This has been and, I feel, will always be a never-ending debate in our world. Books being adapted into movies. Bookworms against the cinematic world. In in this post, I just want to share my opinion about this issue.
Or opinions.
Actually my point of view about this subject has evolved as the years have passed, through the three stages as follows:
Stage 1:
I know most of you have been in this mindset: THE BOOK IS WAY BETTER THAN THE MOVIE!!!
Yes don’t worry I sided 100% with books too a few years earlier. I would always read first, or even if I couldn’t do so, still I would fiercely be excited about how the movie is so different and how the book was like… GOD, compared to a mere mortal…
I think it’s childish though that kind of behaviour… It’s stubborn as well and today it only reminds me of narrow-mindedness (like homophobia, though that’s too much of a serious thing) and… well, fangirling, which I always tend to frown at, although I admit I totally fangirl about Game of Thrones haha!
Stage 2:
Stage 2 only recently passed away a few… days ago?
I had just expressed my stage 2 views in a recent video of mine:
For those of you who can’t (or don’t want to, lol) watch the video, it basically explains that I’ve figured out how it’s actually not that straightforward to transform a book into a movie as they use different tools (paper vs moving images) and different goals (appeal to our creative mind vs to our senses like sight, hearing…); therefore they just can’t be exactly the same.
So I decided to consider a book and its movie adaptation as two different entities and enjoy them both instead of constantly comparing one to another and be disappointed.
Stage 3:
This is that in which I’m currently in!!!
That in which I realised that finally my stage 2 theory is a little WRONG.
No, we should take the book and the movie as two separate entities!
We shouldn’t not compare them. At least not exactly.
Okay, what I’m going to reveal to you might not be true for all books and movie adaptations. But I’ve realised it with Game of Thrones, Hunger Games and Divergent (and perhaps more but I don’t have more names right now :P)…
Actually, the book and the movie compensate for each other! Like since the visual aspects are more emphasised on in the movie and the empathic one in the book, being exposed to the two simply makes the story even better.
(I hope I make sense)
After all we have to keep in mind that whether it’s the book or movie version, regardless of which came first, the main aim towards the audience (readers or watchers) is STORYTELLING. That’s what any producer and writer want to do: to share a story.
If you insist on an example: in Game of Thrones, the tortures Theon goes through in season three doesn’t appear in the book, however it does happen and in the book we come to know about later on but in subtler ways; but I know that if the series hadn’t put that additional emphasis on his torture, I would not have been as sympathetic towards Theon. The TV show compensated for missing/hidden parts in the book and on the other side, the book gives more in depth details about what goes on in the character’s mind and inner thoughts, which allows me to connect to the same characters in the series much better.
So now not only do I appreciate both the book and its movie adaptation but I also can link the two, and in doing so, I can have a better and richer experience of the story as a whole.
Now I want to read your opinions!!! What stage are you in? (even a stage that I haven’t come across yet).
An Evil Nymph.
An Evil Nymph's Blog 
Your youtube vlog was dead on 🙂
Thank you!! 🙂
It is a fair point that you make, some times films can do a good job on certain things because they are a stronger medium for such things. If I don’t compare them as separate entities, I just lose sleep. My problem is usually that they change a key plot point in the film that then skews the whole message of the book but maybe I’m just to picky.
Indeed. Then it’s healthier to remain at stage 2 😉
Yeah it’s true that it’s still frustrating on the spot when it happens.
You have some interesting ideas, and I like that you highlighted that the key issue was storytelling.
While working on my MA degree in English Lit., I took several classes on Adaptation theory and on Film Theory. The general idea in some theories is that, like you rightly pointed out, both are means of storytelling; however, they are different modes of storytelling. They interact with audiences in different ways, which is good (essentially what you said in Phase 2). An opera should tell a story differently than a play, a movie, a novel, or a video game.
ON a more humorous note, the debate between book vs. movie led a roommate to say, “That’s why I see the movie first. Then I like them both.”
Thank you!
Oh nice I’m actually also going to take some classes on film studies and screen writing with my Bachelor this year and I can’t wait 😀
Haha yeah that roomate is right! XD