# Movies Better Than Their Books



## WillMunny (Nov 10, 2017)

Lord of the Rings and Hannibal Lecter movies for the exact same reason - the movies trimmed out all the meandering, annoying, unnecessary fat the novels had, which made the plot feel a lot more streamlined and better-organized in general.

The Shining - I'm glad Kubrick cut out of all the sappy family melodrama crap of Stephen King's book and completely focused on the more cold-blooded, mysterious, chilling aspects of the story.

Hellraiser - I didn't really like Clive Barker's The Hellbound Heart because it felt too manic and the story felt really cluttered and scrambled.  But the movie's plot felt a lot more clear and focused.

Carrie - Brian DePalma's 1976 movie was so much more shocking and fiercely flamboyant and visceral than King's pedestrian first novel.  It had the kitchen-crucifixion scene of that evil mother that the book didn't have.


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## Skull Pilot (Nov 10, 2017)

I have yet to see a movie that is better than the book it was based on.

Some movies have come very close and were very good IMO.

Stand By Me, Shawshank Redemption, were both excellent.

The Lord of the Rings movies were very good but the books were still better


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## OldLady (Nov 10, 2017)

WillMunny said:


> Lord of the Rings and Hannibal Lecter movies for the exact same reason - the movies trimmed out all the meandering, annoying, unnecessary fat the novels had, which made the plot feel a lot more streamlined and better-organized in general.
> 
> The Shining - I'm glad Kubrick cut out of all the sappy family melodrama crap of Stephen King's book and completely focused on the more cold-blooded, mysterious, chilling aspects of the story.
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Disagree about LTR.  All the movies left in was the fighting/war.  All the meandering "fat" is what made them such great novels.  IMO.


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## Unkotare (Nov 10, 2017)

*Movies Better Than Their Books*

*There are none.*


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## TheOldSchool (Nov 10, 2017)

Game of Thrones is better than A Song of Ice and Fire


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## JoeB131 (Nov 10, 2017)

Jaws.  The book had absolutely no likable characters..  Speilberg famously said halfway through reading the book, he was rooting for the Shark.  Then he took the book and made the characters people you'd want to cheer for.  

The 1990 version of "A Handmaid's Tale", which was better than the crappy book by Margaret Atwood.  Her book had non-linear storytelling and a protagonist you kind of didn't care about.  The movie version had good performances by Robert Duvall, Faye Dunaway and Natasha Richardson.


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## skye (Nov 10, 2017)

Unkotare said:


> *Movies Better Than Their Books*
> 
> *There are none.*




I agree.
It's very difficult if not impossible to bring a book to life.

It can happen, but very, very rarely.


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## ChrisL (Nov 10, 2017)

It depends on a lot of different things I guess.  Of course they are going to have to put a lot more in a book than in a movie for imagery purposes.  They have to set a tone and atmospheres and since that is done with words in a book as opposed to pictures, well, you see what I mean.


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## OldLady (Nov 10, 2017)

I liked the movie Gone With The Wind better than the book.


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## TNHarley (Nov 10, 2017)

my wife reads erotica
do you know where i am going with this?


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## AsianTrumpSupporter (Nov 10, 2017)

Trainspotting

The book was good, but it was so chaotic and crazy to read. It's still a good read, but the movie was much better.


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## Montrovant (Nov 10, 2017)

WillMunny said:


> Lord of the Rings and Hannibal Lecter movies for the exact same reason - the movies trimmed out all the meandering, annoying, unnecessary fat the novels had, which made the plot feel a lot more streamlined and better-organized in general.
> 
> The Shining - I'm glad Kubrick cut out of all the sappy family melodrama crap of Stephen King's book and completely focused on the more cold-blooded, mysterious, chilling aspects of the story.
> 
> ...



I agree with the LoTR books.  I am not a big fan of the books, but the movies were good.  I disagree on the King books.  The Shining was the best adaptation of a King horror novel, but the book was still better.  I never read The Hellbound Heart.

I preferred the Sci-Fi miniseries of Dune to the book.  Like LoTR, it is a classic book that I did not particularly enjoy.


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## Montrovant (Nov 10, 2017)

TheOldSchool said:


> Game of Thrones is better than A Song of Ice and Fire



Game of Thrones is a good show, but too much detail is left out.  The books give much greater depth to the characters and story.


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## TheOldSchool (Nov 10, 2017)

Montrovant said:


> TheOldSchool said:
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I’ve read all the books.  There are plots and characters that I just thought “whaaat does this have to do with anything.”

But it’s been years and years since I read them.  I’ll go back eventually.


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## Gracie (Nov 10, 2017)

WillMunny said:


> Lord of the Rings and Hannibal Lecter movies for the exact same reason - the movies trimmed out all the meandering, annoying, unnecessary fat the novels had, which made the plot feel a lot more streamlined and better-organized in general.
> 
> The Shining - I'm glad Kubrick cut out of all the sappy family melodrama crap of Stephen King's book and completely focused on the more cold-blooded, mysterious, chilling aspects of the story.
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> ...


The only movies that did justice to the book that I have seen are Gone With The Wind, Shawshank Redemption, Green Mile that I can think of off the top of my head.

I never read LOTR books or The Hobbit, but LOVE the movies.


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## Montrovant (Nov 10, 2017)

TheOldSchool said:


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Oh, sure, there's excess.....but I prefer a bit too much going on to some of the gaps and lack of depth from Game of Thrones the show.


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## Montrovant (Nov 10, 2017)

Gracie said:


> WillMunny said:
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> > Lord of the Rings and Hannibal Lecter movies for the exact same reason - the movies trimmed out all the meandering, annoying, unnecessary fat the novels had, which made the plot feel a lot more streamlined and better-organized in general.
> ...



I recently read The Green Mile for the first time.  The movie was very true to the book (or maybe I should say books, wasn't it originally a bunch of short books?).  Shawshank is one of my favorite movies, and I'd probably put it on equal footing with the book, but there's a bit more difference between them than with Green Mile.  Both are definitely excellent movies.


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## ChrisL (Nov 10, 2017)

AsianTrumpSupporter said:


> Trainspotting
> 
> The book was good, but it was so chaotic and crazy to read. It's still a good read, but the movie was much better.



That was one of the weirdest movies ever!  Remember the baby on the ceiling?  That was really quite creepy.  The toilet scene?    Gross.


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## ChrisL (Nov 10, 2017)

Montrovant said:


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I've never read the Shawshank Redemption but saw the movie.  Good movie.


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## Gracie (Nov 10, 2017)

Montrovant said:


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Shawshank was a mini novel..like The Mist...in one of Kings condensed books of short stories.  Yes, both were excellent movies.


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## ChrisL (Nov 10, 2017)

Gracie said:


> WillMunny said:
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> > Lord of the Rings and Hannibal Lecter movies for the exact same reason - the movies trimmed out all the meandering, annoying, unnecessary fat the novels had, which made the plot feel a lot more streamlined and better-organized in general.
> ...



I was supposed to read The Hobbit and Lord of The Rings for an elective I took called Tales and Legends.  I never read them though.  I just kind of winged it and got an A because the teacher liked me.  Lol.  What a punk I was.    I did see the first Lord of The Rings.  It was pretty good.  I was entertained.  

I read Bram Stoker's Dracula, and NONE of the movies can compare to it for me.  Now that was an excellent book, so creepy too.


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## Correll (Nov 10, 2017)

Books with a LOT of freaking characters and places in them, can become much easier to follow when made into movies.

You don't have to, with the beginning of each chapter, or sometimes even paragraphs, placing the character and the place, which in my opinion interferes with getting into the story.


Lord of the Rings benefited from that a lot, and does Game of Thrones.


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## AsianTrumpSupporter (Nov 10, 2017)

ChrisL said:


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Yeah, that part of the movie was basically like a horror movie. The book is even more grim than the movie from what I can remember.


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## Montrovant (Nov 10, 2017)

Gracie said:


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The story was called Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption.  It was a novella, which I guess is when it's too long to be a short story but not long enough to be a novel.    It was published in Different Seasons, which also had Apt Pupil, The Body (which became Stand By Me, also a good movie), and The Breathing Method.  I read The Mist in his book of short stories called Skeleton Crew, but apparently it was first published 5 years prior to that in an anthology called Dark Forces.  I hadn't realized The Mist was also a novella, but I guess it was.    I definitely preferred the novella of The Mist to the movie.


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## Montrovant (Nov 10, 2017)

ChrisL said:


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I very much liked the Dracula with Gary Oldman.  I never read the book to compare it to, though.


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## ChrisL (Nov 10, 2017)

Montrovant said:


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Is that the one with Winona Ryder?  That was the most accurate one that I've seen and was the best one.  It kind of captured the creepiness of the book.  The book though . . . really scary and creepy.  The whole set up and atmosphere that it creates is like . . . supernatural.


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## HereWeGoAgain (Nov 10, 2017)

skye said:


> Unkotare said:
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  Yep...your imagination is a far better director than any movie mogul.


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## HereWeGoAgain (Nov 10, 2017)

Gracie said:


> WillMunny said:
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> > Lord of the Rings and Hannibal Lecter movies for the exact same reason - the movies trimmed out all the meandering, annoying, unnecessary fat the novels had, which made the plot feel a lot more streamlined and better-organized in general.
> ...



  The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings are the only books I've read more than once.
   I've tried reading past favorites again but knowing what's coming takes away the magic.


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## HereWeGoAgain (Nov 10, 2017)

Correll said:


> Books with a LOT of freaking characters and places in them, can become much easier to follow when made into movies.
> 
> You don't have to, with the beginning of each chapter, or sometimes even paragraphs, placing the character and the place, which in my opinion interferes with getting into the story.
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  Books with too many characters can be tedious.
Especially when you enjoy one plot line over the others.


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## Gracie (Nov 10, 2017)

The Mist did not stay true to the book. But..they still did well with the movie.


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## JOSweetHeart (Nov 10, 2017)

Charlotte's Web (I prefer the animated copy.)
Fudge A Mania
The Outsiders

God bless you always!!!

Holly


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## HereWeGoAgain (Nov 10, 2017)

JOSweetHeart said:


> Charlotte's Web (I prefer the animated copy.)
> Fudge A Mania
> The Outsiders
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  The Outsiders!!!
Wow,thanks for bring back old memories!! 
   I was around 13 when I read that the first time and I think I'll go back and try and read it again.
  I'll never forget the scene where he he went into a gang fight with a trash can over his head and swinging a bat!

   Funny how you remember scenes in a book...that was 39 years ago.


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## JOSweetHeart (Nov 10, 2017)

^^^ I was 14 when I was introduced to the book and film in my 9th grade English class. C. Thomas Howell (Pony Boy) is my favorite of the film.   

God bless you and him always!!!

Holly

P.S. May Darry (Patrick Swayze) rest in peace.


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## DGS49 (Nov 10, 2017)

Prince of Tides 
The Body ("Stand by Me")
The Bible


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## HereWeGoAgain (Nov 10, 2017)

JOSweetHeart said:


> ^^^ I was 14 when I was introduced to the book and film in my 9th grade English class. C. Thomas Howell (Pony Boy) is my favorite of the film.
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> God bless you and him always!!!
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    Pony Boy!! I was trying to remember the name.


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## WillMunny (Nov 10, 2017)

Unkotare said:


> *Movies Better Than Their Books*
> 
> *There are none.*



Uh, I just think you need to compare more novels and their movies then.  It'll give you more perspective when it comes to storytelling in general.


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## WillMunny (Nov 10, 2017)

ChrisL said:


> It depends on a lot of different things I guess.  Of course they are going to have to put a lot more in a book than in a movie for imagery purposes.  They have to set a tone and atmospheres and since that is done with words in a book as opposed to pictures, well, you see what I mean.



I think I understand what you're saying, because books and movies are very different mediums of entertainment.  So what works well in one may not work at all in the other.


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## WillMunny (Nov 10, 2017)

TNHarley said:


> my wife reads erotica
> do you know where i am going with this?



Actually I do, because my own sexual imagination is so creatively sick, it's much hornier and better than any porno I've ever seen.  The biggest reason I don't bother with other people's erotica is that I think it's boring.


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## WillMunny (Nov 10, 2017)

Gracie said:


> WillMunny said:
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> > Lord of the Rings and Hannibal Lecter movies for the exact same reason - the movies trimmed out all the meandering, annoying, unnecessary fat the novels had, which made the plot feel a lot more streamlined and better-organized in general.
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I've read them all and I can promise the movies' plot lines made more basic sense.


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## WillMunny (Nov 10, 2017)

Gracie said:


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I read the Shawshank Redemption many years ago.  It was a pretty good novelette but I think I liked the movie a little bit better.  In that case it's close between the two.


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## WillMunny (Nov 10, 2017)

See, this utterly cold-blooded, jolting scene is why I kind of prefer Kubrick's The Shining over Stephen Kings.  This extra "hallway scene" is pure Stanley Kubrick.  When I first saw this movie as a small child myself, you can imagine how much this scene must have fucked me up.


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## WillMunny (Nov 10, 2017)

Another scene in The Shining that I think Kubrick made more weirdly creepy than King.  LOL, I realize it's now my new mission here to convince USMB members that Kubrick's The Shining was more coldly morbid than Kings.  It's my new holy mission in Internet life, just accept it.


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## WillMunny (Nov 10, 2017)

Need I really say anything about this Kubrick scene that greatly expanded on the brief Jack/Grady conversation from the book?  I've never seen a "ghost" change from a friendly, servile gentleman to an utterly cold-blooded monster in a few minutes of conversation.  So perfectly.


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## rightwinger (Nov 10, 2017)

Montrovant said:


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Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank redemption was a short story and the movie was much better fleshed out


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## Montrovant (Nov 10, 2017)

rightwinger said:


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It is a novella.  Longer than a short story, shorter than a novel.    I wouldn't be surprised if the novella is longer than the script of the movie.  I've read that a movie screenplay generally goes about 1 minute per 1 page of script.  The Shawshank Redemption is 142 minutes long.  

It's been some years since I read the story, but I don't recall the movie being "much better fleshed out."


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## Montrovant (Nov 10, 2017)

WillMunny said:


> Another scene in The Shining that I think Kubrick made more weirdly creepy than King.  LOL, I realize it's now my new mission here to convince USMB members that Kubrick's The Shining was more coldly morbid than Kings.  It's my new holy mission in Internet life, just accept it.



The movie may have been more morbid, but I found the book more entertaining.  For that matter, I thought the book was creepier, although I was pretty young when I first read it.


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## ChrisL (Nov 10, 2017)

WillMunny said:


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> > It depends on a lot of different things I guess.  Of course they are going to have to put a lot more in a book than in a movie for imagery purposes.  They have to set a tone and atmospheres and since that is done with words in a book as opposed to pictures, well, you see what I mean.
> ...



Well that, and they have to delve more into the atmosphere and what is going on to set the tone in the book because you can't see it in pictures, they have to use words to describe it, so that is why books would be a lot more wordy than the movies.


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## ChrisL (Nov 10, 2017)

I've never read Frankenstein.  I've seen some silly movies about Frankenstein, none that I would consider very good adaptations of the book probably though.  I should read that one because I really enjoyed Dracula.  That was a great book.  I just saw an episode of Expedition Unknown recently and they went and visited the actual castle of Dracula (Vlad the Impaler) and talked about how Bram Stoker got a lot of his inspiration for his book by visiting the castle, talking to the locals, learning the history and the myths and legends regarding the dead and how rumors of the undead first began, and not to mention the terrible deeds of the former King of the region, Vlad Dracula.  Fascinating stuff.


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## Montrovant (Nov 10, 2017)

ChrisL said:


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On the other side, one thing that movies can't do nearly as well or frequently as books is to give the thoughts of the characters. It only works in movies in limited ways, while in books a character's thoughts and feelings can be described regularly and it is simply part of the story. I think that is a big part of why books can create so much more character depth than films, other than the obvious time constraints films have to work under.


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## ChrisL (Nov 10, 2017)

Montrovant said:


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And they describe it but you use your own imagination to create your own imagery.


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## frigidweirdo (Nov 10, 2017)

OldLady said:


> WillMunny said:
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Yes, Lord of the Rings is so much better than the movies, which at best are okay. I couldn't watch them a second time, but could read the books again.


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## Unkotare (Nov 11, 2017)

WillMunny said:


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I’ve compared very many. There are none.


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## Unkotare (Nov 11, 2017)

ChrisL said:


> I've never read Frankenstein.  I've seen some silly movies about Frankenstein, none that I would consider very good adaptations of the book probably though.  I should read that one because I really enjoyed Dracula.  That was a great book.  I just saw an episode of Expedition Unknown recently and they went and visited the actual castle of Dracula (Vlad the Impaler) and talked about how Bram Stoker got a lot of his inspiration for his book by visiting the castle, talking to the locals, learning the history and the myths and legends regarding the dead and how rumors of the undead first began, and not to mention the terrible deeds of the former King of the region, Vlad Dracula.  Fascinating stuff.








You’ve never read Frankenstein?!


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## Montrovant (Nov 11, 2017)

Unkotare said:


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> > I've never read Frankenstein.  I've seen some silly movies about Frankenstein, none that I would consider very good adaptations of the book probably though.  I should read that one because I really enjoyed Dracula.  That was a great book.  I just saw an episode of Expedition Unknown recently and they went and visited the actual castle of Dracula (Vlad the Impaler) and talked about how Bram Stoker got a lot of his inspiration for his book by visiting the castle, talking to the locals, learning the history and the myths and legends regarding the dead and how rumors of the undead first began, and not to mention the terrible deeds of the former King of the region, Vlad Dracula.  Fascinating stuff.
> ...



I've never read Frankenstein.  I don't know if anyone that I know has read it, either.  Lots of people have not read Frankenstein.


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## Unkotare (Nov 11, 2017)

Montrovant said:


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What??!!??!!?? What the heck? Read it!


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## Montrovant (Nov 11, 2017)

Unkotare said:


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The book is old enough that I worry the language differences would make it difficult to really immerse myself in the story.


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## Unkotare (Nov 11, 2017)

Montrovant said:


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Not at all. You'll love it.


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## theDoctorisIn (Nov 11, 2017)

I generally agree with the posters in this thread in saying that the books are almost universally better than the movies based on them.

But every rule has an exception, and for me, it's "Children of Men".

The book is OK. The movie is mind blowing.


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## rightwinger (Nov 11, 2017)

Montrovant said:


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I read the story about 30 years ago
It was about 100 pages

Movie was better


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## rightwinger (Nov 11, 2017)

The Godfather


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## WillMunny (Nov 11, 2017)

frigidweirdo said:


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Like I said, I've read all 3 Tolkein's LOTR novels and they were very, very creative.  But I also thought his novels had a lot of distracting plot clutter in them I thought was unnecessary plot-wise (like the Tom Bombadil character, who served no plot purpose of any kind).  Apparently Peter Jackson agreed with me because the movies' plots felt more "cleaned up" to me, that's all.  Nobody in their right mind can deny that seeing an LOTR movie on the big screen was a visceral, mental rollercoaster ride experience.


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## WillMunny (Nov 11, 2017)

Montrovant said:


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In high school English class I remember we read Frankenstein.  Then Ms. Mullins showed us the old 1930s Frankenstein movie on video.  I remember liking different things about the book and movie.  But I thought the Boris Karloff movie was openly scarier.  BTW, Frankenstein is the name of the scientist who created the monster, not the monster himself.  I'm ambivalent over whether the book or movie is better.  It's apples and oranges.


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## WillMunny (Nov 11, 2017)

rightwinger said:


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I noticed the movie had more general "flare" to it than the novelette.


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## WillMunny (Nov 11, 2017)

Montrovant said:


> WillMunny said:
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> > Another scene in The Shining that I think Kubrick made more weirdly creepy than King.  LOL, I realize it's now my new mission here to convince USMB members that Kubrick's The Shining was more coldly morbid than Kings.  It's my new holy mission in Internet life, just accept it.
> ...



Oh I know the novel had a much more realistic human family drama element to it, no question of that.  But I happened to enjoy its colder, blood-chilling, ghostly aspects more, which Kubrick seemed to focus on in the movie.  Hauntings are more fun than Jack's inner alcohol issues, just my own taste.


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## Unkotare (Nov 11, 2017)

WillMunny said:


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No, it's wagyu beef and rabbit poop.


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## ChrisL (Nov 11, 2017)

Unkotare said:


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> > I've never read Frankenstein.  I've seen some silly movies about Frankenstein, none that I would consider very good adaptations of the book probably though.  I should read that one because I really enjoyed Dracula.  That was a great book.  I just saw an episode of Expedition Unknown recently and they went and visited the actual castle of Dracula (Vlad the Impaler) and talked about how Bram Stoker got a lot of his inspiration for his book by visiting the castle, talking to the locals, learning the history and the myths and legends regarding the dead and how rumors of the undead first began, and not to mention the terrible deeds of the former King of the region, Vlad Dracula.  Fascinating stuff.
> ...



Hmm.  I thought that is what I wrote above?


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## bodecea (Nov 11, 2017)

JoeB131 said:


> Jaws.  The book had absolutely no likable characters..  Speilberg famously said halfway through reading the book, he was rooting for the Shark.  Then he took the book and made the characters people you'd want to cheer for.
> 
> The 1990 version of "A Handmaid's Tale", which was better than the crappy book by Margaret Atwood.  Her book had non-linear storytelling and a protagonist you kind of didn't care about.  The movie version had good performances by Robert Duvall, Faye Dunaway and Natasha Richardson.


The book Jaws was a blatant rip off of Moby Dick...


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