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.

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More Palahniuk

Just finished 2 more Chuck books:

Diary: Misty Wilmot is a once promising artist who is now a waitress at a tourist resort as her husband lies in a comma after a suicide attempt. She quickly learns everything is not at it seems and that she may simply be a pawn in deep, dark conspiracy. I really liked the concept here but the story didn’t grab me that much. You are either a fan, or not a fan, of his writing and I happen to be a big fan, so I did enjoy the ride anyway. I did like the ending which contained the usual Palahniuk twists and turns and it really elevated the book for me from average to above average. Keep in mind the ending of Beautiful Monsters did the exact opposite.

Snuff: I enjoyed the whole ride on this one. The plot on this gem is that an aging porn star plans to go out with a bang by setting the world record for the largest gang bang. You soon learn why she is really doing this as you learn the reasons for her assistant and three of the actors, who wait their turn, for being there, as well. Oh, and one of them may want to kill her. Great read this book was and don’t let the porn aspect throw you off from reading it. While there are some graphic descriptions there was actually very little actual sex in the novel. The only thing that kept this book from being one of the greats, in my opinion, is that once the book ended there was really no real resolution to any of the characters plights. It still clocks in high on my Chuck reads and I can’t wait for the movie to come out.

I rank my favorites as follows:

Lullaby
Choke
Snuff
Beautiful Monsters
Diary
Haunted

Next up for me, Fight Club.

Invisible Monsters and An Update or Two About Writing

I’ve been a bad blogger. It’s been a while but I’ve good excuses. First the holidays are always hectic and it’s hard to get anything recreational done. Next work has been nuts and I won’t get into that, suffice to say that well….it’s been nuts.

Most importantly I am in the end stretch of draft one of a novel length work. It has been consuming my free time, in a good way. I am enjoying the process and I know there’s a long way to go but it feels great. I can’t wait to finish it up and get going on the edits.

While I’ve been writing this novel sized piece my short story “Beth Hartley is Hot” was rejected.

I have not been fixin/resending any short stories because I don’t want to loose steam on the longer piece but all my little babies waiting to go back out into the world is making me itch a bit

In the meantime the most memorable book I’ve read in the past few months is Chuck Palahniuk’s “Invisible Monsters” a book that takes on: Transsexualism. Models. Riches. Shotguns. Makeup. Drugs. Disfigurement. Fire. Sexually transmitted disease. Estrogen. Real Estate. Weddings. Homosexuality. High Fashion. Yup, it’s a wild ride.

Interesting book. I liked it a lot, better than “Haunted” but not as much s “Lullaby.” What kept me from loving monsters? It had some very interesting twists and turns but the last one was just too much for me. I don’t want to spoil anything…but did you read it? What do you think?

Lullaby

I now have three favorite books.

‘The Great and Secret Show” by Clive Barker is my personal benchmark for horror and horror mythology.

“The Physiognomy” by Jeffrey Ford is, for me, the perfect blend of weirdness and dark fantasy.  This book changed the way I think about writing.

“Lullaby” by Chuck Palahniuk was also brilliant.  The themes of life, death, construction and deconstruction (among others) was threaded perfectly throughout the story.  One thing I LOVED is that Palahniuk is twisted but not in a gratuitous manner whatsoever.   Are all Palahniuk’s books this great?  I can’t wait to find out.   Oh, and if you know the proper way to pronounce his last name let me know.