movies that are better than the books they are based on

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I can only think of three:

Jaws
The Godfather
The Ice Storm

― shookout (shookout), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 12:20 (twenty years ago)

Interview with a Vampire.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 12:22 (twenty years ago)

American Psycho

― Rotgutt (Rotgutt), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 12:22 (twenty years ago)

Eyes Wide Shut.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 12:22 (twenty years ago)

Closely Watched Trains is my favourite book and my favourite movie, but I don't know which one I enjoy more! Sometimes it's the movie, sometimes it's the book. Right now I'd say the movie -- but of course just barely.

― Ian Riese-Moraine. Exposing ambitious careerists as charlatans since 1986. (East, Wednesday, 8 June 2005 12:31 (twenty years ago)

A Room with A View
The Princess Bride

― jocelyn (Jocelyn), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 12:35 (twenty years ago)

"Eyes Wide Shut."

WAH? THOU ARETH MAD! Traumnovelle was far superior. :-)

― nathalie's post modern sleaze fest (stevie nixed), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 12:39 (twenty years ago)

American Psycho
The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Enemies, A Love Story
The Big Sleep
The Long Goodbye

― Alfred Soto (Alfred Soto), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 12:52 (twenty years ago)

The Commitments

― accentmonkey (accentmonkey), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 12:53 (twenty years ago)

like, every western ever. (probably. i've never read any westerns.)

― N_RQ, Wednesday, 8 June 2005 12:55 (twenty years ago)

Lord of the Rings.

― dog latin (dog latin), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 13:01 (twenty years ago)

Are the American Psycho votes jokes? You might as well say Gulliver's Travels.

The Godfather owns this thread. Also:

Trainspotting
Diary of a Chambermaid
Nosferatu

― Jetlag Willy (noodle vague), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 13:06 (twenty years ago)

Renoir's version of "Chambermaid" is superior to Buñuel's, confirmed by a screening of both films a few weks ago.

"American Psycho" is a dreadful book, and LOOOONG. The movie's no calssic, but does a better job at establishing a macabre tone than the novel (which some of my college professors treat as A Great American Novel).

― Alfred Soto (Alfred Soto), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 13:09 (twenty years ago)

yeah 'american psyho' the film pwns the book.

― N_RQ, Wednesday, 8 June 2005 13:13 (twenty years ago)

Frankenstein

― The Sensational Sulk (sexyDancer), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 13:14 (twenty years ago)

American Psycho is a meticulously constructed novel, the film is a 2nd rate slasher flick that blows most of Ellis' best jokes. Guess we'll have to disagree.

I couldn't choose between either of the Chambermaid movies, but the book's basically a bodice-ripper, yes?

― Jetlag Willy (noodle vague), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 13:16 (twenty years ago)

Tuomas is soooo OFF the money with "Eyes Wide Shut".

A Room with a View.
The Swimmer.

― jed_ (jed), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 13:16 (twenty years ago)

(xpost)

It sure is. "Belle de Jour" is also a better film than book (and another bodice-ripper).

― Alfred Soto (Alfred Soto), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 13:21 (twenty years ago)

this thread contains the highest ratio of contentious answers to posts i have ever come across.

Willy Wonka the film is better than Charlie the book.
High Fidelity
maybe the Maltese Falcon (such a wonderful film, but also a great book)

― Lee F# (fsharp), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 13:40 (twenty years ago)

Gone with the Wind. I tried to read the book and just couldn't. Also (possibly contentiously), The Talented Mr. Ripley. I tried to read that book too but was so put off by the sheer boringness of it that I had to discard it.

― accentmonkey (accentmonkey), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 13:47 (twenty years ago)

All of them.

― The Yellow Kid, Wednesday, 8 June 2005 16:48 (twenty years ago)

Ice Storm absolutely OTM.

― jaymc (jaymc), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 16:53 (twenty years ago)

Wise Blood
Midnight Cowboy

― C0L1N B... (C0L1N B...), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 16:54 (twenty years ago)

My dad's treasured example of this is Lonesome Dove. I cannot verify.

― Jordan (Jordan), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 16:55 (twenty years ago)

Starship Troopers

― C0L1N B... (C0L1N B...), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 16:55 (twenty years ago)

MASH
I haven't read the books, but the Godard adaptations from the 60s (My Life To Live, Contempt, Band of Outsiders etc.)

― Marxism Goes Better With Coke (Charles McCain), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 16:56 (twenty years ago)

HULK

― Huk-L, Wednesday, 8 June 2005 16:58 (twenty years ago)

Baz Luhrmann's Romeo + Juliet

― Gravel Puzzleworth (Gregory Henry), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 17:02 (twenty years ago)

The Hunt for Red October, which I am ashamed to admit I did read, but I was 13 OK?

― Ash (ashbyman), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 17:05 (twenty years ago)

Solaris (the Tarkovsky one)

― Zack Richardson (teenagequiet), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 17:12 (twenty years ago)

The guy who said The Lord of the Rings is on crack. And A Room with a View is a great, great novel. Film can't traffic in the charm and subtleties Forster delivers page after charge.

I'm gonna say The Firm. The movie wasn't the greatest, but the book, man. . . .

And also, The Shining. Not King's best novel (and a little too meta-, too 'pity me the struggling writer'), but one of the scariest movies I've ever seen, with Jack's strangest performance, to boot.

― Don Antonio Myer, Wednesday, 8 June 2005 17:13 (twenty years ago)

Starship Troopers

OTM! Also, the 2nd best use of Neil Patrick Harris of all time!

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 17:15 (twenty years ago)

>The Talented Mr. Ripley<

Baaah! The movie was SO wrongheaded.

The World According to Garp

The Manchurian Candidate (1962)

Kiss Me Deadly (tho I haven't read it -- CAN'T be as great)

The Butcher Boy

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 17:16 (twenty years ago)

The Butcher Boy

good film, NOT as good as the book

― kyle (akmonday), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 17:19 (twenty years ago)

Bridget Jones' Diary

― jocelyn (Jocelyn), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 17:32 (twenty years ago)

Close call on Butcher Boy, I admit. Ditto "The Portrait of a Lady" and Campion's free adaptation, which is one of the few great Hollywood films of the '90s.

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 17:33 (twenty years ago)

sorry, i think "A Room with a View" is a terrible book but a pretty good story. Most Forster is awful, actually.

we did this thread a few weeks ago btw.

― jed_ (jed), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 18:08 (twenty years ago)

A Passage to India is an interesting book but an absolutely butchered movie.

― jocelyn (Jocelyn), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 18:10 (twenty years ago)

otoh, Lean's "Oliver Twist" is better than Dickens' dodgy novel.

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 8 June 2005 18:15 (twenty years ago)

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