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Post by hengest on Apr 23, 2022 19:03:29 GMT -5
Does anyone have a favorite adaptation? I mean novels adapted into movies, but also anything adapted creatively / well from one medium to another.
I will post later, but want to give someone else first crack at the thread.
(This can be moved sometime, of course).
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Post by The Perilous Dreamer on Apr 23, 2022 23:39:58 GMT -5
Hmm, I will have to give this some thought. Two that come to mind are The Wizard of Oz and The Princess Bride. Both are excellent, for The Wizard of Oz, I mean the original. Another great one is MASH and I am fond of the LotR. Another that I loved it The Bridge Over the River Kwai. Yeah, I don't have one favorite. I have to mention One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, scary good, as is The Silence of the Lambs. I cannot leave out AND THEN THERE WERE NONE.
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Post by The Semi-Retired Gamer on Apr 24, 2022 19:04:26 GMT -5
Good topic! Some of my favorite adaptations include the Peter Jackson Lord of the Rings trilogy. I really enjoyed the films and don't mind watching them just about any time. On the other hand, I did not enjoy The Hobbit trilogy. I know Jackson was involved with both, but I thought the adaptation of The Hobbit was way over the top and too "video-gamey" in many of the action spots. I much prefer the older animated version of The Hobbit; is it the Rankin-Bass version? It might be mostly nostalgia from my youth, but I think it was better than the live-action version. I remember the local PBS station used to play it during the summer and on some weekends throughout the year.
I'm sure there are more but I'm going to think on it...
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Post by hengest on Apr 24, 2022 19:18:25 GMT -5
Good topic! Some of my favorite adaptations include the Peter Jackson Lord of the Rings trilogy. I really enjoyed the films and don't mind watching them just about any time. On the other hand, I did not enjoy The Hobbit trilogy. I know Jackson was involved with both, but I thought the adaptation of The Hobbit was way over the top and too "video-gamey" in many of the action spots. I much prefer the older animated version of The Hobbit; is it the Rankin-Bass version? It might be mostly nostalgia from my youth, but I think it was better than the live-action version. I remember the local PBS station used to play it during the summer and on some weekends throughout the year. I'm sure there are more but I'm going to think on it... I agree with you about the live-action The Hobbit 100%. I think in the first ten minutes, I was somewhat taken in, and thought the movie might be really good. Then my expectations were dashed. Apart from the video-gamey parts, which I thought did not fit at all and were unpleasant to watch, I found that some of the dramatic choices made no sense at all to me. For example, the very opening of the film showed Bilbo writing his memoir. Within that memoir, the first thing we see is the dwarves under the Lonely Mountain. Then it cuts to young Bilbo hanging out before meeting Gandalf. Then, later, some dwarf tells the story of...the dwarf-kingdom under the Lonely Mountain. Why did they give this away and then just have it mentioned when we already know it? It made no sense. Bilbo is the viewpoint character, if there is one, and it's way more interesting to learn something with the protagonist than it is just to learn it out of nowhere, no possibility of caring, then have it mentioned again later on so that the protagonist knows it, too. A change from the presentation in the book that made the movie worse. I can't see any way of justifying this. Maybe someone thought "just opening with someone sitting around is too flat?" But why? A movie can start out idyllic and then that leads into adventure. (A friend who knows about horses remarked that the party of dwarves neglected to take the bits out of the horses' mouths even when they were clearly stopped for the night. She said this was definitely an error on the filmmakers' part and meant that the horses couldn't eat. I mention this not to condemn the movie but simply to mention it.) |
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Post by The Semi-Retired Gamer on Apr 24, 2022 19:31:42 GMT -5
Good topic! Some of my favorite adaptations include the Peter Jackson Lord of the Rings trilogy. I really enjoyed the films and don't mind watching them just about any time. On the other hand, I did not enjoy The Hobbit trilogy. I know Jackson was involved with both, but I thought the adaptation of The Hobbit was way over the top and too "video-gamey" in many of the action spots. I much prefer the older animated version of The Hobbit; is it the Rankin-Bass version? It might be mostly nostalgia from my youth, but I think it was better than the live-action version. I remember the local PBS station used to play it during the summer and on some weekends throughout the year. I'm sure there are more but I'm going to think on it... I agree with you about the live-action The Hobbit 100%. I think in the first ten minutes, I was somewhat taken in, and thought the movie might be really good. Then my expectations were dashed. Apart from the video-gamey parts, which I thought did not fit at all and were unpleasant to watch, I found that some of the dramatic choices made no sense at all to me. For example, the very opening of the film showed Bilbo writing his memoir. Within that memoir, the first thing we see is the dwarves under the Lonely Mountain. Then it cuts to young Bilbo hanging out before meeting Gandalf. Then, later, some dwarf tells the story of...the dwarf-kingdom under the Lonely Mountain. Why did they give this away and then just have it mentioned when we already know it? It made no sense. Bilbo is the viewpoint character, if there is one, and it's way more interesting to learn something with the protagonist than it is just to learn it out of nowhere, no possibility of caring, then have it mentioned again later on so that the protagonist knows it, too. A change from the presentation in the book that made the movie worse. I can't see any way of justifying this. Maybe someone thought "just opening with someone sitting around is too flat?" But why? A movie can start out idyllic and then that leads into adventure. (A friend who knows about horses remarked that the party of dwarves neglected to take the bits out of the horses' mouths even when they were clearly stopped for the night. She said this was definitely an error on the filmmakers' part and meant that the horses couldn't eat. I mention this not to condemn the movie but simply to mention it.) Yep. That's the feeling I got when I watched them. I have watched the LOTR films dozens of times, but I've only seen each of The Hobbit trilogy once or twice each. There was just so much i didn't enjoy. The Dwarves seemed idiotic in the movies, most of the Goblin area was just over the top, The guy firing the arrow but he used his son's should to aim with, Radagast running around with bird poop on his hat, the scene with Saruman Kung Fu fighting, the big Ogre or Troll without feet and hobbling around on the metal balls, and UGH - make it stop! |
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Post by hengest on Apr 24, 2022 20:01:54 GMT -5
The Semi-Retired Gamer I had managed to forget what they did with Radagast. That made no sense at all. The people I spoke to who defended that movie went straight to "It's for kids!" Forgetting for the moment that movies for kids can be good or great...if we say that the movie is "for kids"...why then stick in this pointlessly filthy character (he works with animals, so...he can't bathe?) just to shoehorn in some absolutely pointless drug jokes that mean nothing to children and also aren't funny? What? Sure, any adaptation can have features I don't care for. Decisions I think are bad. Fine. But with The Hobbit...I just got the feeling the whole time that whoever worked on it (on the story and general presentation) simply had no interest in and and just slapped the story up there, plopping in whatever lowly "ornaments" came to mind.
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Post by The Perilous Dreamer on Apr 24, 2022 20:21:15 GMT -5
The Semi-Retired Gamer I had managed to forget what they did with Radagast. That made no sense at all. The people I spoke to who defended that movie went straight to "It's for kids!" Forgetting for the moment that movies for kids can be good or great...if we say that the movie is "for kids"...why then stick in this pointlessly filthy character (he works with animals, so...he can't bathe?) just to shoehorn in some absolutely pointless drug jokes that mean nothing to children and also aren't funny? What? Sure, any adaptation can have features I don't care for. Decisions I think are bad. Fine. But with The Hobbit...I just got the feeling the whole time that whoever worked on it (on the story and general presentation) simply had no interest in and and just slapped the story up there, plopping in whatever lowly "ornaments" came to mind. I agree with all of the critiques of The Hobbit. I think they were so focused making a one movie book into a three movie story that they lost sight of trying to be faithful to the book and maintaining quality and consistency. I thought LotR was about as close as you could get without splitting three movies into six or having to have an intermission. But The Hobbit was a one movie story, it is a much smaller book than any of the Trilogy. |
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Post by The Perilous Dreamer on Apr 24, 2022 20:29:27 GMT -5
The Semi-Retired Gamer I had managed to forget what they did with Radagast. That made no sense at all. The people I spoke to who defended that movie went straight to "It's for kids!" Forgetting for the moment that movies for kids can be good or great...if we say that the movie is "for kids"...why then stick in this pointlessly filthy character (he works with animals, so...he can't bathe?) just to shoehorn in some absolutely pointless drug jokes that mean nothing to children and also aren't funny? What? Sure, any adaptation can have features I don't care for. Decisions I think are bad. Fine. But with The Hobbit...I just got the feeling the whole time that whoever worked on it (on the story and general presentation) simply had no interest in and and just slapped the story up there, plopping in whatever lowly "ornaments" came to mind. If someone thinks the bird poop was "for the kids" slap them upside the head hard and repeatedly.  |
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