Book vs. Movie

[gallantwarrior]

Having recently read "The Martian" I thought I'd look at the movie based on the book. Many, many discrepancies, not all intended to abridge the book's contents to facilitate the screen version. Anyone else have any thoughts? Are the things Watney did scientifically feasible? How about the political decisions, like not notifying the crew that Watney had survived? Most important: the gender and ethnic discrepancies?

 

[fncceo]

But all books to movies are awesome ...

 

[gallantwarrior]

But all books to movies are awesome ...

Very interesting. Now I'll have to check this one out. I enjoy comparing movies vs. books used as their basis. Unfortunately, movies come up short. Books are far superior, IMHO. Harry Potter series comes to mind, as well as the Lord of the Rings trilogy. They tried...

 

[gallantwarrior]

Something not mentioned in the book "The Martian" but used in the movie was the fact that he had to shave before being presented to the public.

 

[fncceo]

But all books to movies are awesome ...

Very interesting. Now I'll have to check this one out. I enjoy comparing movies vs. books used as their basis. Unfortunately, movies come up short. Books are far superior, IMHO. Harry Potter series comes to mind, as well as the Lord of the Rings trilogy. They tried...

Books and movies are two very different mediums. What makes a great book will very often be the death of a movie. Case in point, 'Dune'. What makes 'Dune' a great book (and a less great series) was the complexity of the universe in which it was set. The very thing that made the film adaptation confusing and unwatchable.

Even LOTR, many attempts were made in the '70s and '80s to bring LOTR to the screen and all were phenomenal flops.
When it finally got made right, it still paled in comparison to the books. Literally paled since much of it was shot in subdued color palette. They managed to get in most of the details of the book but, even at nine-hours, they had to leave out Tom Bombadil to the anger of many a book purist.

If you have a favourite book, I would expect to got and see the film and get disappointed. If you aren't, you've won the cinematic lottery.

 

[MarathonMike]

I can't wait for the movie version of Hillary's blockbuster book "What Happened?"

 

[fncceo]

I can't wait for the movie version of Hillary's blockbuster book "What Happened?"

I know how I'll be watching it ...

 

[Montrovant]

But all books to movies are awesome ...

Very interesting. Now I'll have to check this one out. I enjoy comparing movies vs. books used as their basis. Unfortunately, movies come up short. Books are far superior, IMHO. Harry Potter series comes to mind, as well as the Lord of the Rings trilogy. They tried...

Books and movies are two very different mediums. What makes a great book will very often be the death of a movie. Case in point, 'Dune'. What makes 'Dune' a great book (and a less great series) was the complexity of the universe in which it was set. The very thing that made the film adaptation confusing and unwatchable.

Even LOTR, many attempts were made in the '70s and '80s to bring LOTR to the screen and all were phenomenal flops.
When it finally got made right, it still paled in comparison to the books. Literally paled since much of it was shot in subdued color palette. They managed to get in most of the details of the book but, even at nine-hours, they had to leave out Tom Bombadil to the anger of many a book purist.

If you have a favourite book, I would expect to got and see the film and get disappointed. If you aren't, you've won the cinematic lottery.

Dune is actually one of the few times where I preferred the film to the book. Well, not the 1984 movie, but the 2000 miniseries. I did not especially like the book (I only read the first), but I very much enjoyed the miniseries.

LOTR is the other major book to film adaptation where I prefer the film version. I read the Rings books through a couple of times, because I am a fan of the fantasy genre and Tolkein is rightly consider the father of modern fantasy...but I did not find the books impressive. The movies had their flaws, but were more engaging to me.

The only other adaptation that comes to mind for me is The Shawshank Redemption. While I don't think the movie was superior to the book, I would put them on equal footing.

I enjoyed the movie The Martian, but never read the book, so can't compare.

 

[fncceo]

How about the political decisions, like not notifying the crew that Watney had survived?

I can speak to that personally. In the Navy, I did ballistic missile patrols in the Atlantic. These patrols last upwards of a hundred days where we are submerged awaiting the order to launch nuclear missiles at our targets. Naturally, they don't want you distracted in any way.

Since the Navy controls all communications, any messages from home (called Familygrams) were limited to 40 words that contain no bad news at all. They are heavily censored by the folks at COMSUBLANT prior to transmission to the sub.

On one patrol, we received a message early in the patrol that a crew member's mom had died. Since we could not be taken off patrol duty, the decision was made, by SUBLANT, that he not be told. Only the captain, the XO, and radio personnel who received the message knew. He was only told more than two months later when we were off of alert status and nearing home.

Since the early days of space flight, NASA has frequently kept information from crews if they thought it would distract him, most famously the fact that NASA delayed telling the crew of Columbia that their heat shield had been damaged on take off and they could die on reentry. John Glenn was similarly not told that there was a landing bag deployment malfunction alarm that could have killed him on reentry.

 

[gallantwarrior]

But all books to movies are awesome ...

Very interesting. Now I'll have to check this one out. I enjoy comparing movies vs. books used as their basis. Unfortunately, movies come up short. Books are far superior, IMHO. Harry Potter series comes to mind, as well as the Lord of the Rings trilogy. They tried...

Books and movies are two very different mediums. What makes a great book will very often be the death of a movie. Case in point, 'Dune'. What makes 'Dune' a great book (and a less great series) was the complexity of the universe in which it was set. The very thing that made the film adaptation confusing and unwatchable.

Even LOTR, many attempts were made in the '70s and '80s to bring LOTR to the screen and all were phenomenal flops.
When it finally got made right, it still paled in comparison to the books. Literally paled since much of it was shot in subdued color palette. They managed to get in most of the details of the book but, even at nine-hours, they had to leave out Tom Bombadil to the anger of many a book purist.

If you have a favourite book, I would expect to got and see the film and get disappointed. If you aren't, you've won the cinematic lottery.

Dune did also suffer in translation. I was also disappointed about Tom Bombadil and Goldberry missing from LOTR, although they did manage to work the evil willow tree into the story later. Ah, well, I can enjoy both mediums. There were some gender and ethnic switches in The Martian film that I felt were unnecessary given the diversity of the characters in the book

 

[Windparadox]

`
As flawed as it was, it was the Dino De Laurentiis version of Dune that got me hook on the entire series of books written by Frank Herbert, excluding the ones written by Brian Herbert and Kevin Anderson.

 

[gallantwarrior]

I read Dune years ago and loved it. I thought the movie was OK. After the first three books, I got bored with the whole series, although I did read through the whole lot eventually.