As you're reading a book, do you visualize how you would film it if you were making it into a movie? I usually think about which scene I would open with. The only movie I can remember actually matching up with what was in my head was A Thousand Acres. But I can't remember enough about the movie or book to add it to the following list:
1. Cold Mountain. I loved this book so much that I was afraid to watch the movie, especially when I heard Nicole Kidman was cast in the lead role. But happily, I loved the movie too. Points deducted though for filming most of the movie in Romania rather than North Carolina.
2. The English Patient. Another Anthony Minghella movie. Was Truly Madly Deeply a book first? If so, I should read it. I actually saw The English Patient before reading the book and I liked the movie better perhaps because the love story is more prominent in the movie. I'm curious how I would have felt if I read the book first.
3. The Secret Garden. The version of this movie I liked best was a 1987 Hallmark Hall-of-Fame TV movie that added a nice little epilogue that I don't think was in the book. I have not seen this movie in probably 20 years though so take this recommendation with a grain of salt.
... So I'm stuck. I can't think of any more book-to-movie adaptations that I liked and where I had also read the book (a rule I imposed for myself). So instead, here are two book-to-movie adaptations I'm excited about:
1. The Time Traveler's Wife
2. Shutter Island
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
7 comments:
I'm so glad you reminded me of that Hallmark Hall of Fame version of the Secret Garden. It was really good. I taped it when it was on TV and then watched it over and over. I had never read the book but it turned me on to Frances Hodgson Burnet at a time when all my other friends were reading things more adolescent things like Tom Wolfe, Kurt Vonnegut and any thing by or about Jim Morrison. I was reading those too, but secretly wishing I was a 19th century British 11 year old.
Another OMG! Just IMDB'd The Secret Garden and saw that Colin Firth played the adult Colin in the epilogue. No wonder I longed to be a British girl.
I just realized Colin Firth was in it recently too! Maybe that's why I'm so fond of him. I still have my VHS taped off of TV copy. I should host a viewing party but I bet the quality is really bad by now.
I LOVED this movie too- also taped it off the TV (wow, how archaic were we in those days?) and watched it over and over again. I still use some of the quotes from the movie, "Please, may I have a bit of earth" and "There'll be roses!" in a terrible British accent. This movie was the whole reason I made my parents create a rose garden in our yard. I tended it for a couple of years, then got bored with it. It looks worse than the secret garden now.
Also, I thought Dickon was the dreamiest...and it was a little icky that Colin and Mary ended up getting married being they were cousins and all.
lol! I could definitely see why she went for Colin. I'll take a spoiled British git any day, especially a reformed one.
I wonder if we can Netflix it? I'll look it up.
Sonya, I loved Dickon too. I looked him up on IMDB and it appears he gave up acting soon after this movie. He now does photography and to bring it full circle, he was a still photographer on Cold Mountain!
It is not even available on DVD, according to Netflix. Can you believe it?
Post a Comment