"We drew a horizontal line from the top of the hill to illustrate how the structure would not be out of scale within the area," Pawson says. "We explained what we were doing and the reasons behind it. We did not have to make any substantial changes." Since its completion, the uncompromising house has become a local celebrity, evoking positive reactions from most passers-by."The structure of the building is only fifteen feet across. I hope the new owners aren't think of keeping cats. [Mefi]
Architecture London's smallest new house? Sometimes great things come in tiny packages:
News Oddly enough, Edwina Currie didn't turn up for her usual gig on Radio Five Live tonight, perhaps because under normal circumstances, her's would be the topic of conversation. Just in case you haven't heard, she and John Major had an affair during the late Eighties. If that image isn't messy enough, the funny thing is no one knew. James Ingram the Number Ten press secretary of the time has only just found out himself. Norma Major knew and has forgiven him but suddenly a whole era of British politics is in a new light.
Competition Still no takers. The questions are here. The prize is a CD. The questions aren't that hard. The CD is shiny. The address to send the answers to is feelinglistless@btopenworld.com.
Abroad III I’ve always found the prospect of a hotel room a disappointing experience, especially in hotel chains. For me a place has to have a sense of presence, an impression of all that has gone before. To truly be a place to feel comfortable it has to be familiar. The only similarity I found at the Comfort Hotel in Paris was that it looked like every other room I’ve ever stayed in. This was probably the worst place I’ve stayed in. Some questions:
Why is the bathroom filled out completely with tiles including the floor, so that any water which flies there stays there. Why isn’t there a shower curtain, so that when I do want to have a shower I spend the entire time against the wall trying not to flood the rest of the bathroom. Why is the holder for the showerhead vertical to the wall so that I can’t actually stand underneath like I can at home? Why does the bath itself look like it was designed to accommodate dwarfs only?
Whose big idea was it to make the bed that way? So you fold the sheet so it covers the full length of the bed, under the pillows, and trap it under a woolen throw, covered again by another sheet. How am I supposed to get into this without wrecking the equilibrium of my sleep patterns? And when I do get in, why should I then spend the whole night trying to keep all but the bottom sheet on the bed? Further, does the maid have a really small head? I can assume this is the only reason there are two wafer thin pillows, which together only amount to half a real pillow, and require that I use all of my possessions to support my cranium for two nights?
Why is the restaurant located in a room which resembles a doctor’s surgery? Why are the hotel’s cleaning staff in here out numbering the guests, shouting a smoking? Why is that cigarette butt lying in an empty jam sachet? Why does the coffee actually taste alright? Why does the cornflakes have the consistency of old rice paper and with the skimmed milk taste like real cornflakes do with water after many pints of cider? Why are people eating them? How old are these croissants and pan du chocolate? Why did make me want to leave as quickly as possible? Why did I have breakfast in the Louvre the following day?
Why did I pay £48 per night for this?
Why is the bathroom filled out completely with tiles including the floor, so that any water which flies there stays there. Why isn’t there a shower curtain, so that when I do want to have a shower I spend the entire time against the wall trying not to flood the rest of the bathroom. Why is the holder for the showerhead vertical to the wall so that I can’t actually stand underneath like I can at home? Why does the bath itself look like it was designed to accommodate dwarfs only?
Whose big idea was it to make the bed that way? So you fold the sheet so it covers the full length of the bed, under the pillows, and trap it under a woolen throw, covered again by another sheet. How am I supposed to get into this without wrecking the equilibrium of my sleep patterns? And when I do get in, why should I then spend the whole night trying to keep all but the bottom sheet on the bed? Further, does the maid have a really small head? I can assume this is the only reason there are two wafer thin pillows, which together only amount to half a real pillow, and require that I use all of my possessions to support my cranium for two nights?
Why is the restaurant located in a room which resembles a doctor’s surgery? Why are the hotel’s cleaning staff in here out numbering the guests, shouting a smoking? Why is that cigarette butt lying in an empty jam sachet? Why does the coffee actually taste alright? Why does the cornflakes have the consistency of old rice paper and with the skimmed milk taste like real cornflakes do with water after many pints of cider? Why are people eating them? How old are these croissants and pan du chocolate? Why did make me want to leave as quickly as possible? Why did I have breakfast in the Louvre the following day?
Why did I pay £48 per night for this?
TV Finally a positive review for Joss Weidon's non-Buffy show 'Firefly'. The original filmed pilot got a right drubbing in SFX magazine this month, but like the afformentioned vmpire sayer show, Joss got another crack at it and has apparently turning out another classic. 'Farscape' fans take heart, methadone is on the way.
Film Along the same lines, Sidekick magazine lists directors who should be more famous than they are (and the writer seems to be on first name terms with all of them ...) There isn't anyone here whose work I don't cherish, but I think to say that Soderbergh isn’t well known is stretching it – and the Coen brothers? Good, clean writing all the same and I would like to add Wes Anderson, Ang Lee, Stephen Friers and Lawrence Kasden to the list …
Film The original screenplay for 'Apocalypse Now' was the work of Conan director John Milius. A much more overtly gung-ho effort, it was closer to the vision of Joseph Conran's 'Hearts of Darkness'. But as this fascinating article from Creative Screenwriting points out, although he is hardly mentioned in conjunction with the film, and the making of film implies that Copolla wrote the thing on location, many of the classic scenes originated in Milius' first draft:
"(He) extends the introduction of the boat crew, but once Willard joins the boat, Milius's script resembles the film. The film's most famous sequence, the Air Cavalry invasion of the river head village, remains faithful to Milius's screenplay. This scene is Milius's best, violent, dark, absurd, and impossible to not watch. Surfing, Wagner, and a cavalry leader in a plumed hat constitute elements of the Milius pastiche. There is no other scene like it in Coppola films. Milius's most memorable dialogue makes it to the film—"Charlie don't surf!" and the "I love the smell of napalm in the morning" speech—but one line, which deserves attention, did not. As Lance and Colonel Kharnage watch two surfers attempt a ride during the attack, Lance says to himself, "The tragedy of this war is a dead surfer."Watching Milius in the documentary 'Hearts of Darkness' I can always see a slight disappointment that he wasn't the general out in the reeds directing the action.
Education Looking at The Dossier in pdf format why do I discover someone's degree dissertation? I was actually waiting for compelling evidence, and whilst this makes sober reading, I'm still on the fence. The reason being that unlike a dissertation there isn't a section detailing sources (a good 30% of the final mark). Listening to commentators on the day was published we found plenty of supposition but nothing to pin point how all of this was gathered. Also, the word 'conclusion' occurs only once. There are plenty of statements like:
"Subsequently, intelligence has become available from reliable sources which complements and adds to previous intelligence and confirms the JIC assessment that Iraq has chemical and biological weapons. The intelligence also shows that the Iraqi leadership has been discussing a number of issues related to these weapons. This intelligence covers:It would be nice to know who the reliable sources are and what makes them reliable. We are told what the intelligence covers, but we aren't given specific instances. Let me put it this way. In film going terms what we have here is the equivalent of a friend telling you that the new Vin Diesel movie is a classic and you should go and see it but not actually telling you why. That's OK because it's just a film. It's £3.50 (or £7.50 in Paris). Here we are talking about going into war. Lives and governments are at stake. For that kind of thing there has to be some accountability and trust that when given the full truth the general public will be able to make a constructive choice. If we’re going to de-stabalise a whole area of the world I want to really know we're doing the right thing. I want to know that whoever's telling us to do this knows what they're talking about ... [Abode pdf reader here]
Confirmation that chemical and biological weapons play an important role in Iraqi military thinking: intelligence shows that Saddam attaches great importance to the possession of chemical and biological weapons which he regards as being the basis for Iraqi regional power. He believes that respect for Iraq rests on its possession of these weapons and the missiles capable of delivering them.
Abroad II Anyone who’s been reading for sometime will know that in most things I’m quite confident. I’ll head at it like a bull and usually work my way through somehow. So there I was standing a in Charles de Gaulle airport (not pretty) and realizing I have absolutely no idea what to do. I know I have to ring home to tell everyone I’ve arrived, but when I approach the phone it doesn’t look like anything I’ve ever seen before, with it’s slot and nothing else. Nowhere to put money. Nowhere to do anything. I put in my credit card. Nothing happens. Then the plane announcer says something I don’t understand and for the first time it dawned on me that I was in a different country.
A sign with a logo on it in the shape of a train was pointing in no particular direction so I decided to follow it. A crowd was heading that direction so I was more following them (hoping that they had the same idea as I did). I had instructions on how to get to the hotel so I decided that rather than deliberately getting lost I’d head there. The walk to the station was about ten minutes through some deep uninspiring concrete. Liverpool ‘John Lennon’ Airport (‘Above us only sky …’) at least has Speke Hall to look at. Here there’s a Prince Charles nightmare of a hotel and a motorway.
Somehow I manage to find myself to the information desk at the railway station. I look at the clerk. She looks back at me. Up until this point I’d been telling myself I would get by. I knew a little bit of French. I’d studied at school for three years afterall. As I stood here, the rest of the story fell into place. I’d been set four French. We’d studied almost nothing useful for two years and I hadn’t paid any attention because I had a crush on the teacher. Anything I might say in French would be just embarrassing.
The only part of me that I’m at all confident with – speaking – is suddenly gone. I hadn’t quite comprehended how alien everything would actually be. For thirty seconds, I’m a mute. I tap my forefinger on the counter. By now the clerk obviously thinks I’m a loony. Then I apologise for not being French.
‘I’m sorry, I’m English.’ No shit, she thinks. I don’t know that for sure but somethings you can tell in the eyes. ‘I just got here.’
‘Yes.’ She says.
'You speak English.’
'Non.’
To this moment I’m not sure if she was lying just so she could have some fun. But whatever’s happening I’m sinking. At the back of my mind I’m thinking ‘Three days like this?’
‘I’m here for three days. Do you have a travel pass or something?’ And so I entered the Roast Beef approach to foreign languages SHOUT LOUDER. I was everything I promised myself I wouldn’t be if I ever left my small island.
Without another word the clerk starts to madly rushing about her cubicle. I hear her mumble something about a leaflet. Eventually she actually growls and returns to her chair. She points.
I follow her pointing. The ticket office is right behind me. There are queues.
'Thank you.’ I mumble and draw away. As a turn, the person behind me in is boggling their eyes. I don’t blame them.
At the ticket counter it starts again. I don’t apologise for my nationality this time (I conclude that they’d all be speaking German if it was for us … just one of the irrational rationalities I’d make over the coming hours). I say I’ll be there for three days and before I can say anything else a travel pass is thrown over the counter. I throw back my credit card and thirtysomething Euros are charged. I didn’t care how much cost I just wanted to get away from the station. As I take the escalator to the platform I keep saying saying to myself, out loud, ‘oh hell what do I do now’ … ‘oh hell what do I do now’ …
A sign with a logo on it in the shape of a train was pointing in no particular direction so I decided to follow it. A crowd was heading that direction so I was more following them (hoping that they had the same idea as I did). I had instructions on how to get to the hotel so I decided that rather than deliberately getting lost I’d head there. The walk to the station was about ten minutes through some deep uninspiring concrete. Liverpool ‘John Lennon’ Airport (‘Above us only sky …’) at least has Speke Hall to look at. Here there’s a Prince Charles nightmare of a hotel and a motorway.
Somehow I manage to find myself to the information desk at the railway station. I look at the clerk. She looks back at me. Up until this point I’d been telling myself I would get by. I knew a little bit of French. I’d studied at school for three years afterall. As I stood here, the rest of the story fell into place. I’d been set four French. We’d studied almost nothing useful for two years and I hadn’t paid any attention because I had a crush on the teacher. Anything I might say in French would be just embarrassing.
The only part of me that I’m at all confident with – speaking – is suddenly gone. I hadn’t quite comprehended how alien everything would actually be. For thirty seconds, I’m a mute. I tap my forefinger on the counter. By now the clerk obviously thinks I’m a loony. Then I apologise for not being French.
‘I’m sorry, I’m English.’ No shit, she thinks. I don’t know that for sure but somethings you can tell in the eyes. ‘I just got here.’
‘Yes.’ She says.
'You speak English.’
'Non.’
To this moment I’m not sure if she was lying just so she could have some fun. But whatever’s happening I’m sinking. At the back of my mind I’m thinking ‘Three days like this?’
‘I’m here for three days. Do you have a travel pass or something?’ And so I entered the Roast Beef approach to foreign languages SHOUT LOUDER. I was everything I promised myself I wouldn’t be if I ever left my small island.
Without another word the clerk starts to madly rushing about her cubicle. I hear her mumble something about a leaflet. Eventually she actually growls and returns to her chair. She points.
I follow her pointing. The ticket office is right behind me. There are queues.
'Thank you.’ I mumble and draw away. As a turn, the person behind me in is boggling their eyes. I don’t blame them.
At the ticket counter it starts again. I don’t apologise for my nationality this time (I conclude that they’d all be speaking German if it was for us … just one of the irrational rationalities I’d make over the coming hours). I say I’ll be there for three days and before I can say anything else a travel pass is thrown over the counter. I throw back my credit card and thirtysomething Euros are charged. I didn’t care how much cost I just wanted to get away from the station. As I take the escalator to the platform I keep saying saying to myself, out loud, ‘oh hell what do I do now’ … ‘oh hell what do I do now’ …
Paris I had actually gone abroad before. To Germany when I was about eight. I was there for three days and I maintain this was the first time I saw ‘The Empire Strikes Back’ on a video from the local emporium. When I say this to people, they gasp, not actually recognizing that not everyone can afford to go abroad sometimes. I hadn’t even actually been on holiday alone for any kind of extended period. That overnighter to Southend, and three years at University, but I’m sure neither of those count. I’m talking about a-lone. Without a support network. In a completely alien environment. So I thought it was about time.
Two hours after I’d found about my new job (more later) I was in the travel shop booking a three day trip to Paris. I always said that this would be the first place I went to and it seemed logical. As usual it was related to something. I wanted to stand on the Eiffel Tower in the spot were Tom Baker and Lalla Ward recorded that iconic scene in the Doctor Who episode ‘City of Death’ (‘the thing about Paris is … it has a bouquet …’) and to see the Mona Lisa. Once I’d covered those, everything else would be a bonus. There is something liberating about going into a travel agent and saying that I want to go away in three days and just picking a hotel out of a hat. Everyone should try last minute once in a while. Yes it’s bound to be more expensive than if you’d planned ahead, but the look smile on the travel agent’s face when you simply sit there and say yes to everything was a picture.
I’d never flown before. Not because I was actually scared. I didn’t have any fear of it. It’s just another one of those things I’d never gotten around to. And another one I’m happy to say I can cross off the list. I liked the simplicity of ‘EasyJet’. Yes, it was just like traveling by train, but this was an even more pleasant experience. I wasn’t prepared for that rush as the plane roars up the runway and into the air. I we left the ground the only thing I could do was laugh. For moments I felt superhuman. I WAS FLYING! Looking down at the landscape I understood how the first balloonist must have felt when the land spread out before him. Patterns of colour and lines. So familiar, from the ground suddenly made no sense. And before I could and my bearings, the plane burst through another barrier and within moments the phrase ‘blanket of clouds’ finally resonated. I hadn’t realized that in the sky although the place must have been proceeding at some speed to stay in the air, the view of the window would be at almost a standstill. Only the usual baby crying broke the silence. And then quicker than it had begun, the plane voluntarily landed at Charles de Gaulle Airport and …. <>
Two hours after I’d found about my new job (more later) I was in the travel shop booking a three day trip to Paris. I always said that this would be the first place I went to and it seemed logical. As usual it was related to something. I wanted to stand on the Eiffel Tower in the spot were Tom Baker and Lalla Ward recorded that iconic scene in the Doctor Who episode ‘City of Death’ (‘the thing about Paris is … it has a bouquet …’) and to see the Mona Lisa. Once I’d covered those, everything else would be a bonus. There is something liberating about going into a travel agent and saying that I want to go away in three days and just picking a hotel out of a hat. Everyone should try last minute once in a while. Yes it’s bound to be more expensive than if you’d planned ahead, but the look smile on the travel agent’s face when you simply sit there and say yes to everything was a picture.
I’d never flown before. Not because I was actually scared. I didn’t have any fear of it. It’s just another one of those things I’d never gotten around to. And another one I’m happy to say I can cross off the list. I liked the simplicity of ‘EasyJet’. Yes, it was just like traveling by train, but this was an even more pleasant experience. I wasn’t prepared for that rush as the plane roars up the runway and into the air. I we left the ground the only thing I could do was laugh. For moments I felt superhuman. I WAS FLYING! Looking down at the landscape I understood how the first balloonist must have felt when the land spread out before him. Patterns of colour and lines. So familiar, from the ground suddenly made no sense. And before I could and my bearings, the plane burst through another barrier and within moments the phrase ‘blanket of clouds’ finally resonated. I hadn’t realized that in the sky although the place must have been proceeding at some speed to stay in the air, the view of the window would be at almost a standstill. Only the usual baby crying broke the silence. And then quicker than it had begun, the plane voluntarily landed at Charles de Gaulle Airport and …. <
Sport ‘The Guardian’ Best British Weblog competition crept up on me. I didn’t know it was happening, entered very late and wasn’t even actually posting during the time when the judges were, well judging. That said I am really pleased to see that the winner isn’t one of the usual suspects (they know who they are) and that one of my regular readers and a weblog I visit all of the time, LinkMachineGo won one of the five runners up prizes (hey Darren). Well deserved I’m sure. Good to see BlogJam in there as well. Also moonunits to see that I recognize many of the ‘blogs of note’ they offer as well – because they’ve been past ‘Blog!s’ here. I knew I was one the right track. Oh well, role on next year …
Quiz! In an idle moment at work the other day I threw together this film quiz. I'll set a closing date for the end of the month. The prize is a copy of the 'feeling listless' soundtrack album. I'll pull a name out of the hat if anyone has the same score....
Odd One Out
Erm, which is the odd one out?
(1) "An American President", "Wall Street", "Hot Shots Part Deux"
(2) "Star Trek VI", "Austin Power I", "Superman II"
(3) "Mystic Pizza", "Hook", "Ocean's Eleven"
(4) "The Sixth Sense", "This is Spinal Tap", "The Usual Suspects", "Jerry Maguire"
(5) "She's All That", "Children of the Corn III", "My Stepmother is an Alien", "Can't Hardly Wait"
(6) "Coming to America", "Scream 3", "Out of Sight", "Hannibal"
(7) "Mallrats", "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom", "The Empire Strikes Back"
(8) "Sliding Doors", "Shakespeare in Love", "Seven", "Emma"
All of the following have two answers. A point for each:
(9) "Sixteen Candles", "Pretty in Pink", "The Breakfast Club"
(10) "French Kiss", "The Big Chill", "A Fish Called Wanda", "I Love You To Death"
And to make up the fifteen points ... who said -- "Have Fun. Stay single." I want the actor, his character, the name of the film ...
Odd One Out
Erm, which is the odd one out?
(1) "An American President", "Wall Street", "Hot Shots Part Deux"
(2) "Star Trek VI", "Austin Power I", "Superman II"
(3) "Mystic Pizza", "Hook", "Ocean's Eleven"
(4) "The Sixth Sense", "This is Spinal Tap", "The Usual Suspects", "Jerry Maguire"
(5) "She's All That", "Children of the Corn III", "My Stepmother is an Alien", "Can't Hardly Wait"
(6) "Coming to America", "Scream 3", "Out of Sight", "Hannibal"
(7) "Mallrats", "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom", "The Empire Strikes Back"
(8) "Sliding Doors", "Shakespeare in Love", "Seven", "Emma"
All of the following have two answers. A point for each:
(9) "Sixteen Candles", "Pretty in Pink", "The Breakfast Club"
(10) "French Kiss", "The Big Chill", "A Fish Called Wanda", "I Love You To Death"
And to make up the fifteen points ... who said -- "Have Fun. Stay single." I want the actor, his character, the name of the film ...
Moving I moved about two months ago. I live in a flat in a tower block which is part of a housing action trust and after an infusion of government funding everything is being knocked through and re-built. Since this would be a bit noisy and create something of a mess, we’ve all been exiled to another flat in a different block. It took three months to pack everything in my room alone (a pause there while someone reading in Idaho actually takes in the immensity of that job). And then three hours to repack everything on the day we moved when we found out that the removal firm didn’t have equipment to shift on the large boxes which we had been given to put everything in. Most moves have taken them a few hours in the morning. Ours took twelve hours and two vans. Needless to say I haven’t unpacked anything. My computer currently looks like the final shot in ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’ although without the spotlight or the cobwebs.
The odd thing about moving was the unconditional resting of your personal positions into the care of a bunch of total strangers who would cross the street to avoid. Whilst they weren't exactly throwing things about my heart missed a beat with every bang and crunch. There are some boxes I still haven't even looked into because I'm scared of what I might find inside. That said, only recorded breakage: the glass plate from the inside of the microwave (we took that out and wrapped it in bubble wrap -- might have been simpler to leave it inside).
The odd thing about moving was the unconditional resting of your personal positions into the care of a bunch of total strangers who would cross the street to avoid. Whilst they weren't exactly throwing things about my heart missed a beat with every bang and crunch. There are some boxes I still haven't even looked into because I'm scared of what I might find inside. That said, only recorded breakage: the glass plate from the inside of the microwave (we took that out and wrapped it in bubble wrap -- might have been simpler to leave it inside).
Return It’s been so long I’m trying to remember when my home connection went down. Boringly, I think it was when I installed the beta version of WinAmp 3. My computer would dial-up and connect but when the browser appeared it would actually talk to net, as though the whole world had sent it to Coventry. So I took the drastic step of re-installing my hard disk. This didn’t work and my PC finally crashed. It sat there and looked at me and gave me a ‘general protection failure’ on the blue screen of hell. And there it sat for months. Ironically my computer gave up, when I gave up my job so my limited funds mitigated against an upgrade. But then I looked at my savings account, looked at the all but empty space on my desk next to my monitor and put my order in. My silver dream machine (well crème and pastel blue) arrived on Sunday and here we are now. Hello. So how have you all been?
Film Adaptation
The film adaptation came before the original screenplay. In many ways, when cinema was in its infancy, the thought of an original idea was repugnant. As television grew in popularity, the film studios realised that to keep business strong, they needed to attract people back to theatres with stories with which they were not familiar. Now, after many years, there is a balance, and almost half of the films released recently have been adaptations, from television, theatre or as will be focused upon here, the novel.
The adaptation of stories from one narrative form to another had always been thought impossible, but is a vital area of the arts.. All but one of Shakespeare's plays were based upon other literary sources. Macbeth and Othello became operas by Verdi and Tchaikovsky. Artists, notably the Pre-Raphaelites have drawn inspiration from literature and religion in their allegorical paintings and sculpture. All are accepted, and often presented as the pinnacle of their particular art form.
The film adaptation is unable to capture the experience gained from reading a novel. Although the screenwriter may remain faithful to the original work's intentions, for the adaptation to have its own value, it must have its own point of view. But as has been demonstrated time and again, a literal adaptation can often be dull and clumsy, badly paced and structure. The screenwriter should give the film its own coherent and persuasive narrative, with an approach that discards the issue of being true or untrue to the original.
Approach
With most works, this can be difficult. Charles Dickens and Thomas Hardy have a great pedigree, the loss of which might lead to critical and box office suicide. Some, however, do need to divert from their source material to be worthwhile. When Harold Pinter considered The French Lieutenants Woman, his task was difficult. The story is of Victorian love, but the narrative, rooted within 20th century thinking, has references, footnotes and flashes to Marx, Darwin, and Freud. Many writers, from Dennis Potter to Richard Lester failed to make sense from the work. At one time it was to contrive an invisible (or even visible) narrator to explain the modern interventions. Pinter had an unusual but effective solution. Film critic, Jennifer Selway describes:-
Structure
There is a definite structure to the screenplay, built into an average of a hundred and twenty pages, broken into three ‘acts’ (these can often be seen as fades to black which appear at the end of a particularly dramatic sequence). Each page is almost a minute of screen time, and the average film is two hours long. Act I introduces the characters and their situation and takes thirty pages or minutes. The first ten minutes should gain the interest of the audience, since this is when the viewer decides whether they like or dislike the film. As David Lean, director explains:
The basis of all drama is conflict. In Act I, the characters are given a goal or aspiration, and in Act II, the confrontation section, obstacles are created. In most novels, conflict exists, but there might not be enough for a strictly dramatic form like films. In 2010 by Arthur C. Clarke, the central investigation is the Monolith and its connection to Jupiter and the nature of the aliens who created it. In the film, the drama is heightened by developing the cold war to nuclear proportions, making the all-too-friendly Russians of the novel, more than a little hostile, bringing suspense.
Act III resolves the story, the work of the main character is ended and their success or failure is demonstrated - whether they live or die, perhaps. The ending is either 'up-beat', 'down-beat' or ambiguous. Star Wars is incredibly upbeat (until the rest of the series comes along) and All the President's Men is down beat. To create intensity the screen writer, William Goldman lost the second half of the book in his adaptation:
Characters
The difficulty of adapting someone else’s character to the screen is always underestimated. Thomas Craven reminds:
The audience must identify with one of the characters, before becoming involved in the story. If the character is famous and played by a bankable actor like Julia Roberts or Tom Hanks, then the script must transcend their star status to have credibility. In the adaptations of John Grisham's novels, The Firm, The Pelican Brief and The Client, little is done to lose the star's mystique - indeed the characters are re-written to build upon the star’s on screen persona. In Blade Runner, however, the adaptation is deft enough that Deckard could have been played by anyone from Christopher Walken to Robert de Nero.
The audience must not only identify with the protagonist, but will them along in their efforts. In the novel, Jurassic Park, the owner, John Hammond is more concerned with making money and the profitability of reviving long dead species, and so the reader is against him. In the film, the character is more sympathetic, as is demonstrated in a long scene between Hammond (Richard Attenborough) and Ellie Satler (Laura Dern), in which he describes his wonder at a flea circus, and his vision to re-create this wonder with dinosaurs. So the audience feels empathy because his dream is a failure.
Often, there is a belief that to stay faithful to a novel's character, all of their experiences should be included to in the film to give them weight. Well-written adaptations use any back story as though created in the development of an original screenplay and used only when it helps the story forward. An exception to this rule might be a classical adaptation, where much of the characterisation is based upon description and action rather than back story, so most action is left alone (since usually the whole of a character's life is included in the novel).
No matter how hard the screen writer works to create a believable character, when it comes to filming, it is finally up to the actor and director to give the person life. Too often, this responsibility is not treated with enough seriousness. After seeing a fictional character 'on-screen', further reading of a text is tainted, because despite any description included, the reader perceives the appearance and personality of the actor. 84 Charing Cross Road is little more than a collection of letters. There is hardly any description. In the film, Helen Hanff and Frank Doel are portrayed brilliantly by Anne Bancroft and Anthony Hopkins. Now, as the story evolves in the book, Helene and Frank have an image in their mind’s eye, but it is the wrong one (although in a later work, Hanff does remark how convincing Bancroft is).
Material
When a short story is considered for adaptation, it is usually as a spring board for the development of ideas, rather than straight adaptation - the essential task is closer to an original screenplay. Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A space oddessy, based upon Arthur C. Clarke's The Sentinel develops the original nine page story into a two and a half hour epic. Kubrick keeps the basic story - the investigation of an alien probe on the moon in the opening minutes of the film, but adds a wealth of new material exploring the concept of man being a child in the eyes of the advanced race.
There is a wealth of material in a novel, seemingly simplifying the adaptation process. But now the writer has to address which sections should be left out or condense in order to transform hundreds of pages into a hundred and twenty. Dealing with character's (as is seen above) can help this cause, as much of a novel can be character development and explanation, but this still leaves the scenes which pull forward the story. Unnecessary background scenes are eliminated. The first quarter of the novel of The Godfather deals with the young Vito going to America and his early days in New York. These are very interesting, but in screenplay terms they do not drive the character or story forward - a scene with a member of his extended family in the film demonstrates that he is a man of experience to fear and respect.
Scenes which are considered essential to the story but over extended can instead be condensed or even merged. In The Pelican Brief, Derby Shaw rings the journalist, Gray Grantham on a number of occasions to get his attention. In the film, we view only two of these calls, and these are re-written to include important information and imply the existence of the other communications (this strategy is used frequently in adaptations, usually with the immortal line - 'Why do you keep calling me?'). This quickens the pace and avoids repetition, which can bore audiences.
It is also important to truncate scenes - the audience must begin a situation at the last possible moment, as William Goldman demonstrates in Marathon Man, when a teaching scene appears. It begins with 'Well, class ...' and the bell ringing, leading to another scene. As the screenwriter continues, when considering the editing of description:
Sometimes, however, books need little adaptation to work as screenplays. The most famous example of this is John Ford's work on The Maltese Falcon. He liked the feeling of the book and decided he could capture its integrity on film. As he left for a vacation, he gave the novel to a secretary, telling her to go through, breaking down the narrative into screenplay form, labelling each scene with the familiar 'interior or exterior' tags with a basic description of the action, using dialogue straight from the book. Somehow, studio chief Jack L. Warner read a copy. He loved it and told Ford to shoot it just as it was - leading to a film classic.
Politics
A screen adaptation, is a collaborative work, not only involving a screen writer, but a director, producer, artists and actors, and unless the writer directs, it is the director who has the decision on whether a screenplay is filmed or forgotten, whether a screen writer's vision is to be fulfilled. This leads to the politics of screen writing. In Hollywood, screen writers can be 'hired and fired' in an instant if the director is not happy with the way a story is developing. To paraphrase Harlan Ellison in an interview for the ‘Moving Pictures’ TV series:
His draft went straight to the core of the work - the action sequences in the park, in a similar way to his previous film Westworld. Spielberg suggested that rather than going straight to the dinosaurs, there should be a closer approximation of what was in the book, in terms of character. So the pair set about a new draft, which was used to begin pre-production design, with story boards and illustrations begun and locations being scouted for. Crichton left the project, and a new writer who had been re-writing Spielberg’s Hook, Scotch Marmo was brought in to strengthen the characterisation.
Marmo, rather than attempting to re-write Crichton's draft, opted to begin afresh, with the novel as the base. She read the novel over and over, read Crichton's draft and viewed the storyboards. She also consulted with Crichton, even borrowing a copy of the book he had highlighted and annotated for his own work. As expected, Marmo leaned towards characterisation in opposition to Crichton’s belief that this would draw away from the essential marvel of the story. There was an unusually close collaboration with Spielberg - Marmo would write some, submit it and the director would offer suggestions. She finished the final draft in five months and gave it to the director. He rejected it.
Spielberg next tried David Koepp, who was told to try from scratch again. Koepp wasn't happy with re-writes and this put his mind to rest. He elected not to read the Crichton and Marmo scripts, but re-read the novel four or five times. He found it to be written much like a film, and his approach was to stay close to the characterisation, and create a structure based upon set pieces, which meant that whole section of the novel's action could be lost, without changing the story. This is the draft that became the film.
Although this procedure seems harsh, it is quite normal. When a popular novel is being adapted for the screen, it needs to be done well - especially when the studio has paid so much for the rights. The Crichton and Marmo scripts might have been accepted by other directors - Joe Dante and Tim Burton had also been interested, but each has a particular style which is expected from an audience and this needs to be reflected in the screenplay. Although it does not give the screen writer the freedom they would like, it does create successful films.
The End
There is still a stigma attached to the film adaptation. It is impossible to leave the cinemas without overhearing criticism about the content - 'Why was the ending changed?', 'I thought that they were quite faithful to the spirit of the novel...', or most likely 'It wasn't as good as the book!'. The novel is apparently 'sacrosanct', the film maker's job being to 'capture the spirit' of the novel', without distorting the detail or novelist's tone. It is as though film eradicates the imaginative involvement without offering a different if comparable involvement. What isn't understood, is that although the film is a different media to the novel, it is also a different form of creativity.
What a filmmaker can hope when adapting a novel is to be able to equalise the nature of the prose. This can only be done when it is accepted that film is a different medium to the novel, but can still offer as much power. Recent successes like Forrest Gump and Shindler's List demonstrates that films are as powerful an art form as the novel and can direct a message at a large audience just as effectively. At the root of any adaptation is a screen writer with a book, a word processor, a notepad and a vivid imagination, and the work their work is as important (if not more) than the original writer.
© 1996 Stuart Ian Burns
Coda:: As you can see I wrote the above some years ago, but I’m amazed how much actually continues to be the case. Some things to note:
For a while, John Grisham has stopped selling the rights to his novels to film studios. Apparently he was in a bookstore in an airport and overheard someone looking at his new novel and then telling her friend that she’d wait for the film to come out.
The second sequel to Jurassic Park wasn't an adaptation, but an original screenplay.
Only three of the top ten grossers of all time are adaptations.
LA Confidential proved that the art isn’t completely dead
Contact:: If you’ve found this essay useful, email and let me know.
Bibliography
Early days
FINLER, Joel W. The Hollywood Story. Pyramid Books:London, England. 1989.
Coffee table sized book which gives an excellent working knowledge of the Hollywood Film Industry, and the five biggest studios. Sections range from Award success, to history and financial endeavours. The scale of the work cannot be described here.
FOX, Julian. The Great Story Chase. In Films and Filming. March 1980. Vol26. No 6. Pages 14-21.
FOX, Julian. Through The Roof (The Great Picture Chase, Part Two). In Films and Filming April 1980. Vol 26. No 7. Pages 14-21.
Detailed account of the search for the stories in early film making, covering some of the first adaptations from classical literature. Offers useful information mainly from the silent era. The style is quite reverential, but not too off putting.
Huston, John. The Maltese Falcon: based upon the novel by Dasheill Hammett. Warner: Los Angeles, USA. 1941.
Good example of the layout of an early film script. Includes a character description as part of the screenplay for the casting director. Interesting also, because the secretary who wrote the script while Huston was away travelling isn’t credited.
The Technicalities
FIELD, Syd. Screenplay: The Foundations of Screenwriting: A Step-by-Step Guide from concept to finished script. Expanded Edition. Dell Publishing: New York, USA. 1982.
VALE, Eugene. The Technique of Screenplay Writing. Redwood Press: Wiltshire, England. 1972.
PORTNOY, Kenneth. Screen Adaptation: A Scriptwriting Handbook. Focal Press: Stoneham, USA. 1991.
There is a progression in the depth of these works. The Field is a very good guide for beginners, offering simple but not patronising language, outlining the broad strokes. Those interested in screen writing as a career, or the more technical aspects should consult the Vale, who describes the process at an incredible depth, from ideas to the format of the screen play, to finding an agent. In the third book, Portnoy takes the detail even further and concentrates upon Screen adaptation. Although there is some description of the screenplay technique, it has been written as a textbook for film courses and so requires a certain amount of previous knowledge.
BRADY, John. The Craft of the Screenwriter: Interviews with Six Celebrated Screenwriters. Simon and Schuster: New York, USA. 1981.
Although some years old, this offers incredible insights into the screen writing industry, and how the film industry perceives the writer and their work. The interviews are from different sections of the industry, from art house, to film adaptations of stage musicals and novels.
SEGAR, Linda. Creating Unforgettable Characters. Henry Holt and Company: New York, USA.
No real focus on adaptations, but an excellent description of the creation of believable characters in scripts, with examples from many sources in film, theatre, television and the novel, from Cheers to when harry met sally...
Diversity
McFARLANE, Brian. Words and Images: Australian Novels into Film. Heinemann Publisher’s Australia PTY Ltd: Victoria, Australia. 1983.
SINYARD, Neil. Filming Literature: The Art of the Screen Adaptation. Croom Helm Ltd.: Kent, England. 1986.
Focus on particular areas of the industry. The McFarlane has an intelligently written introduction, which argues for the capacity of film to be a different art form to the novel but still have the same weight. Sinyard is a good companion to the Portnoy, with descriptions of the entire process, including the work of the director and cinematographer. Essays included on adaptations of Shakespeare, Dickens, Joyce and the Bronte’s, as well as adaptations as criticism.
BARKER, Martin. First and Last Mohicans. In Sight and Sound. August 1993. Vol 3. No 8. Page 26.
Surveys the fascination with ‘The Last of the Mohicans’ and compares the many adaptations which have appeared in film, including the recent Michael Mann production with Daniel Day-Lewis and Madeline Stowe in the title roles.
HARMETZ, Aljean. The Making of ‘The Wizard of Oz’. Pavilion Books Ltd.: London, England. 1989.
A chapter dedicated to the adaptation of the original books to the original film - and the politics involved when the first contracted screenplay isn’t what the STUDIO might have hoped.
TAUBLIN, Amy. 1993. Out of the Ruins. In Sight and Sound. October 1993. Vol 3. No 10. Page 29.
Interview with the director and screen writer of the recent adaptation of ‘The Secret Garden’ .
The Business
GOLDMAN, William. Adventures in the Screen Trade. Futura: England. 1990.
GOLDMAN, William. Which Lie Did I Tell?: More Adventures in the Screen Trade. Bloomsbury: England. 2000.
Industry standard. Should be read, even if the rest of this list is ignored. Goldman gives dramatic insights into the film industry and the treatment of screen writers, as well as a set-by-step guide to the adaptation of a short story and how it would be treated if different professionals were on the project. Magical. The new book looks at the creation of an original screenplay.
SQUIRE, Jason E. (ed.) The Movie Business Book. Columbus Books: Kent, England. 1986.
Includes essays about the licensing of books for film adaptation, the reverse process of the novelisation, as well as the merchandising possibilities...
The Creative Process
CRIGHTON, Michael. Jurassic Park. Arrow/Random House. London, England. 1991.
DUNCAN, Jody and Don SHAY. The Making of Jurassic Park. Boxtree: London, England. 1993.
CRIGHTON, Michael and DAVID Koepp. Jurassic Park: From the novel by Michael Crighton: Directed by Steven Spielberg. Hollywood Scripts: London, England. 1993.
It is quite useful to read the novel (worth reading anyway), then seeing what an early draft contains. The script included here has much more adult content with stronger philosophical debate about the cloning from DNA, but quite close in character to the finished version. The writing in the Duncan and Shay is more scholarly than the format might suggest, and gives a good description of the process which occurs when a director is searching for the right script. There are also reproductions of the storyboards based upon the final script.
BERNSTEIN, Carl and Bob Woodward. All the President’s Men. Secker and Warburb: London, England. 1974.
GOLDMAN, William. All the President’s Men: based upon the book by Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward. Wildwood Enterprises Inc: Los Angeles. 1975.
The screenplay is a development of the book, rather than a straight adaptation, and so comparing the two in conjunction with the chapter in Goldman’s ‘Adventures in the Screen Trade’ suggests that there is as much if not more work involved in an adaptation, as opposed to an original screen play.
The Films
ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN. Screenplay by William Goldman. Directed by Alan J. Pakula. Wildwood Enterprises for Warner Brothers Pictures. USA. 1976.
Incredibly tense thriller (considering the outcome is known), in which two reporters for the Washington Post uncover the Watergate affair. Woodward and Bernstein, well played by Dustin Hoffman and Robert Redford, are presented in a less self-congratulatory style than their novel, and are therefore more sympathetic. Wonderfully atmospheric cinematography which sets the two against huge buildings help to demonstrate the enormity of their task (an aerial view from inside a library being the most beautiful).
BLADE RUNNER: THE DIRECTOR’S CUT. Screenplay by Hampton Fancher and David Webb Peoples, from ‘Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?’ by Philip K. Dick. Directed by Ridley Scott. Blade Runner Partnership. USA. 1991.
Little can be added to the applause already given to this Science Fiction classic, recently released in the original cut. A good example of how screen writers and directors use the book as a source in adaptation - in the novel, there is greater emphasis on artificial wildlife, while in the film they become part of Scott’s nightmarish Los Angeles. Best seen in Widescreen.
84 CHARING CROSS ROAD. Screenplay by Hugh Whitemore, based upon the book by Helene Hanff. Directed by David Jones. Brooks Films for Columbia Pictures Corporation. USA. 1986.
Demonstrates how even the most abstract of novels can become a beautiful of films. Tells of the transatlantic friendship between an American writer and very English book shop worker, and contrasts the differences in the countries during the aftermath of the Second World War. Readings of the letters by Anne Bancroft and Anthony Hopkins, help to crystallise what these people must have been like, turning them into real, credible people.
THE FRENCH LIEUTENANT’S WOMAN. Screenplay by Harold Pinter. Directed by Karel Reisz. Juniper Films. USA. 1981.
Obtuseness turned into good cinema. Meryl Streep and Jeremy Isaacs are cast as lovers in the 19th century, and actors in the film that they are a part of, allowing them to comment on Victorian love in a similar way to John Fowle’s original novel, but still produce a credible film. A description of the development of this approach is given in Sinyard.
GREAT EXPECTATIONS. Screenplay by David Lean, George Pollock and Antony Havelock-Allen. Directed by David Lean. Cineguild. GB. 1946.
One of the best screen adaptations based upon Dickens’s work, Lean manages to evoke the dark nature of the prose without the film becoming a harrowing experiences. The transitions from childhood to adulthood are handled almost seamlessly, a credit to the screenwriter, casting director and director.
JURASSIC PARK. Screenplay by David Koepp, Malia Scotch Marmo and Michael Crighton. Amblin Enterprises. USA. 1993.
Demonstrates how some novels can only be diminished by adaptation. Although the computer generated dinosaurs can be startling on the first viewing, further watches diminish the experience, and unfortunately the characters and story are not sustaining enough. Still a blockbuster however. One wonders how things may have turned out if the original Michael Crighton or Scotch Marmo scripts had been filmed instead - read the screen play listed above for this perspective.
KRAMER Versus KRAMER. Screemplay by William Goldman. Directed by Robert Benton. Stanley Jaffe Production for Columbia Pictures Corporation. USA. 1979.
Strong, intelligently written melodrama. Dustin Hoffman and Meryl Streep come to terms with divorce and a court battle for their son. Goldman takes the main thrust of the novel and re-writes the characters so that the audience is tied between each party. Although he is seemingly the villain of the peace at the beginning of the film, we finally want Hoffman to win, as Streep’s demands seems more and more irrational.
2001: A Space Odyssey. Screenplay by Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke, based upon ‘The Sentinel’ by Arthur C. Clarke. Directed by Stanley Kubrick. MGM. GB. 1968.
A product of the 1960s, but still another piece of cinema history. Fans argue over whether this is Science Fiction or simply a story set in space (despite the presence of the monolith), because of Kubrick’s attention to scientific detail (space is a vacuum and therefore soundless - space ships do not thunder when they explode, space ships will not whoosh when they pass the camera). Although Clarke wrote the novel in conjunction with the screen play, one is based around Jupiter, the other Saturn. This allows each to be an excellent example of their media, rather than an adaptation of each other (another reason was that a probe had recently visited Jupiter and Kubrick wanted to use the visually exciting shots of Jupiter which where taken in the film to highlight space exploration’s continuing development).
The Reviews
PYM, John (ed.) The Time Out Film Guide. Thirteenth Edition. Penguin: London, England. 2003.
Less pretentious than Halliwells, and recommended by Barry Norman. Over fifty reviewers contribute over 14,000 film reviews, often from a point of view not previously thought of, and usually as an example of their genre rather than the business as a whole.
If any authors feel their work has been infringed by the above, please let me know and I will be happy to remove any offending material. I have tried to attribute any quotes either here or in the bibliography. Thank you.
The film adaptation came before the original screenplay. In many ways, when cinema was in its infancy, the thought of an original idea was repugnant. As television grew in popularity, the film studios realised that to keep business strong, they needed to attract people back to theatres with stories with which they were not familiar. Now, after many years, there is a balance, and almost half of the films released recently have been adaptations, from television, theatre or as will be focused upon here, the novel.
The adaptation of stories from one narrative form to another had always been thought impossible, but is a vital area of the arts.. All but one of Shakespeare's plays were based upon other literary sources. Macbeth and Othello became operas by Verdi and Tchaikovsky. Artists, notably the Pre-Raphaelites have drawn inspiration from literature and religion in their allegorical paintings and sculpture. All are accepted, and often presented as the pinnacle of their particular art form.
The film adaptation is unable to capture the experience gained from reading a novel. Although the screenwriter may remain faithful to the original work's intentions, for the adaptation to have its own value, it must have its own point of view. But as has been demonstrated time and again, a literal adaptation can often be dull and clumsy, badly paced and structure. The screenwriter should give the film its own coherent and persuasive narrative, with an approach that discards the issue of being true or untrue to the original.
Approach
With most works, this can be difficult. Charles Dickens and Thomas Hardy have a great pedigree, the loss of which might lead to critical and box office suicide. Some, however, do need to divert from their source material to be worthwhile. When Harold Pinter considered The French Lieutenants Woman, his task was difficult. The story is of Victorian love, but the narrative, rooted within 20th century thinking, has references, footnotes and flashes to Marx, Darwin, and Freud. Many writers, from Dennis Potter to Richard Lester failed to make sense from the work. At one time it was to contrive an invisible (or even visible) narrator to explain the modern interventions. Pinter had an unusual but effective solution. Film critic, Jennifer Selway describes:-
'... (the) screen play gives flesh to this 20th century perspective with a parallel story; not only do Meryl Streep and Jeremy Irons play the 19th century lovers, but they are also cast as a pair of adulterous sophisticates swotting up on Victorian social history between takes on the filming of 'The French Lieutenants Woman'.This allows the differences between nineteenth century love and modern sex to be compared and contrasted, building upon what is expressed in the novel; the film is a metaphor as well as an adaptation.
Structure
There is a definite structure to the screenplay, built into an average of a hundred and twenty pages, broken into three ‘acts’ (these can often be seen as fades to black which appear at the end of a particularly dramatic sequence). Each page is almost a minute of screen time, and the average film is two hours long. Act I introduces the characters and their situation and takes thirty pages or minutes. The first ten minutes should gain the interest of the audience, since this is when the viewer decides whether they like or dislike the film. As David Lean, director explains:
'Imagine - as the lights go down, a member of the audience strikes up a match in order to light his cigarette. The task the film maker is to ensure that that cigarette remains unlit, because the spectator cannot lower his eyes from the screen.'In adaptation terms, a good beginning might not present itself until some time into the novel. In Kramer versus Kramer, the writer begins with over forty pages of background information before there is a suitable beginning for the screenplay, as the married-with-child characters Ted and Joanna are separated. This helps to dramatise the situation, as it is the caring husband of the novel who cannot help as his confused wife becomes a workaholic with little time for his family, leading to an exploration of a new theme - which gender makes the better parent.
The basis of all drama is conflict. In Act I, the characters are given a goal or aspiration, and in Act II, the confrontation section, obstacles are created. In most novels, conflict exists, but there might not be enough for a strictly dramatic form like films. In 2010 by Arthur C. Clarke, the central investigation is the Monolith and its connection to Jupiter and the nature of the aliens who created it. In the film, the drama is heightened by developing the cold war to nuclear proportions, making the all-too-friendly Russians of the novel, more than a little hostile, bringing suspense.
Act III resolves the story, the work of the main character is ended and their success or failure is demonstrated - whether they live or die, perhaps. The ending is either 'up-beat', 'down-beat' or ambiguous. Star Wars is incredibly upbeat (until the rest of the series comes along) and All the President's Men is down beat. To create intensity the screen writer, William Goldman lost the second half of the book in his adaptation:
'Bernstein and Woodward had made one crucial mistake dealing with the knowledge of one of Nixon's aides. It was a goof that for a while, cost them momentum (in uncovering Watergate). I decided to end the story of their mistake, because the public already knew they had eventually been vindicated, and one mistake didn't stop them. The notion behind this was to go out with them down and let the audience supply their eventual triumph.'Sometimes, there may be not be a clear structure. In his adaptation, Goldman found a novel without a structure - just a set of dramatised facts strung together. To create structure, he consulted with one of the authors, Bob Woodward and created a list of crucial events - not the most dramatic - 'just the essentials', that enabled as complete a story to be told. Then, no matter how much re-writing took place, the basic structure would still exist.
Characters
The difficulty of adapting someone else’s character to the screen is always underestimated. Thomas Craven reminds:
'I doubt if the most artistic and sympathetic reader ever visualises a character; he responds to that part of a created figure that is also himself. But he does not actually see his hero. For this reason, all illustrations are disappointing.'Once the character is visualised, it loses some of its mystery, as well as some of the characteristics created by the reader's imagination. In order to re-create this mystery, the screenwriter must painstakingly turn them into a believable, three-dimensional representation of the character.
The audience must identify with one of the characters, before becoming involved in the story. If the character is famous and played by a bankable actor like Julia Roberts or Tom Hanks, then the script must transcend their star status to have credibility. In the adaptations of John Grisham's novels, The Firm, The Pelican Brief and The Client, little is done to lose the star's mystique - indeed the characters are re-written to build upon the star’s on screen persona. In Blade Runner, however, the adaptation is deft enough that Deckard could have been played by anyone from Christopher Walken to Robert de Nero.
The audience must not only identify with the protagonist, but will them along in their efforts. In the novel, Jurassic Park, the owner, John Hammond is more concerned with making money and the profitability of reviving long dead species, and so the reader is against him. In the film, the character is more sympathetic, as is demonstrated in a long scene between Hammond (Richard Attenborough) and Ellie Satler (Laura Dern), in which he describes his wonder at a flea circus, and his vision to re-create this wonder with dinosaurs. So the audience feels empathy because his dream is a failure.
Often, there is a belief that to stay faithful to a novel's character, all of their experiences should be included to in the film to give them weight. Well-written adaptations use any back story as though created in the development of an original screenplay and used only when it helps the story forward. An exception to this rule might be a classical adaptation, where much of the characterisation is based upon description and action rather than back story, so most action is left alone (since usually the whole of a character's life is included in the novel).
No matter how hard the screen writer works to create a believable character, when it comes to filming, it is finally up to the actor and director to give the person life. Too often, this responsibility is not treated with enough seriousness. After seeing a fictional character 'on-screen', further reading of a text is tainted, because despite any description included, the reader perceives the appearance and personality of the actor. 84 Charing Cross Road is little more than a collection of letters. There is hardly any description. In the film, Helen Hanff and Frank Doel are portrayed brilliantly by Anne Bancroft and Anthony Hopkins. Now, as the story evolves in the book, Helene and Frank have an image in their mind’s eye, but it is the wrong one (although in a later work, Hanff does remark how convincing Bancroft is).
Material
When a short story is considered for adaptation, it is usually as a spring board for the development of ideas, rather than straight adaptation - the essential task is closer to an original screenplay. Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A space oddessy, based upon Arthur C. Clarke's The Sentinel develops the original nine page story into a two and a half hour epic. Kubrick keeps the basic story - the investigation of an alien probe on the moon in the opening minutes of the film, but adds a wealth of new material exploring the concept of man being a child in the eyes of the advanced race.
There is a wealth of material in a novel, seemingly simplifying the adaptation process. But now the writer has to address which sections should be left out or condense in order to transform hundreds of pages into a hundred and twenty. Dealing with character's (as is seen above) can help this cause, as much of a novel can be character development and explanation, but this still leaves the scenes which pull forward the story. Unnecessary background scenes are eliminated. The first quarter of the novel of The Godfather deals with the young Vito going to America and his early days in New York. These are very interesting, but in screenplay terms they do not drive the character or story forward - a scene with a member of his extended family in the film demonstrates that he is a man of experience to fear and respect.
Scenes which are considered essential to the story but over extended can instead be condensed or even merged. In The Pelican Brief, Derby Shaw rings the journalist, Gray Grantham on a number of occasions to get his attention. In the film, we view only two of these calls, and these are re-written to include important information and imply the existence of the other communications (this strategy is used frequently in adaptations, usually with the immortal line - 'Why do you keep calling me?'). This quickens the pace and avoids repetition, which can bore audiences.
It is also important to truncate scenes - the audience must begin a situation at the last possible moment, as William Goldman demonstrates in Marathon Man, when a teaching scene appears. It begins with 'Well, class ...' and the bell ringing, leading to another scene. As the screenwriter continues, when considering the editing of description:
'In a book, you might start with some dialogue, and then describe the room, and start with some dialogue, then describe your clothes, and more dialogue. The camera gets all that in an instant. Boom, and you're on.'In Great Expectations, the Dickens prose gives a sense of a physically and socially constricting world. David Lean demonstrates this in his adaptation with some well-planned shots. Although some descriptions are replaced by a facial gesture or camera angle, the do not amply demonstrate the implications and feelings a novel can bring across when written and read at leisure.
Sometimes, however, books need little adaptation to work as screenplays. The most famous example of this is John Ford's work on The Maltese Falcon. He liked the feeling of the book and decided he could capture its integrity on film. As he left for a vacation, he gave the novel to a secretary, telling her to go through, breaking down the narrative into screenplay form, labelling each scene with the familiar 'interior or exterior' tags with a basic description of the action, using dialogue straight from the book. Somehow, studio chief Jack L. Warner read a copy. He loved it and told Ford to shoot it just as it was - leading to a film classic.
Politics
A screen adaptation, is a collaborative work, not only involving a screen writer, but a director, producer, artists and actors, and unless the writer directs, it is the director who has the decision on whether a screenplay is filmed or forgotten, whether a screen writer's vision is to be fulfilled. This leads to the politics of screen writing. In Hollywood, screen writers can be 'hired and fired' in an instant if the director is not happy with the way a story is developing. To paraphrase Harlan Ellison in an interview for the ‘Moving Pictures’ TV series:
‘Do I mind? That I put my mind and soul into a piece of art, which when it's finished is rejected by a studio? It's like a baby, only you go nine months and when it's delivered you get a ball pin hammer and bash in its skull. Do I mind? I love it...love it...’Although not a famous story, the development of Jurassic Park from novel to film illustrates these problems very well. Manuscripts of the novel had circulated Hollywood and become hot property. Crichton priced the rights at $1.5 million, but promised them to Steven Spielberg. The director duly made the purchase and offered Crichton another half million to write the screen play. The author was sick of the actual story by then, but wrote a draft anyway, which brought the novel to a budgetable size. But when he submitted the screenplay, it did not live up to expectations.
His draft went straight to the core of the work - the action sequences in the park, in a similar way to his previous film Westworld. Spielberg suggested that rather than going straight to the dinosaurs, there should be a closer approximation of what was in the book, in terms of character. So the pair set about a new draft, which was used to begin pre-production design, with story boards and illustrations begun and locations being scouted for. Crichton left the project, and a new writer who had been re-writing Spielberg’s Hook, Scotch Marmo was brought in to strengthen the characterisation.
Marmo, rather than attempting to re-write Crichton's draft, opted to begin afresh, with the novel as the base. She read the novel over and over, read Crichton's draft and viewed the storyboards. She also consulted with Crichton, even borrowing a copy of the book he had highlighted and annotated for his own work. As expected, Marmo leaned towards characterisation in opposition to Crichton’s belief that this would draw away from the essential marvel of the story. There was an unusually close collaboration with Spielberg - Marmo would write some, submit it and the director would offer suggestions. She finished the final draft in five months and gave it to the director. He rejected it.
Spielberg next tried David Koepp, who was told to try from scratch again. Koepp wasn't happy with re-writes and this put his mind to rest. He elected not to read the Crichton and Marmo scripts, but re-read the novel four or five times. He found it to be written much like a film, and his approach was to stay close to the characterisation, and create a structure based upon set pieces, which meant that whole section of the novel's action could be lost, without changing the story. This is the draft that became the film.
Although this procedure seems harsh, it is quite normal. When a popular novel is being adapted for the screen, it needs to be done well - especially when the studio has paid so much for the rights. The Crichton and Marmo scripts might have been accepted by other directors - Joe Dante and Tim Burton had also been interested, but each has a particular style which is expected from an audience and this needs to be reflected in the screenplay. Although it does not give the screen writer the freedom they would like, it does create successful films.
The End
There is still a stigma attached to the film adaptation. It is impossible to leave the cinemas without overhearing criticism about the content - 'Why was the ending changed?', 'I thought that they were quite faithful to the spirit of the novel...', or most likely 'It wasn't as good as the book!'. The novel is apparently 'sacrosanct', the film maker's job being to 'capture the spirit' of the novel', without distorting the detail or novelist's tone. It is as though film eradicates the imaginative involvement without offering a different if comparable involvement. What isn't understood, is that although the film is a different media to the novel, it is also a different form of creativity.
What a filmmaker can hope when adapting a novel is to be able to equalise the nature of the prose. This can only be done when it is accepted that film is a different medium to the novel, but can still offer as much power. Recent successes like Forrest Gump and Shindler's List demonstrates that films are as powerful an art form as the novel and can direct a message at a large audience just as effectively. At the root of any adaptation is a screen writer with a book, a word processor, a notepad and a vivid imagination, and the work their work is as important (if not more) than the original writer.
© 1996 Stuart Ian Burns
Coda:: As you can see I wrote the above some years ago, but I’m amazed how much actually continues to be the case. Some things to note:
For a while, John Grisham has stopped selling the rights to his novels to film studios. Apparently he was in a bookstore in an airport and overheard someone looking at his new novel and then telling her friend that she’d wait for the film to come out.
The second sequel to Jurassic Park wasn't an adaptation, but an original screenplay.
Only three of the top ten grossers of all time are adaptations.
LA Confidential proved that the art isn’t completely dead
Contact:: If you’ve found this essay useful, email and let me know.
Bibliography
Early days
FINLER, Joel W. The Hollywood Story. Pyramid Books:London, England. 1989.
Coffee table sized book which gives an excellent working knowledge of the Hollywood Film Industry, and the five biggest studios. Sections range from Award success, to history and financial endeavours. The scale of the work cannot be described here.
FOX, Julian. The Great Story Chase. In Films and Filming. March 1980. Vol26. No 6. Pages 14-21.
FOX, Julian. Through The Roof (The Great Picture Chase, Part Two). In Films and Filming April 1980. Vol 26. No 7. Pages 14-21.
Detailed account of the search for the stories in early film making, covering some of the first adaptations from classical literature. Offers useful information mainly from the silent era. The style is quite reverential, but not too off putting.
Huston, John. The Maltese Falcon: based upon the novel by Dasheill Hammett. Warner: Los Angeles, USA. 1941.
Good example of the layout of an early film script. Includes a character description as part of the screenplay for the casting director. Interesting also, because the secretary who wrote the script while Huston was away travelling isn’t credited.
The Technicalities
FIELD, Syd. Screenplay: The Foundations of Screenwriting: A Step-by-Step Guide from concept to finished script. Expanded Edition. Dell Publishing: New York, USA. 1982.
VALE, Eugene. The Technique of Screenplay Writing. Redwood Press: Wiltshire, England. 1972.
PORTNOY, Kenneth. Screen Adaptation: A Scriptwriting Handbook. Focal Press: Stoneham, USA. 1991.
There is a progression in the depth of these works. The Field is a very good guide for beginners, offering simple but not patronising language, outlining the broad strokes. Those interested in screen writing as a career, or the more technical aspects should consult the Vale, who describes the process at an incredible depth, from ideas to the format of the screen play, to finding an agent. In the third book, Portnoy takes the detail even further and concentrates upon Screen adaptation. Although there is some description of the screenplay technique, it has been written as a textbook for film courses and so requires a certain amount of previous knowledge.
BRADY, John. The Craft of the Screenwriter: Interviews with Six Celebrated Screenwriters. Simon and Schuster: New York, USA. 1981.
Although some years old, this offers incredible insights into the screen writing industry, and how the film industry perceives the writer and their work. The interviews are from different sections of the industry, from art house, to film adaptations of stage musicals and novels.
SEGAR, Linda. Creating Unforgettable Characters. Henry Holt and Company: New York, USA.
No real focus on adaptations, but an excellent description of the creation of believable characters in scripts, with examples from many sources in film, theatre, television and the novel, from Cheers to when harry met sally...
Diversity
McFARLANE, Brian. Words and Images: Australian Novels into Film. Heinemann Publisher’s Australia PTY Ltd: Victoria, Australia. 1983.
SINYARD, Neil. Filming Literature: The Art of the Screen Adaptation. Croom Helm Ltd.: Kent, England. 1986.
Focus on particular areas of the industry. The McFarlane has an intelligently written introduction, which argues for the capacity of film to be a different art form to the novel but still have the same weight. Sinyard is a good companion to the Portnoy, with descriptions of the entire process, including the work of the director and cinematographer. Essays included on adaptations of Shakespeare, Dickens, Joyce and the Bronte’s, as well as adaptations as criticism.
BARKER, Martin. First and Last Mohicans. In Sight and Sound. August 1993. Vol 3. No 8. Page 26.
Surveys the fascination with ‘The Last of the Mohicans’ and compares the many adaptations which have appeared in film, including the recent Michael Mann production with Daniel Day-Lewis and Madeline Stowe in the title roles.
HARMETZ, Aljean. The Making of ‘The Wizard of Oz’. Pavilion Books Ltd.: London, England. 1989.
A chapter dedicated to the adaptation of the original books to the original film - and the politics involved when the first contracted screenplay isn’t what the STUDIO might have hoped.
TAUBLIN, Amy. 1993. Out of the Ruins. In Sight and Sound. October 1993. Vol 3. No 10. Page 29.
Interview with the director and screen writer of the recent adaptation of ‘The Secret Garden’ .
The Business
GOLDMAN, William. Adventures in the Screen Trade. Futura: England. 1990.
GOLDMAN, William. Which Lie Did I Tell?: More Adventures in the Screen Trade. Bloomsbury: England. 2000.
Industry standard. Should be read, even if the rest of this list is ignored. Goldman gives dramatic insights into the film industry and the treatment of screen writers, as well as a set-by-step guide to the adaptation of a short story and how it would be treated if different professionals were on the project. Magical. The new book looks at the creation of an original screenplay.
SQUIRE, Jason E. (ed.) The Movie Business Book. Columbus Books: Kent, England. 1986.
Includes essays about the licensing of books for film adaptation, the reverse process of the novelisation, as well as the merchandising possibilities...
The Creative Process
CRIGHTON, Michael. Jurassic Park. Arrow/Random House. London, England. 1991.
DUNCAN, Jody and Don SHAY. The Making of Jurassic Park. Boxtree: London, England. 1993.
CRIGHTON, Michael and DAVID Koepp. Jurassic Park: From the novel by Michael Crighton: Directed by Steven Spielberg. Hollywood Scripts: London, England. 1993.
It is quite useful to read the novel (worth reading anyway), then seeing what an early draft contains. The script included here has much more adult content with stronger philosophical debate about the cloning from DNA, but quite close in character to the finished version. The writing in the Duncan and Shay is more scholarly than the format might suggest, and gives a good description of the process which occurs when a director is searching for the right script. There are also reproductions of the storyboards based upon the final script.
BERNSTEIN, Carl and Bob Woodward. All the President’s Men. Secker and Warburb: London, England. 1974.
GOLDMAN, William. All the President’s Men: based upon the book by Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward. Wildwood Enterprises Inc: Los Angeles. 1975.
The screenplay is a development of the book, rather than a straight adaptation, and so comparing the two in conjunction with the chapter in Goldman’s ‘Adventures in the Screen Trade’ suggests that there is as much if not more work involved in an adaptation, as opposed to an original screen play.
The Films
ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN. Screenplay by William Goldman. Directed by Alan J. Pakula. Wildwood Enterprises for Warner Brothers Pictures. USA. 1976.
Incredibly tense thriller (considering the outcome is known), in which two reporters for the Washington Post uncover the Watergate affair. Woodward and Bernstein, well played by Dustin Hoffman and Robert Redford, are presented in a less self-congratulatory style than their novel, and are therefore more sympathetic. Wonderfully atmospheric cinematography which sets the two against huge buildings help to demonstrate the enormity of their task (an aerial view from inside a library being the most beautiful).
BLADE RUNNER: THE DIRECTOR’S CUT. Screenplay by Hampton Fancher and David Webb Peoples, from ‘Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?’ by Philip K. Dick. Directed by Ridley Scott. Blade Runner Partnership. USA. 1991.
Little can be added to the applause already given to this Science Fiction classic, recently released in the original cut. A good example of how screen writers and directors use the book as a source in adaptation - in the novel, there is greater emphasis on artificial wildlife, while in the film they become part of Scott’s nightmarish Los Angeles. Best seen in Widescreen.
84 CHARING CROSS ROAD. Screenplay by Hugh Whitemore, based upon the book by Helene Hanff. Directed by David Jones. Brooks Films for Columbia Pictures Corporation. USA. 1986.
Demonstrates how even the most abstract of novels can become a beautiful of films. Tells of the transatlantic friendship between an American writer and very English book shop worker, and contrasts the differences in the countries during the aftermath of the Second World War. Readings of the letters by Anne Bancroft and Anthony Hopkins, help to crystallise what these people must have been like, turning them into real, credible people.
THE FRENCH LIEUTENANT’S WOMAN. Screenplay by Harold Pinter. Directed by Karel Reisz. Juniper Films. USA. 1981.
Obtuseness turned into good cinema. Meryl Streep and Jeremy Isaacs are cast as lovers in the 19th century, and actors in the film that they are a part of, allowing them to comment on Victorian love in a similar way to John Fowle’s original novel, but still produce a credible film. A description of the development of this approach is given in Sinyard.
GREAT EXPECTATIONS. Screenplay by David Lean, George Pollock and Antony Havelock-Allen. Directed by David Lean. Cineguild. GB. 1946.
One of the best screen adaptations based upon Dickens’s work, Lean manages to evoke the dark nature of the prose without the film becoming a harrowing experiences. The transitions from childhood to adulthood are handled almost seamlessly, a credit to the screenwriter, casting director and director.
JURASSIC PARK. Screenplay by David Koepp, Malia Scotch Marmo and Michael Crighton. Amblin Enterprises. USA. 1993.
Demonstrates how some novels can only be diminished by adaptation. Although the computer generated dinosaurs can be startling on the first viewing, further watches diminish the experience, and unfortunately the characters and story are not sustaining enough. Still a blockbuster however. One wonders how things may have turned out if the original Michael Crighton or Scotch Marmo scripts had been filmed instead - read the screen play listed above for this perspective.
KRAMER Versus KRAMER. Screemplay by William Goldman. Directed by Robert Benton. Stanley Jaffe Production for Columbia Pictures Corporation. USA. 1979.
Strong, intelligently written melodrama. Dustin Hoffman and Meryl Streep come to terms with divorce and a court battle for their son. Goldman takes the main thrust of the novel and re-writes the characters so that the audience is tied between each party. Although he is seemingly the villain of the peace at the beginning of the film, we finally want Hoffman to win, as Streep’s demands seems more and more irrational.
2001: A Space Odyssey. Screenplay by Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke, based upon ‘The Sentinel’ by Arthur C. Clarke. Directed by Stanley Kubrick. MGM. GB. 1968.
A product of the 1960s, but still another piece of cinema history. Fans argue over whether this is Science Fiction or simply a story set in space (despite the presence of the monolith), because of Kubrick’s attention to scientific detail (space is a vacuum and therefore soundless - space ships do not thunder when they explode, space ships will not whoosh when they pass the camera). Although Clarke wrote the novel in conjunction with the screen play, one is based around Jupiter, the other Saturn. This allows each to be an excellent example of their media, rather than an adaptation of each other (another reason was that a probe had recently visited Jupiter and Kubrick wanted to use the visually exciting shots of Jupiter which where taken in the film to highlight space exploration’s continuing development).
The Reviews
PYM, John (ed.) The Time Out Film Guide. Thirteenth Edition. Penguin: London, England. 2003.
Less pretentious than Halliwells, and recommended by Barry Norman. Over fifty reviewers contribute over 14,000 film reviews, often from a point of view not previously thought of, and usually as an example of their genre rather than the business as a whole.
If any authors feel their work has been infringed by the above, please let me know and I will be happy to remove any offending material. I have tried to attribute any quotes either here or in the bibliography. Thank you.
Life I'm entering my weblog into The Guardian's competition. I hope they take into account all of my writing over the past year and not just the dribs and drabs of the past few months. It'll be interesting to see who finally wins ... I hope it's no one we've heard of ...
TV Via the quick Channel 4 re-runs, finally saw Benton's final episode of e.r. which also featured a 'cameo' from The Book Group's Anne Dudek. She appears with all of the main characters and shares some of Benton's final dialogue in the hospital. If we can't get Clare Danes for the 'My So-Called Life' reunion movie, Dudek will do nicely as a grown up Angela Chase ...
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