The Best and Worst Novel/Movie Adaptation

[Tanasi]

I think the Best is two different movies by two different authors about the same thing only at different times.
Gods and Generals and Gettysburg. I must say everytime I watch Gettysburg I keep hoping for a different outcome but I'm always disappointed.

The worst is Battlefield Earth by L. Ron Hubbard starting John Travolta. The novel is great, that piece of crap of a movie is a disgrace.

What's your choices???

The above are just my opinions feel free to make them your own.

[Andara Bledin]

One of my favorite adaptations is the classic To Kill a Mockingbird.

As for worst, there are so many to choose from, I'm not sure which will take that cake.

^-.-^

[AdminAssistant]

One of the best, and you're going to call me crazy, has to be A Muppet's Christmas Carol. Yes, seriously.

[IDrinkaRum]

My favorite adaptation is "Auntie Mame". The original (non-musical version) starring Rosalind Russell. ( Rosalind Russell!) The book, written by one Mr. Patrick Dennis, is long and boring. Actually, the movie cuts out the last 1/3(?) or so of the book. The ending of the book wasn't really necessary, IMHO.

The worst adaptation is "Flowers in the Attic". Written by V. C. Andrews, it's a story about 4 children who are locked up in a room in the house that belongs to their grandparents. They are forced to "pay" for their sins of their "parents". Their only playground is the attic. Kristy Swanson (of Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie fame) plays the story's narrator.

[anakhouri]

I actually liked "LA Confidential" better than the book. Ellroy's style is incredibly choppy and uneven in the novel, and the movie cut out a lot of unecessary stuff to streamline the story.

I also think the Merchant/Ivory adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro's "The Remains of the Day" was pitch-perfect.

I have high hopes for the resported Scorsese/Daniel Day Lewis version of Endo's "Silence", supposedly coming out in the next couple years.

Bad adaptations...there's so many. The one I hate the most is the Hughes' Brothers "From Hell"...but then, it seems no one can make a decent movie based on an Alan Moore product ("Watchmen" was just OK).

[HYHYBT]

I must say everytime I watch Gettysburg I keep hoping for a different outcome but I'm always disappointed.

Reminds me of something I vaguely remember seeing on Benny Hill on HBO in the early 80's*... he was watching a videotape with a naked woman in it, but just as she came onscreen, something or other strategically blocked the camera's view of certain portions of her body. He kept rewinding the tape, in hopes that one time it wouldn't.

Anyway... I'm not entirely sure what I'd call best and worst, but the Harry Potter series reflects some of both: the first couple were good, and also made the world feel real... but as the books got longer, they wound up having to pretty much stick to bare-bones plot points to fit each into a reasonable-length movie (and, of course, gave up by the end.) They lost me when, in #5, they for no apparent reason at all had the villains zooming around with their lower halves replaced by whirlwinds.

And yes, I know there are far worse adaptions... but starting well means that if you get worse it's worse than if the whole thing were like that

*yes, I was "too young." But then, his was a childish sort of humor, in a sense.

[jackfaire]

Worst, Planet of the Apes both versions neither one quite gets the brilliance of what the book was doing nor got the point.

Best, Lord of the Rings because it did what the books couldn't and made me actually care about the characters and what was going on in the story.

[Racket_Man]

Worst, Planet of the Apes both versions neither one quite gets the brilliance of what the book was doing nor got the point.

Best, Lord of the Rings because it did what the books couldn't and made me actually care about the characters and what was going on in the story.

I have to disagree on Planet of the Apes the book. I found it to be very dry and boring.

Rod Serling took the basic premise of and history within the book, modernized it a bit and darkened the heck out of it.

If you take the book, combine it with the original movie and the 4 sequals, it DOES make sense as all of the book "history" is used.

[Hyena Dandy]

Best adaptation, to me, is also my favorite movie. "American Psycho"

Worst, again to me, is "V for Vendetta"

Not that it's a bad movie, it's just a bad ADAPTATION.

[jackfaire]

If you take the book, combine it with the original movie and the 4 sequals, it DOES make sense as all of the book "history" is used.

Except that the Apes live in caves like primitives instead of in houses and offices like modern 20th century citizens. Also in both movies that cover the origins of it the beginnings are violent revolutions where in the book Humanity lost being the dominant species because they got lazy and came to rely on their Ape servants for everything becoming little better than beasts themselves.

In the book it wasn't a post apocalyptic world that we needed to beware of it was our own laziness. Letting others determine everything for us leading to our doing nothing and deciding nothing for ourselves.

[tropicsgoddess]

The Romeo and Juliet with Claire Danes was the worst...seeing people in modern (1998 modern) day clothes and such while talking in Medieval or Shakespearean English was just ridiculous, IMO.

[mikoyan29]

Best Adaptation is a tough one for me...but I'll have to say that Hunt for Red October was one of the better ones. Yes they changed the ending but the ending made a good movie ending.

Worst...I would almost have to say Starship Troopers. But I enjoyed the movie.....

[jackfaire]

The Romeo and Juliet with Claire Danes was the worst...seeing people in modern (1998 modern) day clothes and such while talking in Medieval or Shakespearean English was just ridiculous, IMO.

*hugs* OH MY GOD THANK YOU!!!!!!

Seriously stupidest thing ever.

[AdminAssistant]

I can't watch Baz Luhrmann movies. They make me dizzy and (the ones I've seen) are universally terrible. Yes, even Moulin Rouge (*gasp* horror!) There isn't actually a good version of Romeo and Juliet that I can think of...the Zeferelli is a bit dull, IMO. But it's considered by a lot of us to be the Oklahoma! of Shakespeare's canon - something terrible by all accounts, but if you do it, you're guaranteed a full house.

[Andara Bledin]

I can't stand the story of Romeo and Juliet, anyway. It's just an emo retelling of Pyramis and Thisbe, anyway, which was a superior, if shorter tale. Although the recent Gnomeo and Juliet movie was quite entertaining for it's lack of following the script.

^-.-^