Best book to movie adaptation

[MCMLXXXII]

Just had a nice conversation with my better half. What is the best book adaptation you've seen in cinema?

For me, without doubt, it's The Green Mile. For me, it was even better then the book.

[Orby]

Green Mile is a good shout out.

Lord of the Rings immediately springs to mind, considering how nervous I was going into that movie thinking they would fuck it up. But they did a very good job.

The Road is another one, while there are some differences and some exceptions, the movie was just as heart string pulling and tear jerking than the book.

The Great Expectations (1946 version). Great adaption of a book I liked growing up as a kid.

[Fencers]

The Godfather, obviously.

Puzo wrote the screenplay for the film based on his own book. He never wrote a formal screenplay before for production. Years after the success of The Godfather films, Puzo decided to buy a book on how to write a screenplay. The first chapter of the book said, "Study the Godfather".

An actual masterpiece.

Mario Puzo wrote both screenplays for Godfather 1&2, saying it was a “cinch” as he just followed his book.
After, he thought he should learn about screenwriting so bought a book on writing and on the first page it said “study the Godfather movies as perfect examples of the art”.

[Khaza-R]

Bram Stoker's Dracula, Doctor Zhivago, and Fight Club all come to mind.

Personally I like film adaptations that are faithful in the spirit of the books but take liberties adapting it to a cinematic formula. Still keeping an artistic integrity along the way.

[Gumble]

Shogun

The only time I think they went:

Q: "Sir, how much of this book are we shooting?"

A: "Yes"

[PixelFox]

The Princess Bride

/thread

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Lord of the Rings immediately springs to mind

The Peter Jackson action flicks are not faithful adaptations of Tolkien's story. His story is about spiritual warfare and morale. Jackson's movies are about cool action scenes and choreography. His movies are also very desaturated and dull and depicts a dull fantasy world devoid of wonder. His movies are entertaining but miss the point of LotR. Same issue applies to Disney's movie adaptations of the Chronicles of Narnia books.

[Kyphael]

I'd say The Lord of the Rings. I love Shawshank Redemption, Jurassic Park, and Green Mile but I heard the movies greatly improved on the source material. Meanwhile with LoTR, the source material is great, and so is the trilogy.

[s_bushido]

That would probably depend a lot on what you mean by "best." Best movie, or most faithful. Unfortunately, those aren't necessarily the same thing.

I liked Watchmen. Snyder rather missed the point that most of the characters were supposed to be just normal schlubs, but otherwise it was pretty good. I'm sure the change to the ending was controversial, but I didn't have a problem with them ditching the fake space squid idea.

[Maljinwo]

The Godfather is the GOAT

Followed by Lord of the Rings

[Darththeo]

I'd say The Lord of the Rings. I love Shawshank Redemption, Jurassic Park, and Green Mile but I heard the movies greatly improved on the source material. Meanwhile with LoTR, the source material is great, and so is the trilogy.

Absolutely not true for Jurassic Park. The book goes a lot more into the themes the Crichton wrote about. Honestly, the book is by far better than anything the movie did. The book verges on being a horror novel. The movie definitely made it more of a summer action movie (which isn't bad).

Jurassic Park isn't bad, but the book is way better. It is help that Crichton was involved in the movie, but I feel anyone who thinks the movie is better likely saw the movie first before reading the book. Jurassic Park was my first non-kids novel I read when I was in 2nd or 3rd grade.

Personally to answer the topic, I would have to give it to Jurassic Park as best adaption and that is more because I don't have many I have seen where I have also read the book.

[Skizzit]

Most faithful has to be Sin City. They quite literally used the comic pages as storyboards. The first movie that is. The sequel is trash.

Best however I would say Starship Troopers. That's the best example of taking a source material and elevating it.

I liked Watchmen. Snyder rather missed the point that most of the characters were supposed to be just normal schlubs, but otherwise it was pretty good. I'm sure the change to the ending was controversial, but I didn't have a problem with them ditching the fake space squid idea.

Watchmen is the oddest adaptation ever to me. Snyder somehow managed to get all the events of the story and more or less nail the look, but he missed the entire point of the story. He took a series about how people putting on costumes and becoming vigilantes is a terrible idea that leads to nothing but pain and turned that into a "look how cool superheroes are!" movie. When I first saw it, I enjoyed it but the more I thought about it the more I disliked the movie.

[s_bushido]

Snyder somehow managed to get all the events of the story and more or less nail the look, but he missed the entire point of the story.

That's because Snyder's all style, no substance. That movie was good (imo) because the source material was amazing and did most of the heavy lifting for him. He just had to shoot what was on the page, basically.

[Darththeo]

Best however I would say Starship Troopers. That's the best example of taking a source material and elevating it.

What? Is this a joke?

I can understand enjoying the movie, but saying it elevated the book is just bizarre to me.

[Doctor Amadeus]

The Never Ending Story. But only the first one. The Author hated it so much he sued. The sequels attempted to be more true to the source and I hated them lol weird.

- - - Updated - - -

The Godfather, obviously.

Puzo wrote the screenplay for the film based on his own book. He never wrote a formal screenplay before for production. Years after the success of The Godfather films, Puzo decided to buy a book on how to write a screenplay. The first chapter of the book said, "Study the Godfather".

An actual masterpiece.

I agree it was a masterpiece. But I hated the story. It is technically near flawless in acting, writing and directing. I just always hated the story.

[HelipsBP]

Well, to be honest, the first movie that comes for me to mind is Starship Troopers too, so I agree with Skizzit.
Besides some changes, like Dizzy being a man, cutting out the battles with other aliens than Arachnids and super-rocket-few-kilometers-jumping, the movie, albeit being a satire, shows greatly a youth society blinded with a fascist-military mega country propaganda, almos similar to the book, and also adding a bit of humor and a few things that made the story more reliable in late 90s.
I cannot find a second-close movie adaptation to Starship Troopers to be honest.

But that is just my opinion...

PS. I find it funny that I was just watching Starship Troopers yesterday afternoon and now find posts about that movie here

[Biomega]

What? Is this a joke?

I can understand enjoying the movie, but saying it elevated the book is just bizarre to me.

Maybe elevate wasn't the best word they could have chosen, but I have to agree - the movie is deceptively smart about what it does, and really takes something that the producers have understood from the book to the next level in a cinematic adaptation. It does things differently, but it's really kind of what a good adaptation is about: not recreating the source 1:1 but taking the essence of the source and doing it justice in a different medium. The film absolutely achieves this, using cheesy acting and cheap plots to be bitingly satirical and oddly prescient about precisely the kinds of things the book was interested in.

It's probably not the BEST book-to-movie adaptation, but it's a very good one.

I don't know what the best would be. Godfather is a contender to be sure. One might argue Rashomon is another, though it's tricky because it's based on two different short stories and is rather loose about actually adapting them.

[Doffen]

PS. I find it funny that I was just watching Starship Troopers yesterday afternoon and now find posts about that movie here

Lol I watched Starship Troopers yesterday too and its like almost 10 years since I watched it the last time

Such a unique movie. And the 15 year old in me remembers Denise from that time

[Kyphael]

Absolutely not true for Jurassic Park. The book goes a lot more into the themes the Crichton wrote about. Honestly, the book is by far better than anything the movie did. The book verges on being a horror novel. The movie definitely made it more of a summer action movie (which isn't bad).

Jurassic Park isn't bad, but the book is way better. It is help that Crichton was involved in the movie, but I feel anyone who thinks the movie is better likely saw the movie first before reading the book. Jurassic Park was my first non-kids novel I read when I was in 2nd or 3rd grade.

Personally to answer the topic, I would have to give it to Jurassic Park as best adaption and that is more because I don't have many I have seen where I have also read the book.

John Hammond was a douche and Malcolm died in Crichton's novel. I'd say the movie greatly improved on the book given Richard Attenborough and Jeff Goldblum's perfomances.

[Mysterymask]

The Peter Jackson action flicks are not faithful adaptations of Tolkien's story. His story is about spiritual warfare and morale. Jackson's movies are about cool action scenes and choreography. His movies are also very desaturated and dull and depicts a dull fantasy world devoid of wonder. His movies are entertaining but miss the point of LotR. Same issue applies to Disney's movie adaptations of the Chronicles of Narnia books.

I mean the Bakshi Movies are REALLY faithful and it still kills me that he didn't get to finish