18 replies to this topic

[GENERAL]

Hello! I hated Harry Potter. It was good at the first few movies, but it just got worse. I have lost interest. Unforunate Events was good, I liked it. It was funny, but in the movie the wedding play was supposed to be before they moved into Monty's house. Otherwise, it would have been better. If you would like to say which book should be a movie, say it here or share your comments of the movies that are already out. I like books converted into movies, but the novels thay come out with for the movies are weird. Most have 8 SCREENSHOTS FROM THE MOTION PICTURE! or, the books into movies made after the movie is like NOW A FEATURE FILM! It's so annoying, I hate it. Post your say here. This is the third of the movie related topics that I have done, and probably I will find more so I could make a collection!

[fffanatics]

OK so i actually really like most movies that were made from books. First of all, both of the movies filmed from the book Dune are amazing. The older of the two, obviously is little but more out there but that has to do with the technology at the time the movie was filmed. However, the newer of the two follows the book amazingly close and is extremely well done.

Another good book made into movies was the Chronicals of Narnia. Before the one released by Disney the BBC release the first 6 books in movie form and they were really good. I grew up with them and i still love them (in fact i now have them in DVD). The Disney version also was really good since it was more realistic but it did change a few things which i didnt like but overall it still was good

Now, the Harry Potter movies. We all know the books are amazing but i would have to say that some of the movies were better than the others. Overall, the movies werent bad either but since the books were so long it was hard to make them exactly the same

Finally, there is the Lord of the Rings Trilogy. I would have to say these movies rocked just as much as the books. Thats about it.

[boyCradle]

I have not seen much movies based on the books, although most people like watching those kind because they could compare if the movies have been faithful to the versions from the book. They would usually react violently when the movie version is not as good or interesting as the book version.

While some would congratulate the directors and the screenplay for not following the book. They like it because the ending would be different, though not entirely, from that of the book's.

One of the from-the-book-movie coming is the The Da Vinci Code.

[Supai]

The only book into movie I think I've liked so far is LOTR, and only the first two. The third wasn't great. They lose some of their imaginative quality when transfered. You don't get inside the mind of the characters, get to know them or their relations with others as well, and you miss a ton of content.

Movies into books are just bad. They leave for a lack of imagination since they have some sort of basis they MUST go buy.

Now, books into TV series is GREAT, provided the writer of the series isn't intent on making it a series longer than the book provides for. They can capture it all in any amount of necessary time. You still lose a lot of the "in the mind" bit, but you don't lose any content. I wouldn't recommend watching it as a series if you didn't read the books fist. That way you already have an idea of what is going on in their minds.

[Janissary]

Movies to books are just... for money? ;)

Anyway, I only bought StarWars books (not extended universe but movie books) becasue Im a fan :)

But, I felt like reading the movie script... not a book feeling... what a waste of my money...

LotR is a great movie, a great convert (I agree, not the 3rd one)
But, PeterJackson added somethings that against Tolkien's world,
such as Gimli being a fool or Elves coming in aid to HelmDeep :(

I havent read Harry Potter and only watched 1st two movies.

Do you know Stephen King's Dark Tower serie... That book can be a great TV serie...
Like you know Hercules or Xena but with a deeper story line not pure action :)

[CinnamorollTK]

Many times when movies are based on a book, the movie does not end up like the book did. One book (which I cannot remember the title of) was made into a movie that so many people loved. The only ones who seemed to hate it were the ones who read the book and saw the movie afterward. They complained that the movie was nothing like the book and should have been changed. I later found out the author just signed a few papers and wasn't involved in the movie while it was being made. Maybe it is just about the money for most of them so they don't care if their book is completely reveresed when it is made into a movie.

[grnjd]

Books to movies are horrible and so is movies to books. I think they should just leave it the way it is. But heard from somewhere that they are making a da vinci movie out of the book. They said that it was pretty good too. The thing that I hate about these conversions is that, if you read or saw anyone of those, you begin to expect certin things which the directors won't put in. That just makes the conversion unwatch/readable.

[Janissary]

Have you read "I, Robot"?
Have you watch "I, Robot"?




Similitiries between them:
Title
Robots

[dark_drgn]

HArry potty i think is overated, what happened to all the other stories about wizards and magic, what is so special about Harry Potter that everyone lines up to get the book and wait there overnight. The book is pretty long but isn't exactly that special, the movie's are pretty horrible too with bad actors

[Janissary]

When I watched 2nd HarryPoter movie, I know very little about it.

So, I thought HayriPitir has some unique talent about magic, or sort

but in that movie he only did one simple spell, and he fought the lizard with sword !

That really made me laugh

[josemariallovet]

Normally, movies made after very good books disappoint me. For example, "The Count of Montecristo" was really awful. If I had not read the book, pehaps I would have found it different. I beleive there are books that most remain as books, because making a good movie about them is impossible. Making a good movie about "The Karamazovi Brothers" would be a superhuman task. Also a movie about the Divine Comedy..., the Illiad, etc.

[FolkRockFan]

The Harry Potter books are much better than the movies, IMO. I prefer reading over watching movies anyway, though, so I suppose that I'm a little biased here

"Fried Green Tomatoes" is a fantastic movie. It's one of my favorites, in fact. The novel is awesome too. I honestly can't decide which version I prefer. The movie basically follows Fannie Flagg's novel, but there are some differences in the subplot. But at least in this case the screenplay wasn't a mashed up, mangled version of the book.

I saw "Field of Dreams" a bunch of times before I read the book ("Shoeless Joe"). I have to say that, in this case, the movie is a lot better than the novel. Kinsella (author) doesn't do well with dialogue. The story itself is fine, though - as long as nobody talks

Most of the older Stephen King movies are utter garbage. I enjoyed the movie versions of "Misery" (with Kathy Bates), "The Green Mile" and "The Shawshank Redemption," though. There are a bunch that I haven't watched, but I'm in no hurry to get around to them.

Alfred Hitchcock's film version of "Psycho" was even better than Robert Bloch's novel. Really. I rarely say that, but in this case it's true. Hitchcock did amazing, fantastic things with that story. The novel rocks, yeah, as do the sequels that Bloch wrote, but man...that black-and-white movie...wow. (The newer version stinks, though.)

[Misanthrope]

For the most part, I'm usually disappointed by the big screen interpretation of the written word, especially from book format. As an example, I found Ann Rice's, "Interview with a Vampire" failed miserably as a film, though I totally devoured it as a book. I do own this DVD and enjoy it on it's own merit; I just don't expect it accurately represent the book. There are, however, a few exceptions. Most notably JR Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy. Somehow, this previously unknown production team managed to beautifully execute the spirit of Tolkien's work in one of the most incredible visual spectacles I've ever witnessed. It's one of the few films I can watch repeatedley for the imagery alone.

But generally, I guess you could say I feel the same way about books made to film as I do about musical pieces put to video. Who is the monster that created MTV? There is something so diabolical about removing the individual's own musical imaging and replacing it with the vile content usually so prevalent on MTV.

[Zlash]

The Harry Potter movies aren't really great, but I like them. I like the books more of course, but the movies aren't too bad. They are entertaining and it's a good movie to watch when you just want to relax with friends and dont want to think about figuring out a riddle in the movie. The movies skip a lot of things that happend in the books, it's to shorten them down, but sometimes they skip important stuff: like in the third harry potter book he meets Cho Chang for the first time, but in the movies it doesn't happend(as far I can remember?).

The Lord of the Rings movies are better than the books actually. Tolkien really made the books boring with the long dialogs which lasts ten pages each chapter. The movies cut down the boring parts and magnify the exciting events. I didn't like the second movie. It was really boring. The first and the third movies were great. I can't decide which of the movies I like best.

The Lord of the Rings is a bit "thinking-movie" but Harry Potter isn't. If you just wan't to watch a movie without following that much Harry Potter would be a better choice.

[elrohir]

== If you enjoy movies, stop reading now ==
First of all, I have to say that I hate it when the turn a perfectly good book into a film. They pretty much always suck.

I'm going to use fantasy in examples, since that's what I have the most experience with.

Since Harry Potter seems to be popular, I might as well start with that. First of all, I hate Harry Potter and everything the damn brat has done to what was once a good genre. It isn't fantasy, it's the product of a sick donkey's back side. After someone went and stepped in it. The quality of makes me wonder why on earth something like that would gain so much support all over the place. Yes, I had a time when I liked it all as well. When I was what? Ten? Is this forum filled with a load of ten year olds or what? So, we have established that Harry Potter and all his little wand-waving cronies are purely the result of mass hysteria, and to be completely ignored by nobody except myself. (Yes, that was on purpose).
The Harry Potter films were good considering what they were made of, but pretty damn sad otherwise. Just for the laughs, bash has the greatest quote of all time

Another one that a few lonely souls had actually heard of was LoTR. The book's not all that bad, even though the characters are not that well developed, and there is no character development during the actual story. But then, Tolkien was more of a historian (more accurately, philologist) than a psychologist. Tolkien's books were decent, even without decent characters. But the films kind of ruined it, didn't they? (oh, btw, I'm not sure that 10 year olds should be watching such violent material alone - I hope you had your mums with you) There was so much they could have kept in and refrained from adding that would have given the whole thing so much more. But I suppose not everybody is in the business for the joy of the literature, are they...

The most classic example is Eragon. The books were not too bad, if odd at certain moments, but hey, it was good in general. And then there's the film. I have never in my life seen a worse rendition of a piece of literature (King Arthur comes close, but they didn't exactly have more than a myth to work on, so they are entitled at least some artistic license). Eragon had nothing to do with artistic license. That is called Macabre Mutilation of Honestly Written Literature. If I had the chance I would happily insert a large sharp object into everyone who had a hand in getting the mutant script to where it went. Fox should be violated anally for what they did.

All in all, I don't think any book should suffer the insult of being turned into the lesser life form of "movie" unless the creator of the film actually enjoyed the book and loves it the way you can only love a book... Please, don't take that the wrong way... And it's clear that most directors, screen-writers, etc go into it because they love movies (well, it makes sense, no?) rather than the books they want to copy so much.

Even they seem to realise that they can't come up with a decent plot, and I wonder whey they can't. Might it perhaps be because while an author devotes more to what he/she creates than, from all appearances, a director does. (Yes, I know, the director doesn't always have autonomous rights to what goes in, blah, blah, blah) There are books that have been worked on for years on end, and that time is spent making something beautiful beyond the scale of any movie. That's something I have never seen, and doubt I will ever see from the film industry, simply because it's an industry, rather than a devotion.

So, that's why I don't like films created from books, nor films created from the void cavity in a screenwriter's head. Now for books created from films.

Since movies created from thin air are by default almost terrible, it's safe to assume that no book created from it will be much better, unless the book is altered from the movie so drastically that the book's writer might as well publish it as a completely independent work. So there. Movie lovers be gone. Your time was in the 90's.

== Ok, you can start reading now ==

[CrashCore]

For the most part, I think they do a pretty good job putting books into movies. I didn't read the Harry Potter books but like the movies, and I have heard that they don't do them justice. But, I know specifically that Narnia was pretty awesome and stuck to the book pretty well. I can tell you one time where I was really pissed though, and that was the DaVinci Code. It was so good and stuck so well to the book until the last half hour. They TOTALLY changed the ending, mixing around the order that things happened, combining scenes, and ending it completely different from the book. Sometimes I hate Hollywood--they can really ruin great literature.

[Evolke]

I prefer Books converted into movies. Hands down. I find that movies converted into books result in a poorly written story. Most of the text relies on the reader having seen the movie to create the visual image, and the conversations are useless. I also find that if I see the movie then read a book about it, I already have an image of the characters. I think its better for the reader to create their perseption of the characters then its always interesting comparing them to those in he movie.

[Ashara]

I dislike watching films of books I know. Mostly because I know that if I do watch them that I will start complaining when parts are missed out, or bits are changed (you should have heard me when I first watched the first Harry Potter film ) I also know that the film would probably annoy my own perspective of the book that it originated from, which is something I also try to avoid.

Likewise I try to avoid the book that films (or tv series) is based on because all I see is the show/film characters playing the roles, which can sometimes distort the descriptions of the events in the book.

[onscreen]

So much of Harry Potter and no talk about Narnia and Golden Compass? IMO, book adaption into movies is something demanding since visual experience can be different with reading books as not many love to read a 400 pages paperback. Still it did be really interesting to see how will they tell their version of story with those fictional characters that is based from the books.

I have no say on Harry Potter as i only watched the movies but not reading the books but i would have to say Golden Compass really did a great job in the book to movie adaption. Though it have some discontinuity between the book's story and the movie but still 90% similarity could content the book reader who watched the movie.