The Never-ending Debate: The Book or Movie?

With the newest Harry Potter movie right around the corner, the thought of books being made into movies stuck in my mind. So many books have been made into movies in the last few years that it appears society would rather watch television than read a good book. It also shows that Hollywood is having trouble finding an original idea. While these are debates in themselves, they are not the one I am focusing on at the moment. I will admit that some of these movies have been done well, but others have been extremely disappointing. In thinking about Harry Potter, I find the movies to be fitting, and little more. Since each movie had a different director, some are done better than others, but they still leave out so much of the books.

One book I found that was made well into a movie is Alexander Dumas’s ‘The Count of Monte Cristo’. It felt true to the storyline of the book, while bringing the characters to life on the big screen. Though I know some of the story line was taken out, it wasn’t obvious in the movie. This is nice; the audience isn’t fully aware they are missing something. In contrast, Jane Austen’s ‘Pride and Prejudice’ has been made into several movies, the latest with Keira Knightley. I enjoyed it, but I could tell where pieces of the story were missing.

Another aspect of books into movies is when the whole plotline is altered. This can be found in Nicholas Sparks' ‘A Walk to Remember’. The whole premise of the boy/girl meeting is completely different from the book to the movie. The relationship between the boy and girl is still there, but everything surrounding it has changed. This is due in part to modernization of the story. However, was this necessary? Do movies need to modernize books? Looking at ‘Pride & Prejudice’ or ‘The Count of Monte Cristo’, the answer is no. These movies made it big without modernizing a classic. Now, I’m not calling ‘A Walk to Remember’ a classic, but it makes one wonder if modernizing a story is a good idea. In this case, it worked, in the sense that the movie made a lot of money at the box office.

Here is where another interesting question pops up. Is it better to read the book first or to see the movie? Does the order it occur in affect one’s feeling toward one type of media versus the other? For instance, if someone watches the Disney version of ‘The Three Musketeers’ years before they ever pick up the book, will they always love the movie better than the novel? The two are different, and it could be said that falling in love with one hinders love of the other. I’m not saying this is true of all book/movie relationships, nor of every person, but simply thought it was an interesting question to explore. This situation could be the same for ‘The Lord of the Rings’, ‘Narnia’, ‘Ella Enchanted’, ‘Bridge to Terabithia’, ‘Girl with a Pearl Earring’, and numerous others.

This also poses the question of whether books should ever be made into movies. On one hand, it brings a good story to a wider audience. On the other hand, it also could lessen the number of people who actually pick up the book. While much profit can be made off the movie, sometimes more than off the book itself, movies are becoming more and more expensive to see. A person could see a movie in a theatre once, and never see it again, or have to wait until it comes out on video. However, paying little more now for a book can allow someone to enjoy it for ages to come.

While it is nice to see a book come to life on the big screen, it also leads to the question of vision. Whose vision is this movie? Is it how the author truly thought it out, or is it solely the workings of the director. A director’s vision may not be at all what my vision is, deterring me from seeing the movie, liking it, or ever feeling the same way about the book. There is always the fear that the character will be different, that the way an event happens isn’t how someone pictured it, etc. While sometimes it turns out better, more often than not it doesn’t. Yet will any of this stop me from continuing to compare the two? Probably not.

I’d love to hear more opinions on this…

Some others weigh in on this debate:

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1134742,00.html

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/11/11/print/main528940.shtml

http://www.boxofficeprophets.com/column/index.cfm?indexID=49



Andrea Hall
Editorial Assistant