Rewriting History
So the other day I went to one of those movie previews where they ask your opinion and then tell you that you can't talk about the film with anyone. I really enjoyed the movie. Then I talked with my boss who hasn't seen the preview but she really wanted to because she has read the book that the movie claims to be based on. So, I do like I always do, I rush right out and buy the book and put it at the top of my terrifyingly tall list. I'm reading the book and I'm loving it. But, I am, also, once again dismayed by how little a movie has in common with its source material. It's as if a movie today is written from a book blurb and a cast of characters. Why do we say that it is from a book at all?
It is not about good or bad. I really love them both, but I have this idea in my head that a movie based on a book should be like a twin, fraternal perhaps but still, this and so many others that I have seen in the past few years...They were more like cousins, second cousins once removed and by marriage.
I am not entirely sure that it is wrong, exactly. I'm just not all that sure that it is right to change the story as much as we do either.
We talk with superior disdain about the Disney-fication of fairy tales and act like we are oh so smart, but kids today... The Disney version is the only one kids are exposed to anymore. They don't learn that Beauty had sisters who try to keep her from returning to the Beast or that she dreams of him as a prince. They don't know that Cinderella's step-sisters get their eyes pecked out by birds when they try to come to her wedding, that they cut off parts of their feet. They don't learn that Rapunzel bears twins in the desert, that the frog king is thrown against a wall or that the little mermaid dies, and never gets her prince at all.
Jim Henson wrote that with every new storyteller, the story itself changes. Part of why l love these stories is that while they do change, there are these core elements that don't. I always thought that if we studied them we might find some core truth about the first people or the gods or whatever. You know? Something fundamental about us, the source of creativity. I don't really know what it is called, but I feel like it is important--always have.
So, does it make a difference whether it is an ancient fairy tale or chick lit written only a couple years ago? Is one more precious than the other, either because it is written down and published? It is one definable person's work of art. Or should something that has stood the test of time or whatever, be valued for the treasure that it is? That piece of our past that maybe we don't fully understand. Because we don't seem to mind changing for Disney so much as we scream and caterwaul over every little minute detail that is left out of the Harry Potter movies.
I haven't made up my mind as to whether or not it is right to make changes when bringing a book to the silver screen. I just know that it happens. It's inevitable and I know that, there is even a part of me that thinks that it has a purpose, in that journey of the soul kind of way. I'm just not so sure we should be so cavalier about it. And we are so cavalier about so many things we do in life.
We rewrite our own stories everyday. We tell people that we are younger, taller, smarter and more than we are, or we tell them that we are less (so often we tell them that we are less). And we become that. as though it has always been that way. And like our stories that date back before anyone we ever heard of much less knew, I wonder if it is such a good idea to write so much of our truth, our stories, our history.
Without a concern, a care, or even a moment's pause...
It is not about good or bad. I really love them both, but I have this idea in my head that a movie based on a book should be like a twin, fraternal perhaps but still, this and so many others that I have seen in the past few years...They were more like cousins, second cousins once removed and by marriage.
I am not entirely sure that it is wrong, exactly. I'm just not all that sure that it is right to change the story as much as we do either.
We talk with superior disdain about the Disney-fication of fairy tales and act like we are oh so smart, but kids today... The Disney version is the only one kids are exposed to anymore. They don't learn that Beauty had sisters who try to keep her from returning to the Beast or that she dreams of him as a prince. They don't know that Cinderella's step-sisters get their eyes pecked out by birds when they try to come to her wedding, that they cut off parts of their feet. They don't learn that Rapunzel bears twins in the desert, that the frog king is thrown against a wall or that the little mermaid dies, and never gets her prince at all.
Jim Henson wrote that with every new storyteller, the story itself changes. Part of why l love these stories is that while they do change, there are these core elements that don't. I always thought that if we studied them we might find some core truth about the first people or the gods or whatever. You know? Something fundamental about us, the source of creativity. I don't really know what it is called, but I feel like it is important--always have.
So, does it make a difference whether it is an ancient fairy tale or chick lit written only a couple years ago? Is one more precious than the other, either because it is written down and published? It is one definable person's work of art. Or should something that has stood the test of time or whatever, be valued for the treasure that it is? That piece of our past that maybe we don't fully understand. Because we don't seem to mind changing for Disney so much as we scream and caterwaul over every little minute detail that is left out of the Harry Potter movies.
I haven't made up my mind as to whether or not it is right to make changes when bringing a book to the silver screen. I just know that it happens. It's inevitable and I know that, there is even a part of me that thinks that it has a purpose, in that journey of the soul kind of way. I'm just not so sure we should be so cavalier about it. And we are so cavalier about so many things we do in life.
We rewrite our own stories everyday. We tell people that we are younger, taller, smarter and more than we are, or we tell them that we are less (so often we tell them that we are less). And we become that. as though it has always been that way. And like our stories that date back before anyone we ever heard of much less knew, I wonder if it is such a good idea to write so much of our truth, our stories, our history.
Without a concern, a care, or even a moment's pause...