See the movie, then buy the book!

Interesting item in today’s Wall Street Journal about a deal between Random House publishers to invest $9 million into film releases by General Electric Co.’s Focus Features that are based on Random House books. The deal, which was made in 2005, calls for the release of 2-3 films annually based on any of Random House’s backlist of 33,000 titles. The first feature will be released this fall, Reservation Road, directed by Terry George and based on a novel by the same name that a Random House subsidiary published in 1998. Article says that paperback copies of the book now have gold labels on the cover saying, “First read the book, then see the movie.”

Random House figures the movie tie-ins will help sell books. A paperback, “Perfume: The Story of a Murderer,” jumped from annual sales of 13,000 copies to more than 100,000 copies after a movie by the same name was released in 2006. A biography of Marie Antoinette that was selling less than 10,000 copies annually jumped to sales in excess of 150,000 copies after the release last year of Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette. “Reservation Road” has sold about 60,000 copies in both hard- and soft-cover, so Random House is hoping for a big jump in sales.

What’s really interesting is that the deal lets Random House participate in picking screenwriters, directors, and actors for the films based on its books.

I have mixed feelings about that. On the positive side, I’m more likely to go see a movie based on a good book—a real book rather than a comic book, a comic strip, a defunct television series, or the remake of a classic film. And I figure the author or publisher of a book knows more about writing than does a movie producer and therefore will be more likely to pick a screenwriter capable of producing a good script.

On the other hand, what does a publishing house know about casting or directing a movie? Will the publishing house opt to pick established directors and actors with the more familiar names instead of an up-and-comer who is more hungry, more daring, and may make a better contribution to the film? Hollywood already is at the point where the “deal” of putting a movie together, with the money-men demanding this name-star and that hot-director regardless if they’re the best choices, is more important than the actual film produced. I can see where this might just lay another layer to “the deal”—this star, that director, this book.

My preferred order is to read the book first. It often makes it easier to understand the movie which has usually lost bits and pieces of the story during the process of making it a film.

Often the film sucks so bad, I'd never willingly read the book after seeing it.

Rare but wonderful are the films that follow a book and translate well on film.

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Bleacheddecay

NOTICE if you haven't read or seen 'Lost Horizen' this could be a spoiler.
Any thoughts about novels made into movies? which was better the book or the movie? Here's a start: Two of James Hilton's novels.
'Random Harvest' the book was so much better than the movie.Fortuneatly, I read the book BEFORE I saw the movie, seeing the movie first would have spoiled the book. I didn't guess the ending until the last couple of pages.
;Lost Horizon; the other way around. the movie had to be better ( and was) because of the subject matter. Seeing Margo turned into an old woman= well, words couldn't describe that as well'

i totally agree with the theme. in my experience reading the book first just builds up expectations and more often than not you are let down coz its just not possible to include the kinda details that a book provides. when i read a book i have a perception of what the whole scene would look like, if i go watch a movie then its just to see another point of view, all thats ok. i just hate the fact that the dirctor twist the plot just so it can fit in the time slot aloted to them. watch the movie, so you have a clearer picture of the charactors, etc and then read the book. brilliant.

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J. Dsilva

rather read it first sorry. everybody dif.

Actually, I'm not advocating one approach over the other. Everybody in the world seems to have read Gone with the Wind (1939) before it was put on film and everyone had certain expectations about who should play what characters. Yet that adaptation turned out very well, although the movie did away with a couple of kids that Scarlett had with her first two husbands. Many other best sellers also have made successful leaps to the screen--East of Eden (1955) and On the Waterfront (1954) to name but two. Only the film version of EoE was taken from about a third of the book, while the Terry Malloy character that Brando played in OtW ends up dead of multiple icepick wounds and his body stuffed into a barrel.

Lots of films ignore unpleasant subjects and tack on more pleasant endings in order to send the audience out smiling. For instance, the movie version of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958) ends on the upbeat note of a happy reconciliation between Brick and Maggie after tiptoeing around the fact that in Tennessee Williams’ original script, Brick is a closet homosexual. Homosexuality was not something movies talked about back then. In another film based on a Williams play, Sweet Birth of Youth (1962), the brother of the girlfriend of Chance Wayne, played by Paul Newman, gets revenge by breaking his nose, although Newman with a broken nose would still be prettier than all of us guys and even some women. In the book the brother hits much further below the belt, cutting off Wayne’s "manhood."

Rarely does a movie improve on a book, such as the more realistic ending to Double Indemnity (1944) and the expansions of Hemmingway’s short story The Killers. That short story was very short, just a handful of pages; yet it inspired two movies that approached the story from two different viewpoints with Burt Lancaster and Ava Gardner in 1948 and with Lee Marvin, Ronald Reagan, and Angie Dickinson in 1964.
More often, films completely ruin the story told in the original book, as happened in Catch 22 (1970).

Meanwhile, I’ve seen only two movies that were better from start to finish than the books from which they were made. One was One-Eyed Jacks (1961), which kept only the California ocean-front setting from the western novel on which it was based; and Paint Your Wagon (1969), which turned miner Ben Rumson and his innocent love-sick daughter into Ben Rumson and Partner, sharing a wife bought from a Mormon.

I think it matters little if reading a book makes you want to see a movie or seeing a movie makes you want to read the book on which it was based. I've done it both ways. I've always been a reader, so I've seen movies based on lots of books I'd already read. But there have been many times, too, that I've hunted down a copy of the original book just to see what the movie left out. Good example was Audie Murphy's best selling (and ghost-written) autobiography, To Hell and Back. When I first saw that movie, I thought everyone in it was just too squeaky clean and wholesome to be true. I mean, this was about the most highly decorated infantryman during World War II, but the uniforms worn by the actors marching through mud and slush looked clearner than what I wore for inspection during basic training. So I got Murphy's book to get the "dirty" side of the story--and boy did I get it! It is the most bloody account of war I've ever read. Murphy introduces a new replacement on one page and two pages later the dying man is trying to run up a hillside on the bloody stumps of his legs that a German machinegun shot off when he stopped at a creek to refill his canteen. Another recruit is introduced on the next page, and a page-and-a-half later all that's left is a mist of blood in the air and the tinkle of bits of metal and bone after a direct hit by a German 88 shell. It's the most gripping anti-war book you ever will read. In it, Murphy mentions getting promoted to sergeant and winning a battlefield commission, but he never says a word about the dozen or so medals he was awarded, including the Medal of Honor.

No, the main point I was raising for discussion is the fact that a publisher is helping finance movies based on books and is getting approval of the actor, director and scriptwriter in the process. At what point is the supposed good of having more movies based on good books, vs. comic strips and TV series, perhaps offset by yet another layer of "The Deal," in which someone with no expertise in movies exercises control over who writes the script, directs the movie, and is cast in a role?

I'm sorry if I misunderstood the basic question you meant to have discussed in this thread.

That's a really good point.

*thinking on it*

I don't know that I'll come up with any answers though.

I usually do the book first, then movie.

I do not have a paticular order of doing the two.But I always combine reading books with watching the film.After reading the book, I would have a better notion of what the film is about,I would be able to understand the details which would be easily ignored,details play important roles in filming,absolutely.But many of the stories that I read,I watched the adapted film beforehand,not because I fancy this order,it's just because the film inspired me to read the book,it made me eager to see how the book was going to tell the story,Gone with the wind,The Counte of Monte Cristo,The painted veil,Devil wears Prada, Pearl Harbour and Shawshank Redemption are the movies that followed this sequence.AND afer the book,probably I would review the movie,that made it more interesting,because I am picky and since I had the book in my mind,I could point out how the movie was losing some of the incidents in the book,and thus it makes me appreciate the book more.I am not sayin books are better than movies,cus the soundtracks and visual effects we get out from movies can not be replaced by merely reading books.Anyway,I enjoy them both.

It amazes me that this thread was so quickly sidetracked into a debate over whether people first see the movie or read the book on which it was based.

The point I outlined in my original post was that publisher Random House invested $9 million into General Electric Co.’s Focus Features to finance movies to be made from Random House books. The deal also lets Random House participate in picking screenwriters, directors, and actors for those. So here we have a publisher picking the story, screenwriters, directors, and actors for movies. Is that good or bad? What if, say, John Deere tractor wants the same sort of deal--pump cash into Hollywood to determine what movies are made by whom? What about the Teamster's Union? A political party? Sciencetology or the Catholic (or Baptist) church? How far might or should buying influence over Hollywood movies go?

Isn't this how hollywood has always been? Influence goes as far as balls and money will carry them?

i usually first read the book, before i watched the movie

That used to be my policy but it's changing a bit now. My daughter is taking British Lit this year.

There are tons of books that she will HATE reading but if she sees the movies first that often makes her more interested in the books.

That also happened when we watched the original and best Alls Quiet On the Western Front while studying WW1 last year. After watching the movie she wanted to see other movie versions and read the book.

I get interested in buying the book of Da Vinci Code, the movie seems to be very interesting but my friends told me book is better than in movie.

Let's get back on topic guys. Ruf has twice explained the focus of this thread, which is not whether or not we prefer to see the film first, or read the book first. Let's take a little time to ascertain what is going on, then comment.

So, again, what are your feelings on the move made by random house in an attempt to boost book sales using the movie industry to increase exposure.

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And is that good or bad? What's your view on people or institutions outside the industry--people with no connection to making movies--deciding what stories to film, who is to write the screenplay, who is to star, and who is to direct? It might be that giving a total novice such power would be disasterous. On the other hand, considering some of the films Hollywood has unleashed on us, it might be good to get some new blood and points of view. Or maybe the outside investor, who we may or may not know about, might try to influence our points of view about politics, religion, or other issues.

For instance, I've heard--but don't know for sure--that some rich man in a major city in the northern US invests large sums into every film that Richard Gere makes. If true, would Gere have been picked to star in fewer movies without such a backer, or is talent likely to win out regardless?

Another instance, I understand that Cagney decided to do Yankee Doodle Dandy, one of the most patriotic films ever made, after being called to a private session with the House committee investigating unAmerican activities and being questioned about his "liberal" political stance. Would that film have been made and would he have starred had Cagney not been under political pressure?

It doesn't amaze me - that is what the thread title implies it will be about. Perhaps you could get it changed to 'Publishers investing in hollywood' or something similar but less dull

I don't see the problem, really. Is it any worse for publishing houses to have a bite of the cherry? Do the executives who run film studios have a better idea of what makes a good story than publishers? I would think that at least publishers know what makes a good story, whereas some of the 'money' in the film industry probably comes from much less reputable places...

Once again, my ol' journalism professor is proved right. "Nobody reads past the headline, kid!"

You're right. A publisher knows what books sell. And dealing with writers, he likely knows good writing when he reads it. But what does he contribute in the selection of a director or actor? Does he go with whoever is hot at the box office that moment, looking for a sure thing, or does he take a chance on an up-and-coming director who's not yet well known except among movie insiders or an offbeat actor who is perfect for the part. Frank Sinatra had to really work to get the part in From Here to Eternity that won him an Oscar and revitalized his career. No one wanted Bogart to play Duke Mantee in The Petrified Forest, although he originated the role on Broadway. He only got the part at the insistance of Leslie Howard, who had the lead role on Broadway and in the film; Howard threatened to walk if Bogart wasn't signed for the movie.

Might those choices have been made if a novice to the business had been financing those films?

As you mention, some movie financing likely comes "from much less reputable places." Is that good for the movies, bad for the movies, or completely doesn't matter?

Generally I think this sounds like a good idea. I don't know how much Random House knows about making a movie, such as picking director/actors etc., but if they do enough of them so that people know which ones are connected to books and the films suck, people won't buy the book or see the film, so Random House at least needs to hire people who have knowledge of how to do this in the industry.

My biggest concern is the adapting process. Some books aren't meant to be adapted, and in order to increase some books sale, Random House might say that one of those books needs to be made into a film. In fact, I tend to find that movies based off of books generally aren't nearly as good as the book and often fail completely at staying true to the book. Some of this has to do with how long books tend to be as compared to movies. People rarely read a good book in one day, but will almost never split a movie into two separate sittings. So, short stories tend to make better films because you read a single story in a single sitting, like a film. But Random House is obviously going to be doing books, not a short story from a compilation of stories by an author, simply because people won't be as apt to buy the compilation, because they really don't care about the rest of the stories, they just want to pay a lesser price for a single story.

Overall, I don't see this as a bad thing, but it really depends on the publishing company and how they use their power in this situation, because it could end up quickly being a bad deal for the studio that has to produce these films, if they start to flop big time when they are expected to do very well.

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"As I was walking up the stair,
I met a man who wasn't there.
He wasn't there again today,
I wish, I wish he'd go away."
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