From The Turn Of A Page To The Big Screen
"I've just has the opportunity to see the finished film of The Hunger Games.
I'm really happy with how it turned out. I feel like the books and the film
are individual yet complementary pieces that enhance one another." - Suzanne Collins
As The Hunger Games recently hit cinema screens worldwide we see yet another movie that has been adapted from a book. Suzanne Collins follows on from other very successful books which have been turned into blockbusting films franchise such as the most popular and commonly known J.K Rowling for Harry Potter and Stephenie Meyer for the Twilight saga.
Before there were the wizards of Harry Potter and the vampires of Twilight there have been many more easily recognised films that have came from books such as The Silences of The Lambs, Schindler's List, The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile. It is far from unusual to find a successful film that draws audiences in has actually came from and been inspired by a book, this may not be the case in all screen blockbusters though. Recently over the last decade some of the most successful grossing box office hits started life a a book.
Apart from aforementioned Harry Potter and Twilight films there were adaptations made in 1930's through to the 1960's that are still popular today and still surpass today's films and still appear on many top ten lists still and still one of them is the highest grossing films of all time.
To Kill A Mockingbird first hit cinemas in 1962 and still over 50 years later it is still considered by many as one of the best adaptation of book to film, even the author Harper Lee agrees, "I believe it remains the best translation of book to film ever made." Lee's autobiographical novel, which is a classic of modern literature, the film follows the same narrative and tells of a lawyer in the Depression-era South who defends a black man against a undeserved rape charge. Atticus Finch went on to become on of the modern day heroes against racism. To Kill A Mockingbird went on to win the Academy Award for Best Actor for Gregory Pecks portrayal of Finch, along with Best Adapted Screenplay and finally Best Art Direction.
Peck as Atticus The great romance of Rhett
Finch Bulter & Scarlett O'Hara
Similarly with To Kill A Mockingbird and the success it still has is shared with Gone With The Wind. This 1,037 page book was adapted for the big screen in 1939. With Scarlett O'Hara and Rhett Butler brought to life for an estimated budget of $3,977,000 today it is still the highest grossing film of all time. As of December 2003 it has taken in $390,000,000. The success was not only held at the box office but also at the Oscars where it held a record for 20 years. This was down to Gone With The Wind winning 10 Oscars, 8 of which were competitive and 2 were honorary. Gone With The Wind has become one of the most successful adaptations ever.
Today along with the Harry Potter, Twilight and The Hunger Games franchise another and one of the most popular and successful blood adaptations belongs to The Lord of the Rings trilogy. With the trilogy lasting over 10 hours Peter Jackson produced a faithful and true representation of J.R.R Tolkien's books. Jackson directed all 3 of the films 2001's The Fellowship of the Ring, 2002's The Two Towers and The Return of the King in 2003.
"We made a promise to ourselves at the beginning of the process
that we weren't going to put any of out own politics, our own
messages or our own themes into these movies. What we are trying to
do was to analyze what was important to Tolkien and try to honor that.
In a way, we were trying to make these films for him, not for ourselves." - Peter Jackson
The Lord of the Rings trilogy was considered by many to be one of the biggest and most ambitious film project to be taken on. It had an overall budget of $285 million and took 8 years of filming in Jackson's native New Zealand.
The success of the adaption was phenomenal with them ranking in the highest grossing film series of all time. The success were also heavily awarded with the the first two installments recieving 17 out of the 30 nominations they were awarded for and with the final installment The Return of the King winning all the 11 Academy Awards it was nominated places it up there with the likes of Gone With The Wind, Ben Hur and Titanic.
What made Lord of the Rings so popular when it went from book to the screen? It retained the original story for fans of the original fantasy books, but for the cinema goer it allowed Tolkien book to be brought to life and have a character for everyone to relate too. Tolkien's characters were always a powerful draw and this does not change. There is Frodo that goes from a innocent through to eventually saving the world, Faramir the warrior who must take on a great responsiblity, the wizard Grandalf who provides the roles of wisdom, Gollum with his extreme obsession over possession of the ring and finally there are also strong female characters in the form of warriors and elves. Along with memorable characters the setting of Middle Earth is brought to life with all the history and cultures of the original book.
The 3 films were also hugely successful at the box office and still went on to have continual success. As of November 2011 The Fellowship of the Ring has grossed $871,530,324. The second part, The Two Towers has proved to be more successful than its predecessor grossing an impressive $926,047,111 worldwide. Finally the third and final installment, The Return of the King proved to be the most successful grossing $1,119,929,521.
Jackson is now taking on Tolkien's other well known work The Hobbit. The big screen narrative will follow the books with the telling of a curious Hobbit named Bilbo Baggins and his attempt to reclaim stolen treasure. The Hobbit sees the return of the the familiar faces of the Lord of the Rings cast returning as the same lovable and rememberable characters. The Hobbit will have a UK release date of 14 December 2012, and the box office will have to wait and see if Jackson can have the same success with this adaptation.
Yes there have been so many successful adaptations in the past but there has also been some really bad ones too. Yes the idea of authors getting their work portrayed on the big screen can feel a life dream but it may not actually turn out to be an advantage. It may be a let down from bad acting or in most cases straying to far from the original plot and missing out important elements. Also many fans of a book have already built up the characters and places in their minds so once they see these portrayed on the big screen these may not match.
Voted Entertainment Weekly's 2008 poll of worst adaptations was topped by The Golden Compass. This film started out in Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy, but did not receive the viewing figures or box office records of that Harry Potter. The adaptation did not stick to the original narrative from the book and changed the narrative of the film to just a long drawn out series of lackluster action sequences. Unfortunately due to the flop of The Golden Compass the next two books in the series were shelved with no future plans to be made.
With the success of To Kill A Mockingbird and Gone With The Wind, not all classic books made for the big screen had the same huge success. Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby in book format is classed as one of literature's greats but the film was not received with the same praise. Based on the chart of materialism and decadence of Americas post-war revival just did not live up to expectations. This title is receiving a remake in 2012 by Baz Luhrmann and hopefully the book will finally receive the big screen feature it deserves. This was shared with George Orwell's 1954's adaptation of Animal Farm. The animated film used to portray Orwell's farmyard were deemed to Disney and ready to burt into sing song at any minute and it was felt that they were far to cheery to portray the books narrative of taking a swipe at Russia's Stalinist regime.
Finally most recently in 2010 Kazuo Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go was the latest book to go with the screen adaptation and end with a disapointing outcome. The plot of the book and the film narrative has the same characters and the plot of what is happening to them stays the same but there is one major detail which is missing that is vital to the books story line. The story follows Ruth, Kathy and Tommy through their life at school and as they grow into the adults they finally become and learn the path their lives set out for them. This is the same in both. But yet the film manages to miss out the vital story line about the mix tape and when it goes missing is important to building the story, the song on the mix tape is even where the film gets its name.
So with all the adaptions available both good and bad it can't help leave the viewer thinking "is the book better than the film?"
Sources:
www.imdb.com
www. lordoftherings.net
www.rottentomatoes.com
www.thecapitaltour.pn/
www.thehobbitblog.com
www.wikipedia.com
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