Interrupted (this one fell victim to ALL of the above. I disagreed with the casting, they left out my favorite parts, and they got the ones wrong they did include. Sigh.)
*The Color Purple
*Anne of Green Gables
*Little Women
*Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood
*Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil

I'm sure there are others, but those come to mind.

A work where I've seen the movie but haven't read the book:

*The Princess Bride. I have the book and got about 10 pages in, and was bored to tears. But I LOVE the movie and know every line.

I thought the twilight series was a pretty good adaptation (still haven't seen the last installment yet). It was pretty faithful to the books.

Are you talking about the original ATKM movie w/ Broderick Crawford or the remake with Sean Penn? Because yes, the remake blows.

That's yet another category. Little Women, eeeesh. The Katharine Hepburn version wasn't bad but the latest one was RIDICULOUS. Winona Ryder sitting around whining about how ugly she is and she's going to be an old maid was asinine. Don't get me started on Marmee the feminist.

This is what so many people have told me. I'm convinced now, so I'm going to the library today to borrow it, and read it. If it's that different than the movie (which was awful) then I'll take your work for it and start reading it today. Thanks for the recommendation, KillarneyRose. :)

lol
Same here, this is so true for me.

I've never really paid attention, but what usually comes out first, the book or the movie? It's just that I'll see a movie, not even knowing there ever was a book out about it. Or I'll see a book on the shelf at the bookstore, not knowing it's based on a previous movie that was already out.

In my experience, it's rare to see a book that's based on a movie. I couldn't think of any off the top of my head and I tried to Google but came up with nothing. Often, when a book is made into a movie, the book is rereleased with new cover art which depicts the actors or a scene from the movie so that new readers are more likely to link the two. Maybe that's what you're thinking of?

Is anyone else excited about "The Great Gatsby" coming out this summer? "Gatsby" is my alltime favorite book. I've heard that Leonardo DiCaprio does an incredible job as Gatsby. I'll absolutely see it but I'm not getting my hopes up after sitting through the 2001 version that featured Mira Sorvino galloping through the movie as the etheral Daisy Buchanan.

Slightly different, but what about adaptions of comics/ video games. I've only seen one video game movie that was good, though a couple of comic movies weren't bad.

Less than Zero. I really liked the book. I really hated the movie.

Yep. This is exactly what I'll see when I go to the bookstore. I'll see the book with the actors from the movie on the cover. Thanks for clearing that up.

I saw Silent Hill which I thought was awful, but I think I remember reading that it was based on a video game or something like that. I'm not sure if there is a series of comic books on it.

And I just left the library to see if they had Christine. I used to see that book there whenever I would go to the library, and now that I really want to read it, someone else has it checked out.

A high school librarian recommended this freshman read Carrie when it came out in 1974. Fascinatingly terrifying! So eerie/cool that it was (then) set in the future.

Didn't see Spacek movie until it was on tv in the 80s. Book way better.

I have never wanted to read any other Stephen King books.

I saw the movie, but I never read the book. I dunno, I just didn't think the movie was scary at all, and I could be wrong, but I think that was Stephen King's best selling book. Maybe the book is better than the movie?

I've read the book and loved it, but I've never seen the movie... but I also thought Stephen King's "It" was a better book than movie. It was really creepy!!

Yep, I saw IT, too. But, I've never read the book. I didn't like the movie as much as I thought I would, but I did have nightmares about the creepy clown, though. :o

I wish they would start making movies based on Dean Koontz books, if they haven't already.

The problem with most of Stephen King's books is they are terrifying, but it's mostly mental, and that's hard to convert to the screen. I still stand by the directive that if your friend knocks on your bedroom window in the middle of the night DO NOT LET HIM IN. And if you happen to be on a 2nd floor or above, SERIOUSLY DO NOT LET HIM IN. I wouldn't sleep facing a window for YEARS after reading Salem's Lot. The movie, while I enjoyed it at the time, didn't have anywhere near that kind of affect on me. But then few movies stick with me like books do. One major exception, After Hours, which caused anxiety in me (literal anxiety) for days after seeing it alone at the theatre as part of a class assignment. I don't know if there was a book associated with that very weird dark comedy.

Actually Silent Hill is considered to be one of the better Video Game based movies because of how true to the series it is, unlike say Resident Evil.

Dolores Claiborne is actually a good character study. The movie was ok.

I didn't like the movie Christine, but this part of the movie really creeped me out. I mean, just the old 50s music, the engine sound, and the movie music was terrifying, to me. If the entire book can top that scene, then I might be too scared to read it. :o

Stephen King is truly a horror movie genius.

I loved the book Cujo, but the meaning was totally lost in the movie. In the book, he gives us the viewpoint of the dog, which was brilliant and fascinating. In the movie, you don't know what the dog is thinking and it loses it's genius.

The remake. The original is great...I had high hopes for the remake with Sean Penn. But that was a big ol' smelly turd

I'll have to place Cujo on the "books to read list", because I loved the movie.

I missed that one. I liked the Robert Redford/Mia Farrow version.

Whenever possible, I try to read the book before seeing the movie. I honestly can't think of any movie version that I liked better than its book counterpart. Many times, after seeing the movie, I'll think, "If I had seen that before reading the book, I doubt I would have had any interest in reading it." Most recent case in point: The Hunger Games. I really liked the book. And because I enjoyed the book so much, I found the movie version disappointing.

I'm really looking forward to Ender's Game. I absolutely love that book, and I hope the movie does it justice.

KR - I saw a preview for The Great Gatsby recently, and it looks pretty good! I'll probably actually see this version, despite the fact that Nick is played by Tobey Maguire. (The Nick in my head, although still young, sounds wiser than what I think Tobey can pull off. But, I'll try to reserve judgment until I've seen the movie.)

Ummmm....Isla Fisher as Myrtle. WHAT WHAT. God knows the 1974 version had issues but Karen Black in that part was not one of them, she nailed it.

Then again if it's anything like Leo's performance in The Aviator he'll blow everyone off the screen anyway so it's not really going to matter.

Wait....Isla Fisher as Myrtle? I did not know this. I really can't see that. Myrtle smolders. Isla, well, Isla bubbles.

I'm also not feeling the guy who is playing Tom. They should get someone who is actually good looking to do it for once.

Oh and Jack Nicholson as Meyer Wolfsheim please. LOL

I've got a soft spot for all of the Little Women films. I love them all, no matter how bad they might be. Having said that, I generally re-read Little Women every year, and even keep copies on my phone and iPad in case I need a fix.

Along Came a Spider and Kiss the Girls by James Patterson. Great books. AWFUL movies.

In the books, Alex Cross is a younger guy, with two kids, whose wife passed away, and he lives with his grandmother. In the movies, he's played by (a much older) Morgan Freeman and there is no mention of family at all. The character is just completely different.

The movies sucked, and I believe one of them ended in an entirely different way than the book. I'm never a fan of such big changes between the two.

I haven't read Kiss the Girls, but I loved the movie.

I've read all the HP and HG books. I think the HP books were done pretty well. I actually liked HG but I'm wondering (hoping) that they do Catching Fire the justice it deserves (as I LOVED that book).

I loved the book A Time to Kill and except for one minor part when Brigance is fired as the lawyer for like 5 chapters, the movie followed the book pretty much to the T.

I loved the Percy Jackson books HATED the movie! It was more a movie "based loosely off" of the book. It was so bad.

The Twilight books were good. Preferred the ending of Breaking Dawn part 2 movie than the book, as I felt the book was a HUGE let down.

Agreed. The movie of The Firm, on the other hand, totally screwed up the ending. So disappointing.

Has anyone seen Ender's Game yet? Just wondering how it compares to the book...

Fried Green Tomatoes. A fine movie, but an AMAZING book.

The book has so much more texture and depth, and it has so many story lines that the movie just can't touch.

That said, not a terrible movie - but the book is just so much better!