Adapt or Die

By Ruel S. De Vera, Associate Editor Sunday Inquirer Magazine EVERYONE is an expert; it’s just a matter of finding what that area of expertise is. Sometimes, that area is a crossroads, an overlapping of two specialties, creating a unique one. Sometimes, it comes by accident. Since I review mostly books -- and some movies -- I am often asked what I think about motion pictures adapted from books. That’s a trick question, of course. Even when adapted from a book, a movie is still a movie and has its own coherence. The book remains a book, even if a movie is made of it. They do not affect one another save for the initial shift from page to screen. Let me just say that devoted faithfulness to the original text is not required; indeed, sometimes, the difference between book and movie is what makes the movie special. Still, I look forward to seeing adaptations, particularly of novels. It is a very interesting case of fiction taking on a kind of three-dimensional life. Here then are five movies adapted from books that I thought were well done: 1) “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban”: The first two Harry Potter movies were slavishly faithful to the first two books, something that can be attributed to the devotion of director Chris Columbus to J.K. Rowling’s source material. But it was the third movie, directed by Alfonso Cuaron, that really developed a life of its own, a character that was added to the potency of the excellent third book. Take note that “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix,” directed by David Yates, was similarly well crafted and for the same reason. 2) “The Bridges of Madison Country”: I know what you’re thinking. How can anyone consider that maudlin love story about old people well-done? Well, let’s just say it’s because I thought the original source material, the novel by Robert James Waller, was awful. The 1995 film, directed confidently by Clint Eastwood, was tolerable if similarly sappy. The improvement alone is worth hailing. 3) “The Remains of the Day”: Wow. I remember watching the movie directed by James Ivory and thinking, this is Kazuo Ishiguro’s book truly come to life. It was stately and sad, but never mawkish. What a wonderful house the action happened in, and Anthony Hopkins and Emma Thompson were simply sublime. 4) “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe”: C.S. Lewis’ novel had been adapted several times already, mostly in animation. But Andrew Adamson’s adaptation worked in every way. It really looked like Narnia. And one cannot say enough by how awesome Tilda Swinton’s White Queen is. She may be evil, but she is amazing. 5) “Black Hawk Down”: There are many, many differences between Mark Bowden’s excellent book and Ridley Scott’s 2001 movie, including my particular pet peeve, composite characters. But the bone-jarring realism of Scott’s take on the Mogadishu mistake stays with you long after the movie ended. If I ever thought of a movie that showed what modern warfare felt like, it would be this one.