ChrisKnudsen

Omega Man was awesome. Never read the book, though.

Mondo Kane

Haven't read the book either, but I love this movie too.

Wanted to clarify this:

Rockmjd23

Maybe the third try will be the charm...

http://imdb.com/title/tt0480249/combined

PopcornTreeCt

I bought the Criterion DVD of The Man Who Fell to Earth which included the book it was based on. I read the book first and then watched the film. The book wasn't great only decent, the movie, however, was incoherent and silly.

H8nXTC

How about the other way around? Bad book made into a good movie...
My vote would have to be American Psycho, the book I found unintelligent in many parts and flat boring, the movie I found better (but not great like many of you think), but most noteworthy was Christian Bale's performance that was fantastic and made the movie more than worth watching.

fmian

I think among some of the best book to movie adaptations in modern times are Stand By Me and The Shawshank Redemption. They're extremely faithful to the sources, apart from minor changes. I was in the middle of reading Kings 'Hearts in Atlantis' when I heard about the movie being made. I was hoping they'd pull it off but kinda hesitant cause the book comprises of about 4-5 unrelated and totally different stories, none with a point. The movie only used one of those stories which was a strange mix of the supernatural, family values, rites of passage and suspense. As a whole the book was passable and interesting. The movie was far from hitting the mark. Not that there was a mark to hit anyway.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that they shouldn't have tried to make a movie from this book.

mrhan

Does a comic book adaptation count? The worst has got to be the Wonder Woman movie from 1974 with Cathy Lee Crosby and Richardo Montalban. It was as if they didn't read any of the comic books and just made a movie with the title as Wonder Woman.

Snowmaker

I don't read many books, but this one definitely pissed me off when I saw the movie after reading the novel.

Mondo Kane

The Roger Ebert thread reminded me of Sounder. A good, faithful film up until the cop-out ending.

UAIOE

See my earlier post where i talk about "Frankenstein"

mllefoo

Ralph Bakshi's Lord of the Rings wins hands down.
Disney's Jungle Book is a close second.

caligulathegod

Actually, there was a couple years in the early 70s where Wonder Woman was pretty close to that. She lost her costume and powers. She turned into Bruce Lee. It wasn't until 1972 she got her costume back. Check it out:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wonder_....2FI_Ching_Era

tlwizard

I would argue Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. I blame that primarily on Christopher Columbus, seeing as how the screenwriter has been the same on every film and Prisoner of Azkaban was great (had a great director).

But Congo, Bonfire are good choices as well. Worst grapic novel adaptation... From Hell. But think of the range... Dr. Suess books? Cat in the Hat.

Upcoming contenders... The Golden Compass and Ender's Game. Worried about those.

Jadow

Congo

I thought it was a good book, horribly movie. Actually Michael Crighton books have a tendency to be bad movies! Sphere, Congo, Eaters of the Dead, Timeline, all turned out to be really bad movies, but all were ok books.

Alien Redrum

I think it's one of those cases like The Shining. It took me years to appreciate Kubrick's version because I kept basing it on the book.

As a standalone movie, it's awesome. Compared to the book, it's horrid.

I think the same applies to The Omega Man.

dhmac

I'll fourth the The Bonfire of the Vanities mention. A great book that satirizes our Media Culture as well as the "Political Correctness" of it shouldn't then be given a P.C. movie adaptation that removed all of the bite of the novel.

Wikpedia has a decent entry on it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bon...f_the_Vanities

riley_dude

Lords of Discipline.
Millennium.

calhoun07

I Robot. Worst EVER.

paradicelost

I have to completely disagree with you on that one. Prisoner was a good film but if you read the book it was a very crappy adaption of the novel. I do agree that it had a great director. The die hard fans of Harry Potter that i talk to always tell me that Prisoner was the worst film of the bunch. And other than a few changes here and there, Sorcerer's Stone stayed somewhat accurate.
Again this is just my opinion so i'm not trying to step on your toes TL.

TimeandTide

The book, I Am Legend, is vastly superior to the movie. Loved the book, but couldn't get through even half of Omega Man. The novel is more horror/suspense (think Assault on Precinct 13/Living Dead here), while the film is ALL camp. A quick read, and well worth it.

And my vote for worst adaptation? Lord of the Flies...the newer one. Absolute garbage. Fahrenheit 451 is a distant second, IMO.

NatrlBornThrllr

The Unbearable Lightness of Being.

Hear me out. As far as adaptations go, I think this one fell flat. Kundera's novel is poetic, and flows so well from philosophical, to political, to basic but great storytelling. The novel has been called "unfilmable." I agree with that wholeheartedly. The movie is a good one, and occassionally peeks into my favorites list, but it doesn't capture half of the novel's greatness. As such, I'd call it one of the poorer book-to-film adaptations.

-JP

SuicycoDave

Rats by James Herbert

tlwizard

I hear what you're saying and completely respect your opinion. My opinion however is that the film is an adaptation and not a literalization. The first two films, while they did maintain much of what happened in the book, were at best lifeless. It's suppose to be a film and there's no way to keep everything from the book to be put into the movie.

While Prisoner may very well be the one film out of four to drop the most stuff, it's the one film out of the four to be a real film. It's not choppy, clunky, overpacked. If I want the book, then I read it. But I go to the cinema to see a film. Maintaining all the bits and details does not a good adaptation make. (again, in my opinion).

That's why I don't think that The Shining is a bad adaptation. I think it's an amazing adaptation. Because it creates a true masterpiece of a film, adapted from a book. If I want everything that Stephen King thought to put in the story, I'll read the book. I think that the remake of the Shining shows, once again, that a more literalization of a book as opposed to an "adaptation" can be damaging and ultimately boring. They're two completely different mediums.

To go out on a limb and switch the progression of mediums, if someone adapted a film into a book, you would hope to all that is holy that it would be an adaptation and not a literalization.

"Green tree. Blue sky. Potter in robes. Running. Wand up." Would be incredibly boring and sterile (as the first two films were for me) as opposed to something like, "Rushing beneath the girth of the great green tree of old, silhouetted before the expanse of England's sky, Potter's robes nipped at his heels as he rushed towards his enemy... raising his wand and determination every step of the way."

To me, although maybe not genius writing, the second version is better. I think the first version would work as some sort of PoMo experimental fiction, but I'd rather read the second than the first... because it's more fitting of literature. There is an art to adaptation and part of it is knowing what to drop, what to keep, and, most importantly, how to make a good film that stands on its own.

I just wrote a lot. I apologize. If anyone would like to adapt, and not literalize, this post into a short film, I give you all the rights.

riley_dude

Here's another one.
Pelican Brief.

thing-fish24

I have to completely disagree with you on that one. Bakshi's "Lord of the Rings" is a great film. Now, if you want to talk about bad adaptations, check out the Peter Jackson film trilogy. It barely resembles the books Tolkien had written. Bakshi's film captured the feel of Middle Earth much better than Jackson did. Too bad he didn't get to do a sequel.