Most disappointing movie adaptation of a book

Gaspode

So folks, as it says above, what for you was the most disastrous movie adaptation of a book? This can be so disappointing particularly if the book was a favourite of yours

The one that springs to mind for me ( as I was talking about it in work today) is the recent Hitchhikers guide to the galaxy which was so seriously awful!

mikemac

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast_Food_Nation
Absolutly brilliant book by investigative journalist Eric Schlosser

The movie was rubbish. Top actors like Greg Kinnear and Bruce Willis couldn't save it.
Cameo from Avril Lavigne too

monkeyfudge

The Handmaid's Tale and Bonfire of the Vanities would be two obvious ones that immediately spring to mind.

Denerick

Lord of the Rings.

Could have been worse, but quite frankly I would have preferred if they never bothered making a film for such a seminal book.

A close second is The Beach.

donaghs

Not exactly a book, but I was expecting something good from the "Judge Dredd" film, and it was awful beyond words.

monkeyfudge

There was actually a hell of a lot they got right about the Judge Dread film.

It's just let down by the fact that they got the title character wrong and gave him an annoying sidekick.

giddybootz

Well when i heard they had changed to ending of The Horse Whisperer when they made it to a film I refused to watch it. Its a favourite book of mine from my early teens and to this day I haven't seen the movie...won't watch anything with Redford now!!

Really loved the LOTR movies but was very sad that Tom Bombadil wasn't in them

Manach

David Brin's "The Postman".

Not only were whole segments dropped, the film lacked the sense of pace & struggle of the book.

zesman

Denerick wrote: »

A close second is The Beach.

Have to agree. I thought the movie adaptation was terrible.

meditraitor

The hitchikers guide to the galaxy was brutal.

High fidelity was a big dissapointment

Iago

Unfortunatly most of the Stephen King adaptations, but in particular The Stand & IT.

The list goes on from there

Juan Pablo

"Stuey" aka High Roller, a shockingly bad adaptation of the book "One of a Kind; The Stu Ungar story"

IrishGooner83

Bringing Down the House by Ben Mezrich was a great book....

I had high hopes for the film version when Kevin Spacey was announced in the cast, However film was a big let down... Great book tho.

Another one was Runaway Jury..... Again thought the book was very well put together with plenty of suspense.... But despite the best efforts of Hackman, Cusack and Weisz the film never had that same edge of suspense!

silvine

The Watchmen for that sex scene alone.

Otis Driftwood

American Psycho


Now before anyone goes off on a tangent about the movie,Bales performance etc let me explain.

A book like AP,is IMO,virtually unfilmable because the best parts of the book are all in Pat Batemans head.One scene that springs automatically to mind is the scene with the business cards.In the book it is just amazingly cringe worthy and you can picture yourself as Bateman.Things like that are simply not transferable to the movie screen(inner-monologues)and I have never seen a movie that has managed to pull the transfer off.This coupled with the toning down of the violence took away from the movie as a whole also.I know Hollywood frowns down on

showing child murders

on screen and

the scene with the lady and the rat couldnt be shown in graphic detail but it could have been implied/off screen etc

as I believe they are 2 of the key scenes in Batemans descent.

Dont get me wrong,its not that its a bad movie,AFAIC its Bales career best performance but I was so dissappointed with the overall difference between book and movie.

MooseJam

giddybootz wrote: »

Well when i heard they had changed to ending of The Horse Whisperer when they made it to a film I refused to watch it. Its a favourite book of mine from my early teens and to this day I haven't seen the movie...won't watch anything with Redford now!!

Really loved the LOTR movies but was very sad that Tom Bombadil wasn't in them

how did the book end ?

gman2k

Bonfire of the Vanities.

Denerick

MooseJam wrote: »

how did the book end ?

Sauron wins.

994

V for Vendetta

Hunchback

Denerick wrote: »

Lord of the Rings.

Could have been worse, but quite frankly I would have preferred if they never bothered making a film for such a seminal book.

A close second is The Beach.

DUDE NO! Forgive me, but I haven't read through the whole thread, cuz I seriously had to just say NOOO, the adaptations, particularly The Fellowship Of The Ring do the best job that could ever have been done, to what everyone agrees was/is a seminal work. Props to Peter Jackson. Dude, don't be a hater..

pwd

Animal Farm. Because of the changed ending. Completely fncks up the whole point of the book. stupid

im_invisible

id agree with the runaway jury, and hitchikers guide,
one that i havnt seen, but probably will disappoint is the golden compass, really loved the books

Dades

gman2k wrote: »

Bonfire of the Vanities.

+100.

Melanie fcuking Griffith? :pac:

godspal

All the Pretty Horses was just terrible.

bladespin

I am Legend - what a waste of a good story.

Denerick

CKonetheonlyone wrote: »

DUDE NO! Forgive me, but I haven't read through the whole thread, cuz I seriously had to just say NOOO, the adaptations, particularly The Fellowship Of The Ring do the best job that could ever have been done, to what everyone agrees was/is a seminal work. Props to Peter Jackson. Dude, don't be a hater..

Please do not EVER use the word Dude again.

Gaspode

I enjoyed the LOTR movies to be honest, and was glad that a lot was left out, lets face it reading about dwarves family history and having them sing for pages on end is bad enough in a book, but in a movie would be torture.

I was also disappointed with the film Contact, based on Carl Sagan's novel of the same name. Didnt like the lead lady as played by jodie Foster, she wasnt right for the part, and the huge central theme of religious awakening/revelation wasn't explored properly. Not a brilliant novel to be fair, but it certainly became a crap movie!

hkcharlie

zesman wrote: »

Have to agree. I thought the movie adaptation was terrible.

That was really really bad, that final scene in the film where they are having a party on the beach with stacked up speakers and a dj booth. What a waste of a decent tale.

hkcharlie

BLACK HAWK DOWN

seriously, they may aswell have rewritten so that the yanks won and came back to a ticker tape parade.
Absolute US cinema hype, RUBBISH!

The Mad Hatter

994 wrote: »

V for Vendetta

Seconded. I wish they'd stop turning Alan Moore's work into summer blockbusters.

Though a lot of people here seem to think that the best way to adapt a book to the screen is to present you with a facsimile of the book on screen. I think it's far more important that the themes and central feeling of the book be preserved than the plot or superficial aspects of the characters.

Bottle_of_Smoke

Animal farm was such a good book - what did they do with the ending in the film?