Writer's Block: Wait, that's not how it happened
I'm usually very forgiving of screenplay vs. novels because I think that there are certain nuances in books that translate poorly to film.
For example, my favorite horror novel is The Shining. The film for this deviates a lot from the book. Stephen King has been quoted saying that he hates the screenplay. However, it's not a bad movie. But I think that a lot of what made the Shining scary (the supernatural elements of the hotel, the descent into madness, etc) wouldn't translate as well to visual media.
I think that the film adaptation of LotR was actually very good. I know that a lot of die hard geeks love to point out how so much was left out of the movies but the bottom line concerning Tolkien for me is this: The man wrote too fucking much. At least with a book, when it takes us over 500 pages to get to the prancing pony, I can get up and get a snack, do something else, pee and come back to it. In a packed movie theater on opening night, not so much. Jackson's finished product is not only a shortened and more dramatic pacing of the film, but anyone not familiar with the story has a good grasp of what is going on.
For example, my favorite horror novel is The Shining. The film for this deviates a lot from the book. Stephen King has been quoted saying that he hates the screenplay. However, it's not a bad movie. But I think that a lot of what made the Shining scary (the supernatural elements of the hotel, the descent into madness, etc) wouldn't translate as well to visual media.
I think that the film adaptation of LotR was actually very good. I know that a lot of die hard geeks love to point out how so much was left out of the movies but the bottom line concerning Tolkien for me is this: The man wrote too fucking much. At least with a book, when it takes us over 500 pages to get to the prancing pony, I can get up and get a snack, do something else, pee and come back to it. In a packed movie theater on opening night, not so much. Jackson's finished product is not only a shortened and more dramatic pacing of the film, but anyone not familiar with the story has a good grasp of what is going on.