Books that just can't make a movie

[cacian]

what books would you say will not make a movie and why?

[PeterL]

I was going to suggest Finnegans Wake, but it might be a better movie than a book.

[cacian]

I was going to suggest Finnegans Wake, but it might be a better movie than a book.

Well if the book is more then complex how would a film/movie make it less so?

[rootinghog]

As a matter of fact, there was an attempt at filming FW with the 1966 Passages from James Joyce's Finnegans Wake, which you can stream here (http://www.ubu.com/film/joyce_wake.html). No idea how that turned out, but it looks intriguing...

My mind always jumps to Gravity's Rainbow as the ultimate unfilmable novel, despite the fact that so much of its structure is rooted in film technique. It's just so all over the place... but perhaps it could work as a serialized (and insanely expensive) television show?

[dfloyd]

They tried to make a movie about a movie being made about Tristram Shandy but it was awful.

[Desolation]

Malone Dies by Samuel Beckett, or almost anything by Beckett for that matter.
In Search of Lost Time by Proust
War and Peace by Tolstoy...I know it's been done a million times, but it's next to impossible to do it right.

I'm tempted to say Notes from Underground by Dostoevsky. But, I actually saw a wonderful indie version on Youtube not long ago.
http://youtu.be/SBmdCFS2cOg

[cacian]

As a matter of fact, there was an attempt at filming FW with the 1966 Passages from James Joyce's Finnegans Wake, which you can stream here (http://www.ubu.com/film/joyce_wake.html). No idea how that turned out, but it looks intriguing...

My mind always jumps to Gravity's Rainbow as the ultimate unfilmable novel, despite the fact that so much of its structure is rooted in film technique. It's just so all over the place... but perhaps it could work as a serialized (and insanely expensive) television show?

Interesting.
Well it has been made into a song by the Klaxons or shall I say they named a song that title.

[cacian]

They tried to make a movie about a movie being made about Tristram Shandy but it was awful.

LOL that sounds awfull the concept is strange..haha.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

You can make a movie out of any book. The question is can you make a good movie out of any book. I think the answer is no.

[PeterL]

Malone Dies by Samuel Beckett, or almost anything by Beckett for that matter.
In Search of Lost Time by Proust
War and Peace by Tolstoy...I know it's been done a million times, but it's next to impossible to do it right.


In Search of Lost Time by Proust would be interesting, but I don't think that I couls it through it.

I have been told that the full version of War and Peace that was done in the 1970's in Russia was quite good, if you are into such things.

[PeterL]

Then there are novels that should make good movies that didn't work in the forms that they were filmed. Lolit is the prime example, but Conjure Wife by Fritz Leiber has been filmed three times, and everyone was a perfect flp, because they strayed too far from the novel. That probably is why Lolita was not a good movie.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

There's a certain poster here who think the film version of Lolita is better than the book. I've never seen the film, so I can't judge.

[PeterL]

There's a certain poster here who think the film version of Lolita is better than the book. I've never seen the film, so I can't judge.

I didn't think much of the film. It seemed to lack wit. I supposethat there are light witted people who might prefer the movie.

[The Comedian]

I'd hate to see Walden, the movie! Guy builds house, guy plays flute, guy hoes beans, guy watches some ants, guy leaves house.

[Delta40]

I would say the movie Kung Pow would never make a book!

[Prince Smiles]

I'd hate to see Walden, the movie! Guy builds house, guy plays flute, guy hoes beans, guy watches some ants, guy leaves house.


LOL! That's funny!

[Calidore]

In Search of Lost Time by Proust would be interesting, but I don't think that I couls it through it.

I have been told that the full version of War and Peace that was done in the 1970's in Russia was quite good, if you are into such things.

I've seen generally good reviews of two adaptations of War & Peace: The seven-hour Russian one (1967, actually), and the twenty-hour BBC serialization.

Some books are hard to film because they don't work visually. One example would be William Gibson's Neuromancer. Another that comes to mind is Robert Arthur's excellent ghost story "Footsteps Invisible", which is told in the first-person by a blind man. That one would make a good radio play, though.

[Scheherazade]

http://images.scholastic.co.uk/assets/a/bb/6a/118353-ml-66258.jpg

[PeterL]

I'd hate to see Walden, the movie! Guy builds house, guy plays flute, guy hoes beans, guy watches some ants, guy leaves house.

Thanks, that was the best laugh I've had today.

It might work, if it were done right. H. D. would come across as a complete lunatic, but it could have some funny bits.

[dysfunctional-h]

I would say Absalom, Absalom! or The Sound and the Fury, but then again pretty much anything stream-of-consciousness is off-limits. XD

Lolita would loose all of its charm if it was made into a movie, that's for sure.

[stlukesguild]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQ_QWILupjA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3a8Ja2GH4eE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDOHPhGortI

The movie's not all that bad... that is the Stanley Kubrick version. It is, after all, by Stanley Kubrick with James Mason, Shelley Winters, and Peter Sellars... music by Nelson Riddle and screenplay by Nabokov himself. But there's no way the film can measure up to the book, which is surely one of the most brilliant and perfect novels ever written.

[Prince Smiles]

Re: Lolita


But there's no way the film can measure up to the book, which is surely one of the most brilliant and perfect novels ever written.


Totally agree with you there. And to think, English wasn't even his native tongue. All those references to butterflies in his work and a vocabulary that puts us mere mortals to shame.

I remember picking up Pale Fire and thinking, this is a small book, I'll knock it out in a weekend. Pale Fire took me months to read and I still haven't got the foggiest notion what it is about! :smile5:

[Trask]

I don't think it's possible to make a movie better than the book or close to as good as the book. I'm interested in seeing how "The Great Gatsby" turns out

[hazelk]

The original movie was just wonder, as close to the novel as could be, brilliant casting.

http://i564.photobucket.com/albums/ss87/kpie2010/great_gatsby.jpg

[dysfunctional-h]

The other thing is that oftentimes movies based on books are good in and of themselves (and if you ignore the implicit moral problem), but are gross misrepresentations of the books they were based upon. Such was the case with both Kubrick's The Shining and A Clockwork Orange, and, apparently, the new Jane Eyre film. Such is most often the case with such complex, difficult fiction. But when a book is more straight-forward, and uses more general techniques of communicating a sentiment, such as symbolism (as opposed to more writing specific techniques such as changing syntax or prose style used in books like Huck Finn), then they usually can be made into a movie without the loss of the emotional power of the original.

[Jair]

The Anatomy of Melancholy.

[Whifflingpin]

The Lord of the Rings

[FranzS]

The Lord of the Rings

To be honest, I thought the films were better than the book. It's a great story, and I enjoyed reading it when I was 12, but going back to it recently I felt Tolkien's prose left a lot to be desired.

[FranzS]

I don't think it's possible to make a movie better than the book or close to as good as the book.

Not sure about this.

Some reviewers reckoned the movie of "The Talented Mr. Ripley" was better than the book. I haven't read the book, but I was blown away by the film. Brilliant acting and direction, superb dialogue, and incredibly suspenseful - in competition with "Vertigo" as the best thriller ever produced, in my humble opinion. One of the most underrated films ever made.

[hawthorns]

Not sure about this.

Some reviewers reckoned the movie of "The Talented Mr. Ripley" was better than the book. I haven't read the book, but I was blown away by the film. Brilliant acting and direction, superb dialogue, and incredibly suspenseful - in competition with "Vertigo" as the best thriller ever produced, in my humble opinion. One of the most underrated films ever made.

Absoutely! Vertigo is maybe the greatest ever made. So is its Wagnerian like soundtrack.

I also agree that certain films have equalled or even bettered their literary counterparts, even those where you wouldn't expect it because the novels were so good. Here's a few just off the top of my head that are debatably so:

The Foresyte Saga--probably my favorite piece of film
Brideshead Revisited--The Jeremy Irons version, of course
Sherlock Holmes--Jeremy Brett was INCREDIBLE
I, Claudius
The Godfather II
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy--Alec Guinness
Smiley's People

The English Patient
A River Runs Through It
Apollo 13
Raging Bull
Shadowlands
The Bridge On the River Kwai
Schindler's List
The Shawshank Redemption

[FranzS]

Brideshead Revisited--The Jeremy Irons version, of course


I'd place the TV series and the book as equal. Saw the series first - loved it (despite being pre-pubescent); read the book - loved it; watched the series again - loved it.

"Brideshead" lent itself exceptionally well to film, because so much of it was dialogue. But they got the casting absolutely perfect.

I was surprised how short the book was - and yet it has exactly the same epic quality as the series.

[hawthorns]

I'd place the TV series and the book as equal. Saw the series first - loved it (despite being pre-pubescent); read the book - loved it; watched the series again - loved it.

"Brideshead" lent itself exceptionally well to film, because so much of it was dialogue. But they got the casting absolutely perfect.

I was surprised how short the book was - and yet it has exactly the same epic quality as the series.

Yeah that series was amazing, as was the book. Cast, director, music, scenery, everything. I got the 25th Anniversary Collector's Edition for Christmas. I could just bathe in Waugh's beautiful prose. It would be hard to put one over the other because practically every line of dialogue and narration is taken verbatim from the novel. Remember Nickolas Grace as Anthony Blanche? That was one of the best acting performances I've ever seen. Incidentally, my favorite line in the novel was also my favorite in the series (5:20-6:20):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1S3LBDT3vk&feature=results_video&playnext=1&list=PL512090F8A7A9DBAA

I love the way memory, music, military backdrop, and tragedy all seem to converge in one scene. That's great film making.

[Calidore]

I liked the I, Claudius novels quite a lot; haven't seen the TV series yet.

I read at least one critic who thought the L.A. Confidential film was better than the novel, just by trimming the fat and slow bits.

I can easily say that Harlan Coben's novel Tell No One was okay, but the French film adaptation was tremendous.

[Calidore]

Almost forgot Jaws. The book had lots of fluff and padding that the movie simply ignored.