Albertinho

I started reading up on the casting choices for the cinematic adaptation of The Fault In Our Stars, and seeing the hate and vitriol that people expel towards a product that doesn’t even exist yet, and how it will “ruin their memory” of the book… It all seems so stupid?

That is not how adaptations work. It’s never how adaptations have worked. When people complain that a film or TV show is not being “faithful” (to me) they are saying “I am not allowing the full artistic capabilities of a medium to  engulf me because I am too pre-occcupied with how it relates to it’s previous model”. I also call this the “Where’s the Quidditch?” argument.

The beauty of art is that it carries different meaning and power through its differing mediums. What works in a book will suck on film. This is why all those literary adaptations of movies that you see in bargain bins at your local bookstore always suck. When you perfectly use the original material as a complete blueprint for another medium, you might appease your “fears” for what may or may not have gone down. But you end up with something forgettable; a charade of the original, merely pretending when it should stand on it’s own two feet. I’m looking at you, The Perks Of Being A Wallflower.

If Mario Puzo fans had stepped in and complained about the change of focus and the casting of A-list actors in The Godfather, well, we may not have had The Godfather. Same goes for Jaws, Jurassic Park, West Side Story, Spec Ops: The Line… You name it, it probably had a basis in an original story that somebody out there loved and that somebody out there feels equally as robbed for a successor existing. As far as I know, the latter is the only reason Star Wars fans exist today.

The best inter-medium adaptations attain the original spirit of their works and translate them flawlessly into a new medium. This is why Game of Thrones works: an episodic television drama fits perfectly with the original themes of GRRM’s work, whilst being able to take it’s own unique path with the original creation.

So unless you end up with a Notebook/Twilight clone, don’t complain if a film doesn’t fit your vision 100%, or even if it doesn’t recreate the original 100%. Judge as it’s meant to be judged: as a film, saying it’s own message, with its own world and own merits and own medium to comprehend.

And even if it does come out bad, you still have the book.

colporteur replied to your photo: Sometimes I feel greedy and bad for constantly…

you have a great outlook and attitude (being 100% truthful.)

The people close to me know it’s super-hard getting to this point. I spend weeks feeling like the worst person in the world. Then you have an epiphany and things seem manageable. From what I know, it’s about valuing those times when that happens, and riding it out when things get shit.