(In case you’re visiting only to vote, please remember that we’re looking only for films that have been released in the past 20 years. Thanks!)
On Wednesday
, I polled readers on the best and worst film adaptations of children’s books and found some surprises, some no-brainers, and some upsets. The results will be posted on Monday.
Sure, we focus mainly on children’s books here on the blog, but that does not mean we at Upstart Crow ignore adult titles completely (just ask the wonderful Danielle Chiotti, who is our resident specialist in adult titles). Given our love of all things literary, we’d be remiss not to discuss the best and worst film adaptations of adult novels.
Because the adaptations of novels go back to the very beginnings of cinema with classics like All Quiet on the Western Front, The Grapes of Wrath, and Gone with the Wind, I’ve decided to limit choices for best and worst adult film adaptations to movies made in the last 20 years because, if the children’s choices are an indication, the nominations will be all over the place. And besides, The Godfather would have been tough to beat for the best, amIright?
So please follow the same format as before in voting for your most/least favorites. List your selections like so: “Best: How the Grinch Stole Christmas (the original) Worst: Twilight” Please limit your choices to best and worth to only one in this format to make it easier for tallying purposes. If you’d like to list runners-up or comments afterward, feel free.
The results from comments and from my concurrent poll on Twitter (follow hashtag #books2film) will be posted next Monday. Let the votes begin!
Best: “The Shawshank Redemption”
Best: The Count of Monte Cristo
Worst: I am Legend
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Best: Apocalypse Now
Best: Oh, I’d have to agree with Will. Shawshank was great, as was The Green Mile.
Worst: The Village. The movie put me to sleep.
Best: Misery by Stephen King
Worst: Watchers by Dean Koontz… I have no idea what they were thinking with this one.
Liked a lot (Best?): One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
and The Shining….?….
ok, I, uh, never read the books (Stephen King books scare me too much). Can’t think of ‘worst’ or anything less sinister at the moment. sorry!
Princess Bride…it might just slip in under the 20 year mark.
If not, High Fidelity. I actually liked the book more than the movie.
Best: Remains Of The Day
Worst: The English Patient
Both difficult books to adapt. Maybe English Patient isn’t really the worst, but the Oscar is so undeserved it makes it seem worse than it is. No, on second thought, it sucks.
WORST: Simon Birch. Based on A Prayer for Owen Meany, but Irving wouldn’t let the film share the same title as the book, so I don’t know if it counts. He didn’t believe the book could be adapted.
BEST: Sense and Sensibility (1995 version w/Emma Thompson)
Best: Wuthering Heights
Best: Babette’s Feast
(If Bryan can slip one in under the mark, so can I.)
Worst: DaVinci Code
BEST: Bridget Jones’s Diary
WORST: Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason
…how did it all go so wrong??
i thought of another one:
BEST: The Color Purple
The English Patient??!! Worst? I LOVed that movie. But I also loved Bridget Jones’s Diary.
BEST: FRIED GREEN TOMATOES (not because it followed the book very well, as it didn’t, but because it was charming in its own right) and SENSE & SENSIBILITY
WORST: DA VINCI CODE
This is really hard because I haven’t read all the books that inspired certain movies I dug (L.A. Confidential, anyone?).
But I have to put my chip on the Sense & Sensibility pick. Loved the book, loved the movie. Emma Thompson and Kate Winslet and Alan Rickman? S&S is one Colin Firth short of perfection.
BEST: Bridget Jones’s Diary (I didn’t see the sequel like MM, so can’t comment on it).
WORST: I only watch highly praised/recommended movies, so I haven’t seen a bad one in a looooong time.
BEST: Like Water for Chocolate–followed the book exactly–and well.
Best, best, best–A & E’s Pride and Prejudice
Worst–the 2005 version of Pride and Prejudice with Keira Knightley (like her, just hated the film)
Best: Babe. I love sheep-herding pigs.
Best: Lord of the Rings
Or, if you don’t like the series aspect,
Best: Pride and Prejudice with Jennifer Ehle as Elizabeth
Best: Persuasion
Not sure on worst