Can’t Be Done
Posted By smokingpen on June 2, 2009
I think one of my biggest pet peeves, right behind people who don’t drive the speed limit and right in front of a highly reviewed and praised work of fiction that ends up being a pile of crap are people who are such big fans of a book or series of books that they immediately take the stance that said book-slash-series-slash-author is impossible to adapt. This was the case with The Lord of the Rings series of movies and, admittedly, it required the inclusion of CGI and the advancement of that technology as well as digital film capture to make it a reality. However, even with The Lord of the Ring movies, which I am only sort of a fan of, Peter Jackson had to take a lot of liberties in translating the narrative texture of the stories into a visual medium. As that is true of any book turned movie, and as most science fiction and fantasy movies are not actually any good (case in point Star Wars) even if they become fan favorites and, to some extent, cultural icons, the outcome is a hurdle that is man-made rather than one that is real.
A series of books turned movies that, as they are read, seemed like an impossible transition from page to screen is the Harry Potter movies and yet, Warner Bros. and the various screenwriters have successfully taken the plot of the books and adapted the story into a visual medium. This is also true of other books that didn’t seem like they could be translated such as Robert Heinlein’s Starship Troopers and (to a much lesser extent) Isaac Asimov’s I, Robot. Granted, in order to express the message of the books and the core themes the production had to take liberties and expand upon the ideas of the stories, but that is how a book is made into a movie. Someone reads it, understands the core elements of the book that are transferable to the big screen, acquires the rights, and then makes a movie.
Not every aspect or element of a book will be translatable. What is worse is when a book comes out at 700 pages and the studio suggests that it should be two movies because it is simply too long to fit into one movie. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows suffers from this. In reality, most of the book is trash exposition that is unnecessary in the actual telling of the story and as a result the decision to split the book into two movies is more about money than it is about the density or quality of the story.
In the case of books that are specific to a genre, science fiction and/or fantasy, the narrative of the book is actually one of the smallest factors in determining whether or not it can be translated. Much larger are fan appeal, general appeal, and budget. If there is no general appeal and only fans of the genre know about the book(s) than a budget for a movie would be miniscule and, “Yes,” a crap movie would result. Just because fans like something doesn’t mean it translates into movies either. More, just because fans have a high regard for the narrative and elements of a story doesn’t mean they are actually necessasry to the story or the translation and as a result, neither the screen adaption nor a specific director, producer, or writer are key to that adaptation.
Believe it or not, books, in general, aren’t all that hard to adapt in a lot of ways. The question isn’t one of adaptation in any circumstance, that is the easy part, but rather of ability to market the genre book to a wide enough audience that will, in turn, offer a return on investment. In short, studios and everyone associated with them are in the business to make money and even though it is nice in theory to suggest that art for arts sake will eventually result in money, a movie that loses money, and a series of movies that lose money, will ultimately cause the studio to go out of business and results in other studios lack of willingness to touch a project.
No, there is not real skill in adapting even a multi-volume graphic novel series to the big screen whether live action or CGI or a combination of both. There is a lot of skill in selling the necessary budget to a studio so that the movie and actors and production are properly funded so the movie will actually do something and go somewhere.
John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Cassandra West
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