Movies that don't resemble the books

[Red Impact]

I'm not just talking about movies that change scenes and cut out characters, I'm talking about movies that bare barely any resemblance to the books they are based on. Two examples I know of

I, Robot -

SPOILER: Click to show

{Spoiler}The book was a collection of short stories that were more exercises in psychology about how Asimov's laws or robotics could cause problems in robots.

The movie was a mystery thriller that, while examining how Asimov's laws could lead to problems in robots, changes the tone drastically and bares no resemblance to any story in the book

Who Framed Roger Rabbit

SPOILER: Click to show

{Spoiler}The movie.. well, we all know the movie right?

The book it was based off of was completely different. The toons involved were all comic-strip stars and the murder mystery is centered around the head of the syndicate. Roger Rabbit is killed early on and replaced by a doppleganger he created to run an errand. Jessica hated Roger and only married him via supernatural intervention, there's no Judge Doom or Eddie's brother, three central characters are left out, and the murderers in the story are revealed to be a malicious genie (who intentionally set up wishes to fail after a time, was responsible for Roger marrying Jessica, and killed Roger) and Roger Rabbit (who killed the syndicate head and hired Eddie so he could pin it on him). The major plot device in the entire story is a tea kettle that is really a magic lamp.

Those are the only two I could think of, but I am curious about any other movies that don't tell the same story in any way as their source material.

[Deleted]

Is this based upon the idea of a movie modifying the source of a book to fit with the times, because if this is the intent of the thread, then there are several examples beyond the two you mentioned.

But, I never heard of the book format of "Who Framed Roger Rabbit".

[darthalexander]

I "can't wait" to see the Dark Tower books for this reason. So much is going to be cut out...sigh.

[Pervy Stone Cold]

I actually finished the book this was based on less than a year before seeing the movie.

I remember certain things not matching with the book but it has been a while since seeing the movie or reading the book.

The book has it were the old villain guy was described as a much more sickly and less likable person than he was in the movie.

[YAKMAN is ICHIBAN]

Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Starship Troopers

[heyguesswhatidid]

Less Than Zero

[KAMALARAMBO: BOOMSHAKALAKA!!!]

I've never actually read Stephen King's The Shining, but I've heard it is incredibly different from Kubrick's film (which I love)! For instance, in the book Jack Nicholson's character beats the shit out of his son in drunken rage, whereas in the movie he is just mentioned as pulling him up by his arm a little too rough. There's some other things I think too that make the character a lot less sympathetic and also grass animals come to life in the garden maze.

One King work I did read that was different from the movie, was the short story "The Lawnmower Man," which I heard King was PISSED about. I always found how angry King was mentioned as being hilarious. If you look up the story and read it you probably will too. It is only about 10 to 20 pages and has nowhere near the amount of depth to it to make a compelling film.

Really, I think one of major plot points is just a guy paid to be a groundskeeper sees a nude centaur or something like that. I mean the centaur doesn't really do anything, the groundskeeper just sees him.How the hell would you make a movie out of that?

You could answer, "Well, maybe the centaur does something, you know anything?" But that would deviate from King's short story, which is the whole reason he got pissed about "The Lawnmower Man" in the first place.

[Baixo Astral]

The Wanderers changes from a viciously dark novel, with some of the most depressing scenes I think I've ever read, to an early 60s gang romp. Both are awesome.

[Red Impact]

Not really updating or changing a few things for the movie version. I'm referring more to movies that might take only the most basic premise and character names and then completely change the story and sequence and characterization. Like that Romeo and Juliet movie that featured everyone as white gangsters still kept the story more or less intact. Neither of those movies really did keep the story.

Who censored Roger Rabbit (the book Who Framed was loosely based on), was released in 1981 by Gary Wolf. So it's not like there weren't cartoons around at the time (he even wrote another one that was closer to the movie than his first book). It's long out of print though, I only got to read it because it's been translated into an e-book.

[hollywood]

JAWS the book is quite different from the film, although the characters are all there and relatively the same.

SPOILER: Click to show

{Spoiler}The book deals quite a bit with the class structure in American society. Ellen Brody was the daughter of a wealthy family who visited Amity as tourists. She married Chief Brody, entering into a blue-collar family, and never quite felt at home in it. This eventually led to an affair with Matt Hooper, the super-rich marine biologist. Although Richard Drewfuss pretty much nailed the character (intelligent and smarmy), he doesn't physically resemble the book's portrayal, which was a young, attractive womanizer. He also dies when the shark attacks him in the anti-shark cage.

Chief Brody isn't a newcomer to Amity Island in the book, either. He grew up there, and was very familiar with the place and its reasons for covering up the first shark victim's death. He didn't like it, but he was far more sympathetic toward the idea than in the movie.

The fishing expedition also doesn't spend days and nights at sea. They return home at the end of each day.

And probably the biggest differences... Quint isn't eaten by the shark. He drowns when he's dragged underwater by the harpoons, ropes and barrels shot into the shark—kinda like Captain Ahab. In the end, he sinks to the bottom of the ocean with the animal when—also unlike the film—it finally dies as a result of all the injuries sustained by the harpoons.

[Junkenstein]

Starship Troopers has next to nothing to do with the Robert A. Heinlein. I remember reading that Paul Verhoeven read the first couple of chapters and then stopped because he hated it so much. Fun movie, but a faithful adaption it ain't.

[YAKMAN is ICHIBAN]

Reading over a synopsis on Wikipedia, The Warriors film seems VERY different from the book.

[Ryback on a Pole!]

The Lost World

The book doesn't feature a group of hunters capturing dinosaurs, it doesn't feature Malcolm going to the island to rescue his gf, it doesn't feature a T-Rex rampaging through San Diego, doesn't feature an annoying environmentalist, doesn't feature the dinos breaking free and rampaging through the hunters camp, doesn't even feature hunters actually. (The main villains are a geneticist and his companion who are on the island to steal dino eggs, neither are big game hunters though)

In fact, the only things that are the same are the T-Rex attacking the trailers and to some degree, the group getting attacked by raptors in the abandoned town.

[bibboid]

Another Stephen King to add to the pile......The Running Man.
I loved the movie, but it had very little to do with the original story.

Clive Cussler tried twice to get his books turned into movies.
Raise the Titanic butchered the story so badly that Cussler vowed to never make another Hollywood movie again.
Twenty something years later, he finally agreed to let them make Sahara into a film and they botched that one so badly that Cussler sued the studio.

[Push R Truth]

Mar 17, 2011 11:48:50 GMT -5 Ryback on a Pole! said:

The Lost World

The book doesn't feature a group of hunters capturing dinosaurs, it doesn't feature Malcolm going to the island to rescue his gf, it doesn't feature a T-Rex rampaging through San Diego, doesn't feature an annoying environmentalist, doesn't feature the dinos breaking free and rampaging through the hunters camp, doesn't even feature hunters actually.

In fact, the only things that are the same are the T-Rex attacking the trailers and to some degree, the group getting attacked by raptors in the abandoned town.

To another extent, Jurassic Park is the same way. The basic plot is there, and the people are sorta there, but it's so different.

[Alex Shelley]

Blood and Chocolate.

Just.... Blood and Chocolate.

[The Line]

A film that differs from the book, but in a good way, is The Godfather. They cut all the young Vito stuff(which later got put into Pt. II, which it fits with entirely better than if it would have gotten shoe-horned into pt. 1) and thankfully, the whole sub-plot with

SPOILER: Click to show

{Spoiler}The woman who Sonny is banging who has the big vagina and gets surgery so her vagina ain't so big anymore

. The book is pretty good, but FFC did probably the greatest (notice I didn't say most faithful) adaptation of a book possible.

[FUNK_US/BRODUS]

The Secret Garden?


Cholera outbreak =/= Earthquake.

[Gus Richlen Was Wrong]

Mar 17, 2011 11:51:38 GMT -5 Push R Truth said:

Mar 17, 2011 11:48:50 GMT -5 Ryback on a Pole! said:

The Lost World

The book doesn't feature a group of hunters capturing dinosaurs, it doesn't feature Malcolm going to the island to rescue his gf, it doesn't feature a T-Rex rampaging through San Diego, doesn't feature an annoying environmentalist, doesn't feature the dinos breaking free and rampaging through the hunters camp, doesn't even feature hunters actually.

In fact, the only things that are the same are the T-Rex attacking the trailers and to some degree, the group getting attacked by raptors in the abandoned town.

To another extent, Jurassic Park is the same way. The basic plot is there, and the people are sorta there, but it's so different.

that's why i dislike the Jurassic Park movies so much, because I read the books and then I saw the movies, and I was so disgusted with how badly they were adapted, esp. the first one.

[legendkiller1985]

I'm Suprised One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest wasn't metioned yet.