Book to Movie Comparison

[Heidi M Simone]

Did you happen to read a book that was made into a movie and watched the movie? If you have, we can use this space to compare the two.

As you consider this topic, let's focus on some of these questions:

- Did you find the book was better than the movie or vice versa?
- What made one better than the other?
- Can you describe some scenes from the book that added to the movie?
- How about scenes that were not included in the movie? Did that affect the movie in a positive, negative, or neutral way?
- Why do you think directors and/or producers decide to change and/or eliminate scenes from the book when it is made into a movie?

Feel free to add any further details and/or thoughts about what you read and saw!

[Dragonsend]

I brought this one up under another topic, but I'll talk about it again. Christine by Stephen King. I love Stephen King both books and movies but this one I really was disappointed after seeing the movie. The book goes into a lot of detail about one of the characters, Lebay, I believe his name was. The movie version completely left out how the car became possessed which entailed the story of Lebay , the previous owner. This took a big psychological horror aspect out and a huge hole to the movie translation.

[VernaVi]

It seems like no matter which book I think of when it's been made into a movie it lacks something the book included.
The best and most current example I can think of is Sleeping Beauty. I read this old classic at a young age and I've always loved it. The Grimms fairy tale was the first version I read, although the original is credited to Charles Perrault.
Recently this tale was made into a movie. It was entitled Maleficent, and I was terribly unhappy with the way it deviated from the original storyline. It changed the good characters into evil ones (like Good King Stephan) and made the bad characters(like Maleficent) into mother-like figures. This was dissatisfying for me, as I had hoped for something more true to the book.

[elenabell]

Carol, or The Price of Salt, by Patricia Highsmith. Simultaneously one of my favourite films of all time, and one of my favourite books of all time. Both very beautiful in their own way.
I watched the film before I read the book, or before I even knew it was originally a book. I loved it instantly - Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara have excellent chemistry, the style and cinematography is gorgeous, the costumes and set design are adorable and so well-done for such a stylish and charming time period (1920s New York), and the soundtrack creates the perfect atmosphere. It's such a devastatingly sweet story and the film encapsulates this so well.
I was pleasantly surprised to find that the film is not a carbon copy of the book, but the most important dramatic and thematic elements were retained, like the beautiful ending (no spoilers!) and no additional characters or subplots were added to make the story more suspenseful or dramatic, which I really appreciate in an adaptation. I recommend the book to absolutely anyone. It's written so beautifully, and it is so romantic in a slow, subtle way - you really feel how bewitched and entranced the main character becomes with how it's written.