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Buffista Movies 7: Brides for 7 Samurai  

A place to talk about movies--old and new, good and bad, high art and high cheese. It's the place to place your kittens on the award winners, gossip about upcoming fims and discuss DVD releases and extras. Spoiler policy: White font all plot-related discussion until a movie's been in wide release two weeks, and keep the major HSQ in white font until two weeks after the video/DVD release.


-t - Nov 01, 2009 5:48:38 am PST #4784 of 30000
I am a woman of various inclinations and only some of the time are they to burn everything down in frustration

2001 the movie is way better than the book (I am unclear as to which was first, actually)


Glamcookie - Nov 01, 2009 5:53:02 am PST #4785 of 30000
I know my own heart and understand my fellow man. But I am made unlike anyone I have ever met. I dare to say I am like no one in the whole world. - Anne Lister

LA Confidential is just as good as the book and they changed quite a bit for the movie but it worked brilliantly.


Jessica - Nov 01, 2009 5:57:12 am PST #4786 of 30000
And then Ortus came and said "It's Ortin' time" and they all Orted off into the sunset

2001 the movie is way better than the book (I am unclear as to which was first, actually)

They were more or less concurrent IIRC (similar to Princess Bride, actually).


tommyrot - Nov 01, 2009 5:57:32 am PST #4787 of 30000
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.

2001 the movie is way better than the book (I am unclear as to which was first, actually)

I was gonna mention that. The movie was based on a Clark short story ("The Sentinal," IIRC.) Although the movie being better might just be because the short story is a short story. In the story, they dig up the monolith on the moon and it sends a signal to Jupiter or Saturn or whatever, and that's it.

(Although it's been about 30 years since I read it.)

Or are you talking about the novelization of the movie?


Lee - Nov 01, 2009 6:06:18 am PST #4788 of 30000
The feeling you get when your brain finally lets your heart get in its pants.

They were more or less concurrent IIRC (similar to Princess Bride, actually).

Actually, Princess bride the book was 1973 [link]

Princess bride the movie was 1987 [link]


-t - Nov 01, 2009 6:07:09 am PST #4789 of 30000
I am a woman of various inclinations and only some of the time are they to burn everything down in frustration

similar to Princess Bride, actually

How's that? I'm sure I read Princess Bride in High School and I thought the movie came out when I was in college.

Or are you talking about the novelization of the movie?

Maybe? Definitely by Arthur C. Clarke, though. I was under the impression that he he wrote the screenplay, got miffed at what Kubrick was doing with it and turned it into a novel. So I'm not sure how to categorize it.


Jessica - Nov 01, 2009 6:08:19 am PST #4790 of 30000
And then Ortus came and said "It's Ortin' time" and they all Orted off into the sunset

Huh. Nevermind, then!


megan walker - Nov 01, 2009 6:30:54 am PST #4791 of 30000
"What kind of magical sunshine and lollipop world do you live in? Because you need to be medicated."-SFist

But "39 Steps" can't be the only movie that was far better than book it nominally brought to the screen. Can anyone think of other examples of movies that were major improvements on the books they were based upon?

Many of Hitchcock's other works were great adaptations. He just had such a way of making things his own, whether they were good or bad to start: The Lodger, Young and Innocent, The Lady Vanishes, Rebecca, Strangers on a Train, The Birds, etc.

Rear Window, Psycho, Vertigo were all adapted.


Sean K - Nov 01, 2009 6:45:05 am PST #4792 of 30000
You can't leave me to my own devices; my devices are Nap and Eat. -Zenkitty

I was under the impression that he he wrote the screenplay, got miffed at what Kubrick was doing with it and turned it into a novel. So I'm not sure how to categorize it.

The novel 2001 was written more or less simultaneously with the movie being made. Both were based on/expansions of The Sentinel. And Clarke wrote the novel.


§ ita § - Nov 01, 2009 6:55:50 am PST #4793 of 30000
Well not canonically, no, but this is transformative fiction.

The novel 2001 was written more or less simultaneously with the movie being made. Both were based on/expansions of The Sentinel. And Clarke wrote the novel.

I'm now trying to search for and cannot find the 2001 book my father bought me which seemed to have been the novel and the making of story. There was a separate publication that was a novel only?