Sometimes I feel that the two things have very little to do with each other at all - the question was partly inspired by simultaneously watching the film and reading HMS Surprise a while ago, and being unable to imagine the film Stephen (for example) complaining about Judaical ritual superstitious cleanliness. But I think part of that is the the film is just more modern in its speech patterns, and part of it is that all the bad-tempered Stephen is in the deleted scenes. So at other times I just accept them as two sides of the same thing, and the more I've read of the books, the more I see things from them reflected in the film.
It's hard to say just where the difference between the film-Stephen and the book-Stephen comes (apart from obvious physical differences, and I'm not sure how much the perception of difference is coloured by those). Possibly it's to do with the sense of having seen far, far too much - there are places where I'm definitely surprised by the film-Stephen's idealism. But his behaviour towards Blakeney could very well be that of another child who had to grow up far too soon, because of the circumstances of his life. What this isn't, for me, is a Stephen in the aftermath of Port Mahon - either it hasn't happened (in spite of the hand thing), or he's already had some equivalent of the trip to Bombay - because it's also not the immediate aftermath of Calcutta and Madeira. It's either a Stephen who hasn't met Diana, or possibly one who still believes she'll be waiting for him at the end of his journey...
Jack is always more difficult for me to pin down, anyway... The film-Jack definitely has the authority of the captain who defused the mutiny in Post Captain, but otherwise he seems to have more of the spirit of the lieutenant of Master and Commander than the commodore of the Mauritius Command. There's very little sense of the captain's isolation - he has his own people around him, and his dinners have definitely got over any sense of formality they started with. Just occasionally... some of his scenes with Stephen - and of course one scene without him. Someone has pointed out elsewhere that this Jack tells the salt story as a joke on himself, whereas the original was told completely straight - I'm not sure just how much this is a fundamental change in the character, and how much it's a slightly older Jack able to look back at his youthful seriousness...
I don't think I came to any conclusions there, but I found it interesting to think about :)
part of it is that all the bad-tempered Stephen is in the deleted scenes.
It could be said that Film!Stephen is just too nice. His innocence is endearing, his mentoring little Blakeney admirable, and then gosh darn it, he's hurt and you just want to hug him. All that is non-huggable about Book!Stephen goes out the window rather, which is perhaps why the scoldings of Jack about booze, mutiny and island-avoidance are given prominence beyond what you'd expect at that point in their friendship, when Stephen had given up expecting to be fetched and carried for purposes of natural history.
It's either a Stephen who hasn't met Diana, or possibly one who still believes she'll be waiting for him at the end of his journey...
Or she doesn't exist in movieverse, or they're long married, or it's later on still... I'm not sure there's any clue at all, and leaving the women out was deliberate. (Again, I wonder how they would handle The Reverse of the Medal)
Jack seems to have more of the spirit of the lieutenant of Master and Commander than the commodore of the Mauritius Command.
As with Stephen, Jack had to be made likable. We have twenty books to learn to love him; moviegoers have two hours, so we see Jack being jolly.
Someone has pointed out elsewhere that this Jack tells the salt story as a joke on himself, whereas the original was told completely straight
He tells it a few times - I'm sure at least one of the times he got drunk and told it as a joke, even if it was "offscreen" :-) We do get serious moments too, and a little sense of his isolation when he has to order the ropes cut and when he overrules Stephen. I think it's a reasonable mixture for mid-series Jack.
So at other times I just accept them as two sides of the same thing, and the more I've read of the books, the more I see things from them reflected in the film.
It's hard to say just where the difference between the film-Stephen and the book-Stephen comes (apart from obvious physical differences, and I'm not sure how much the perception of difference is coloured by those).
Possibly it's to do with the sense of having seen far, far too much - there are places where I'm definitely surprised by the film-Stephen's idealism. But his behaviour towards Blakeney could very well be that of another child who had to grow up far too soon, because of the circumstances of his life.
What this isn't, for me, is a Stephen in the aftermath of Port Mahon - either it hasn't happened (in spite of the hand thing), or he's already had some equivalent of the trip to Bombay - because it's also not the immediate aftermath of Calcutta and Madeira. It's either a Stephen who hasn't met Diana, or possibly one who still believes she'll be waiting for him at the end of his journey...
Jack is always more difficult for me to pin down, anyway...
The film-Jack definitely has the authority of the captain who defused the mutiny in Post Captain, but otherwise he seems to have more of the spirit of the lieutenant of Master and Commander than the commodore of the Mauritius Command.
There's very little sense of the captain's isolation - he has his own people around him, and his dinners have definitely got over any sense of formality they started with. Just occasionally... some of his scenes with Stephen - and of course one scene without him.
Someone has pointed out elsewhere that this Jack tells the salt story as a joke on himself, whereas the original was told completely straight - I'm not sure just how much this is a fundamental change in the character, and how much it's a slightly older Jack able to look back at his youthful seriousness...
I don't think I came to any conclusions there, but I found it interesting to think about :)
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It could be said that Film!Stephen is just too nice. His innocence is endearing, his mentoring little Blakeney admirable, and then gosh darn it, he's hurt and you just want to hug him. All that is non-huggable about Book!Stephen goes out the window rather, which is perhaps why the scoldings of Jack about booze, mutiny and island-avoidance are given prominence beyond what you'd expect at that point in their friendship, when Stephen had given up expecting to be fetched and carried for purposes of natural history.
It's either a Stephen who hasn't met Diana, or possibly one who still believes she'll be waiting for him at the end of his journey...
Or she doesn't exist in movieverse, or they're long married, or it's later on still... I'm not sure there's any clue at all, and leaving the women out was deliberate. (Again, I wonder how they would handle The Reverse of the Medal)
Jack seems to have more of the spirit of the lieutenant of Master and Commander than the commodore of the Mauritius Command.
As with Stephen, Jack had to be made likable. We have twenty books to learn to love him; moviegoers have two hours, so we see Jack being jolly.
Someone has pointed out elsewhere that this Jack tells the salt story as a joke on himself, whereas the original was told completely straight
He tells it a few times - I'm sure at least one of the times he got drunk and told it as a joke, even if it was "offscreen" :-) We do get serious moments too, and a little sense of his isolation when he has to order the ropes cut and when he overrules Stephen. I think it's a reasonable mixture for mid-series Jack.
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