Movies that were better than the Books

[7oddisdead]

theres really only one thing that comes to mind in this for me. the mothman prophecies

[DogFromDuckhunt]

Bourne Ultimatum.
Starship Trooopers. Cheesy as it was.
Anything made from a Tom Clancy book.

[Leedo2502]

Starship Trooopers. Cheesy as it was.

Oh my god! THe book Starship Troopers was the shit... I loved the politics of it



Though I can begrudgingly accept that most would find it boring

[Leedo2502]

I'll even say any movie based off of a book by Stephen King is going to be better than the book

[lanezjones]

I think not a single movie is better than the book it taken.....mmmm.......Yes I do....not a single movie...!!!

[Litmaster]

You guys are friggin crazy... movies SUCK! They always have to cut corners and leave stuff out in order to condense the whole story.

Saying that movies are better than books is like saying that watching highlights of a football game is better than watching the game itself.


Also, the visual nature of movies automatically means that they'll put more emphasis on action scenes where something is 'happening' rather than on more subtle character development and underlying tension. The result is that damn near half of a 3 hour movie is taken up by bullshit car chases and fight scenes, where this may not be nearly so emphasized in the book version. They basically steamroll all the nuance in favor of flashy sensationalism.


Besides, in a movie you cannot get inside the head of a character like the way you can in a book. It's a total weakness of the visual medium.

[DannyBox]

"Books are always better" (that's the quote of my boo) girlfriend lol my thinking is that, movies are a way of turning that imagination of the readers minds, back to life in the BIG SCREEN but...sadly they not get it quite right when directors buy some of the permits to change stuff etc... but when you do it whit the dedication like Peter Jackson did you will get a piece of art

[Litmaster]

... but when you do it whit the dedication like Peter Jackson did you will get a piece of art

Tolkien was a bit long-winded with some of his tedious songs and page upon page of meeting-discussion dialogue. He was a bit too in love with the world he created, which is by now a cliche among fantasy writers. I re-read the Hobbit last summer after nearly two decades since I last read it, and found it quite a bit slower than I had remembered. By today's standards, I think the series would be improved a bit if a few dozen pages were edited out, but this would only make it a better book.

My point:
- I thought the LOTR movies were done as well as they could be, by any director
- I thought the LOTR books were great, but could be better with some stern editing

Nevertheless, a good book beats a great movie any day.

[Osiris]

Comes to Books subforums, says movies are better.

[Vlarken]

I'll even say any movie based off of a book by Stephen King is going to be better than the book

......No. Most movies based off of his books butcher the story. Also, a lot of things that he does with writing sound good in a book, but translate poorly into a movie. Example: In Dreamcatcher the character Beaver has all these strange made up swearwords that seem funny and unique in the book, but sound rather stupid in the movie. A lot of the thought processes that go in in character's heads don't translate well either, and just most dialogue taken directly from the book doesn't sound that great on film.