Books into movies?

[WIREMAN]

Recently there's been a run on books by movie makers... On the Road...... The Great Gatsby.... & now Jack Kerouacs Big Sur.... Any thoughts or opinions would be interesting to hear.....

[mtmynd]

Best selling books have often been turned into movies throughout the history of movie making. What we have recently seen, i.e. the movies you've listed are but a continuation of the art of movie making, an art that many embrace as (arguably) the most complex art of our times, given the extraordinary variety of artistic modes utilized to create the chosen stories into believable "true life" adventures that will captivate a movie goer's experience.

[the mingo]

man I don't know - people compare the movie to the book as a means to judge how "true" the movie was - but nobody ever does the same with the book in the first place - nobody ever compares the book to the events & experience of those events that it grew out of - somebody gathered from the events, distilled it, wrote it down, then packed it into expression then made it into a book - so the book is at the first remove from reality - then someone comes along makes a movie from the book - the second remove from reality - folks will say the book is better than the movie but what could that mean in this context? Since you can take many different stories from the same set of events I enjoy the book for itself & enjoy the movie or film the same way - neither of them could possibly carry the truth of the actual flow of circumstances that they grew out of - leaving the reader or viewer free to enjoy it all -
and I do -

[WIREMAN]

It's a hard call......original movies I tend to like better, though my tastes are limited to certain directors, (Herzog, Wenders, Huston, Fellini, Kurosawa, Malle, Peckinpaugh), to name some of my favorites. I dunno I find if I have not read the book a movie is better for me, liKe say Treasure of Sierra Madre which was a book by B. Traven or Hemingway's To Have and Have Not for instance. All I know is if I really dig a book Big time, i'm bound to be disappointed by the movie. On the Road being the newest example. I watched it over and over and just got more disappointed with the whole venture. I really feel Kerouac's writing style being narrative just does not translate to a 2 hour movie. I do know this, even the strongest novels need a great screenplay in order for them to work as a movie. OTR definitely lacked this aspect. Just my opinion.

[mtmynd]

wired, i've heard that too about OTR... just seeing the trailer was disappointment enough for me to lose interest in sitting thru the flick.

not all movies that come up to the plate are homeruns but should be viewed as attempts in capturing whatever the initial writer intended.

[tarbaby]

mingo wrote:

man I don't know - people compare the movie to the book as a means to judge how "true" the movie was - but nobody ever does the same with the book in the first place - nobody ever compares the book to the events & experience of those events that it grew out of - somebody gathered from the events, distilled it, wrote it down, then packed it into expression then made it into a book - ]so the book is at the first remove from reality - then someone comes along makes a movie from the book - the second remove from reality -[/b][/u][/color] folks will say the book is better than the movie but what could that mean in this context? Since you can take many different stories from the same set of events I enjoy the book for itself & enjoy the movie or film the same way - neither of them could possibly carry the truth of the actual flow of circumstances that they grew out of - leaving the reader or viewer free to enjoy it all -
and I do -

Man I don't know either but you sure said it well.

I wonder if anyone will ever make a movie out of A Confederacy of Dunces.? That's one I would love to see.
http://www.laughspin.com/2012/05/25/wil ... of-dunces/

[WIREMAN]

A cursed movie...Belushi...Candy....Farley....sounds interesting.

[jackofnightmares]

Interesting?

Oh yes, but don't get me started on that.
That's a whole nother topic

[WIREMAN]

Start me up
I never stop....never stop.....never stop....
What we talkin bout ST?
Oh movies....books..... Jack?
Why do movies made from his books SUCK!?
His books be soooooooo good
Maybe they need a Jack voice in the back
to get them off????

[stilltrucking]

Talking about reality and two steps from it


Not really talking about much of nothing I guess. I just liked that novel a lot (A Confederacy of Dunces), I loved it just as much as OTR if not more and I wondered why nobody has been able to make a movie of it.


Another novel into movie is Full Metal Jacket, Based on the book Short Timers by Gustav Hasford, the beat marine. I always thought that Hollywood had trashed that novel.
Made a John Wayne war movie out of it. What was that director's name —I forget? Oh yeah, Stanley Kuprick.

Rest in Peace Gus.
Another novel into film.
I always liked was the Disney version of Gulliver's Travels, Walt stayed so true to Reverend Swift's novel :
Sorry I ramble

[stilltrucking]

[WIREMAN]

Ramble on
Sing that song
Zepplin still sounding good
Oh this b bout movies.......ugh!
I need to chk out confederacy of dunces
My readings always being limited to Beat subjects
I dunno why the OtR movie bothers me so
Maybe because i waited all dem years
Levi seemed to like it
I thought it sucked
Except for the girl Kristen Stewart who played mary lou
How could anybody play jack?....or neal?.....what was i expecting
Maybe i know the story too well
Maybe maybe maybe....what a word
Maybe if id stayed in new york in '78
Maybe if id a kept playing golf
Maybe if id taken a chance, said fuck the rod job and just been wireman full time
Carole Jean had it right, but she also had the power
But this is about books and movies
Ya know what i think
This is it pure and simple
Unless u have Humphrey Bogart and John Huston doing the book as movie
there aint a chance in hell this wireman's gonna dig it, and they are dead
Sooooooooooooooooooooooo.....guess i spilled the beans

[tarbaby]

This is a good thread, worth a second try for me. Not to get off into the universality of the subject and try to stay on a specific novel or movie is hard for me. That's why I liked mingo's comment about the two steps from reality.

I always wondered what Tacitus meant when he said beware of the man of one book. For a long time I used to think he meant the Bible, but duh, there was no bible when he wrote that.

Beats, used to get hassled on Litchicks for saying "beatniks" I guess that must be one of those words that good people should not use, like nigger, kike, spic, wop etc.
Hippies now there is a word in transition. At least for me. I wasn't just square, I was bat shit crazy, swept up in the backlash of the sixties. I am still a child of the forties and fifties, like were my high riding heroes, the beats.

I loved that website, it is the house that Jack built. You know Jack had a better business model than Levi.

I read only good books
John Kennedy Toole you wrote my life.
not much more I enjoy than jam
studio eight you got to have a lot of soul to GO here.
Always be grateful to the beats, they were life changers for me.

[WIREMAN]

Total lifesaver
The Beats that is
Gonna try to get up to new york next week
Chk out kerouac archives at public library
Was there in '78
CoCo a dancer from montreal i met and
Was shakin with for awhile got a case of the
Ass with me when she was out of town and the guy
At the hotels front desk told her i was up in shirley's room when she was calling me
In mid of night, well to make a long story short she said she was comin back and
She was gonna cut me....sheeeeezzzz cant a young wireman have a little fun?
Well i left the village shortly thereafter came back to dc met a little girl and the rest is history. Always wonder how things would have panned out if my dick didnt always get me
In trouble....story of my life....yet now i think i got things under control with age.... Right?..

[silent woman]

Oh yes, under control with age.
I used to be circumcised.

which reminds me of another movie novel comparison Slaughter House Five

I think of how useless the Dresden part of my memory has been, and yet how tempting Dresden has been to write about, and I am reminded of the famous limerick:

There was a young man from Stamboul,
Who soliloquized thus to his tool:
"You took all my wealth
And you ruined my health,
And now you won't pee, you old fool."

Slaughter House Five, or A duty dance with death, a children's crusade.