When the movie is BETTER than the book

It happens. Not often is the movie better than the book, this wont be a long thread because of it, but I thought it deserved one.

First one that comes to mind is in my Top 10 - JAWS



The book was not good. Just really unexciting, no dialogue worth remembering, and even Quints famous Indianapolis speech was less than a page. People dont realize Spielbergs genius until reading this. Between the plain story, and giving the man a broken shark, he ended up making one of the greatest films ever made.

Ill list others unless someone else lists them first

Die Hard. I have not read the book that it is based on, but since no one ever talks about it, I say it is safe to say Die Hard is better.

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Fear and Loathing in MoFo... The Gunslinger 45's Top 50 Favorite Films

In the 10 Ring: Gunslinger45's reviews

I tend to agree here on the movie Jaws vs. the book Jaws.

The book was rather boring, dry, and somewhat puerile, to boot. The movie version of Jaws, on the other hand, was much more interesting, with much more action in it.

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"It does not take a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brush fires of freedom in the minds of men." -- Samuel Adams (1722-1803)

The movie West Side Story was also better than the novel (which came out in the late 1960's, several years after the movie was released.) While the movie West Side Story was fantastic, with all kinds of emotions, actions and movements, and great music and dancing, Irving Schulman's novelization of WSS, although fun to read, was rather puerile. It felt like too much had been stripped from West Side Story when it was made into a novel, imho.

I think the movie of The Exorcist was better than the book...so was the movie of Mystic River.

Apologies to Allan Moore, but I thought V for Vendetta (2005) was better than the book.

Also thought the movie ending of Watchmen (2009) worked better than in the book - I usually criticize comic-based movies for tying every extraneous detail into the main characters somehow, but in this case tying the climax into Dr. Manhattan (as opposed to some random apparent alien) seemed logical and worked well.

didnt even know there was a book

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Agreed, also the whole squid thing didn't really work for me.

Based off the book "Nothing Lasts Forever." And now you know. And knowing is half the battle.

Howl's Moving Castle, marginally. Both were brilliant, although the film was simply near perfection

Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption



It was a Stephen King short story, and bland as hell. You just do not know how great a job those actors and director did until you read Kings original story. He had 2 other stories made into movies - The Body, which was the movie Stand By Me, and Apt Pupil. Wil Wheaton killed any chance of me liking Stand By Me, and Apt Pupil was meh in either capacity, (except Ian McKellan)

I agree that the movie was better. However, I don't agree that the novel wasn't good. The novel would have no strikes against it if it weren't for that thing with Hooper and Ellen Brody, in my honest opinion. I will say that I think the movie Patriot Games is much better than the novel because the movie has a much better ending and the line that comes from Jack Ryan, "I will ****ing destroy you. I will make it my mission in life."

Had no idea Die Hard was a book but I can't imagine it being better than the movie, which was #1 on My Favorite Action/Adventure films thread.

Fight Club. Book was good but the movie was amazing.

I was curious about that, thank you. You just saved me some time

Die Hard was based on the novel Nothing Lasts Forever. It is the sequel to the authors earlie novel The Detective which was made into the 1968 film of the same name starring Frank Sinatra - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Detective_(1968_film).

Apparently it followed the novel pretty closely the only major difference was that the main characters name was changed from Joe Leland to John McClane. I only found this out a few weeks ago when someone in another thread said that Sinatra was offered the role of McClane, i found out it was a contractual thing they basically had to offer him it.

Has anyone seen The Detective, Mark? Kinda want to see it now.

The Shining. There is no ambiguity in the book, and I think the ambiguity in the movie makes it a lot better. I love the book too, though.

what ambiguity in the movie? Jack is played as a psycho from the word go and casting Nicholson is just plain horrible. It's like he is auditioning for the joker a decade before the batman even got made.

You think the Robin Williams movie was an odd watch? The movie was like On Golden Pond compared to the book. This book was bizarre, really overdone in the quirky and fantastic. This is when Hollywood got it right, and George Roy Hill took this mess and molded a solid story. It wasnt a boring read at least

OH! < Sopranos style

Let me ask you this, do you think if they put a different actor in Kubricks movie it would have worked better? If the movie failed put it on Kubrick, not Nicholson. Damn man that movie wasnt a breeze to watch and his raw charisma at least kept me interested.