Blog Archives
Top 10 Novel to Movie Adaptations
Being the holidays and having just suffered a computer crash I have taken the easy way out and ripped another top 10 list from LitReactor available at the following link:
http://litreactor.com/columns/the-top-10-book-to-film-adaptations-that-were-actually-good
1. Jurassic Park
By Michael Crichton/Adaptation by Steven Spielberg
2. Fight Club
By Chuck Palahniuk/Adaptation by David Fincher
3. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
By Ken Kesey/Adaptation by Milos Forman
4. Trainspotting
By Irvine Welsh/Adaptation by Danny Boyle
5. American Psycho
by Bret Easton Ellis/Adaptation by Mary Harron
6. Batman Begins and The Dark Knight
Created by Bob Kane, written by others/Adaptation by Christopher Nolan
7. The Shining
by Stephen King/Adaptation by Stanley Kubrick
8. Bringing out the Dead
by Joe Connelly/Adaptation by Martin Scorsese
9. Memento Mori
By Jonathan Nolan/Adaptation by Christopher Nolan (as Memento)
10. The Godfather
By Mario Puzo/Adaptation by Francis Ford Coppola
My personal favorites are:
FIGHT CLUB – Both the book and movie are fantastic and the movie makes changes in all the right places that work. Great soundtrack, great everything.
THE GODFATHER – The movie was better than the book in my opinion and the book was awesome.
THE SHINING – I can’t beleive King doesn’t like this movie.
BATMAN – As long as the movie was by Nolan it’s good. He captured the struggle between the Dark Knight and the Joker beautifully.
One movie that didn’t make the list was CLOCKWORK ORANGE. Another movie that made a few changes that worked well on film, like leaving out the last chapter.
One of my favorite books that I’d love to see as a movie is THE PHYSIOGNOMY by Jeffrey Ford. If you haven’t read it, please do so. It’s time to make this gem into a film.
Chris Nolan Will Try to Get the Suck Out of Superman
Nolan did a brilliant job with Dark Knight. Except for the ending and being about 15 minutes to long it was close to perfect. He captured the true feel of Bruce Wayne, the Batman and his relationship with the Joker.
The Superman franchise has been a huge mess. I’m a Marvel guy but I don’t like seeing a flagship character be reduced to crap. I hope he can capture the real Superman. The alienation that Kal-El feels and the weight of responsibility he feels towards man. PLEASE no origin story, no Luthor, and no kryptonite, unless it’s red.
Sherlock Holmes: A Unsolicited Review
I read quite a bit, always have but I never read Sherlock Holmes. So, I give this review with no knowledge of how the characters should be portrayed.
I thought this was a great movie. Both Holmes and Watson were strong characters with a lot of depth. Downey and Law had a great chemistry that was fun to watch.
The fight scenes were great and the music fit nicely as well.
Another great aspect of this movie was that is was not JUST an action flick. The detective aspect of Holmes was well played. Batman must be partially based on Sherlock Holmes. Again I haven’t read Holmes so maybe the movie version of him is based partially on Batman.
I thought this movie was very, very good and to be honest I was surprised to learn that this is a Guy Ritchie film, as I have liked none of his previous films. I have to give him credit for this one.
The Badgerine 