So last week I found out that the first Chuck Palahniuk book that I bought, Choke, has been made into a film. Initially I was very happy with this news. But after a while I thought, "Is this movie going to live up to my expectations?"And it probably won't. Most book to movie conversions end up this way for a variety of reasons. Having read Choke several years ago when it first came out and again this week, I knew that it wasn't going to live up to the book based on the fact that it's only an R-rated film. NC-17 would be the lowest rating this film could get and accurately portray what happens in the book. I mean, the book is about a sex addict who chokes on food to make money to support his dying mother. His mother is, well, anarchist isn't the right word, but it's the first that comes to mind.
But I think the biggest problem I had, just seeing the previews for this film was the cast. Now, while I like the actors in the film, they don't really resemble the characters of the book much. The guy who plays Denny seems way to big for the role, Sam Rockwell is too old to play a 25-year-old guy and Kelly McDonald, who plays Paige Marshall, while I loved her in Trainspotting and, most recently, No Country for Old Men, she still just doesn't seem right.
But this is exactly what I mean by "a variety of reasons" to not like the film. But does that make it bad? Maybe I would have felt differently about Fight Club (one of my favorite films) if I had read the book first. I don't know. But then again, Jurassic Park was very different from the original book (and seriously lacking in the Malcolm drawings) but still kicked a lot of ass.
Well, WDR readers, I'll let you be the judge for now. I'm sure I will report back on this once I've actually seen the film, which should occur sometime in September when it's finally released to large audiences.
No comments:
Post a Comment