# 'Unfilmable Books'



## Nesacat (Jun 3, 2009)

Was sent this today:

Unfilmable Books

_Watchmen, The Lord of the Rings_: These are books that were commonly thought to be impossible to adapt to the big screen. That is, until a filmmaker such as Zack Snyder or Peter Jackson found the keys to unlock them.


Whatever you may think of the final results, the fact is that Snyder and Jackson succeeded in translating the books to film. And that got us thinking about other great works of SF literature that are supposedly unfilmable—and how they might be successfully adapted, and by whom.
It's a heady list. The following novels have captured the imaginations of generations of readers, but have so far been given a wide berth by filmmakers.



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## biodroid (Jun 3, 2009)

Looks very interesting. I haven't read Hyperion yet, is it any good?


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## AE35Unit (Jun 4, 2009)

I can't see how any book can be unfilmable these days. Oh I know, how about Haynes Car Manuals. Or Mrs Beeton's Cookbook


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## Fried Egg (Jun 4, 2009)

I think that "The Foundation" trilogy is pretty unfilmable. Unless they changed it beyond all recognition.


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## AE35Unit (Jun 4, 2009)

Fried Egg said:


> I think that "The Foundation" trilogy is pretty unfilmable. Unless they changed it beyond all recognition.



Oh Hollywood wouldn't do a thing like that now would they•••


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## iansales (Jun 4, 2009)

Fried Egg said:


> I think that "The Foundation" trilogy is pretty unfilmable. Unless they changed it beyond all recognition.




That might be to its advantage.


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## AE35Unit (Jun 4, 2009)

iansales said:


> That might be to its advantage.



You not a Foundation fan Ian?


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## Connavar (Jun 4, 2009)

Imo many great books are unfilmable no matter how good the director,writer in film world are.

Some ideas,themes,characters,the spreed of the story just doesnt fit.

Foundation is a good example.   You can do it as Battlestar Galactica like epic space opera drama but it wouldnt fit with the history,science etc

Thats why i dislike hollywood trying to make a film out every famous book.


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## iansales (Jun 4, 2009)

AE35Unit - I loved it as a kid, but made the mistake of rereading it last year. Terrible - cardboard characters, clunky prose, and world-building that's essentially 1950s USA with atomic spaceships.


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## Fried Egg (Jun 4, 2009)

iansales said:


> That might be to its advantage.


I doubt it because the bits you would have to change are precisely it's good points.


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## iansales (Jun 4, 2009)

It doesn't have any good points - you'd have to add them in to make a film of it.


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## Fried Egg (Jun 4, 2009)

I shalln't be drawn into another debate with you over "The Foundation". I know we shall never see eye to eye on this one. Can't you at least concede that, for you, it's good points are outweighed by it's bad points?

Whereas for me the bad points (which I don't dispute) are outweighed by it's good points.


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## Urlik (Jun 4, 2009)

getting away from the Foundation debate, after the 2 attempts made by Sky, I would have to say that Terry Pratchett's Discworld books are unfilmable (although that could have been down to poor casting and too many liberties taken with the plot)


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## j d worthington (Jun 4, 2009)

I can think of several books which would be at least near to "unfilmable"; at least, any films made from them would likely deviate so far from the book itself as to completely miss not only the incidents but the basic substance and feel of the book.

Having just reread Moorcock's *The Blood Red Game*, I'd say that is a good example. While the majority of the book might be adaptable as a sf-adventure tale, the core of the book relies heavily on psychological and philosophical points which are all within the characters' heads; the sort of words and images Moorcock picks are openly symbols approximating the thoughts/emotions taking place, and depicting anything like them literally would simply make no sense. On the other hand, the actual thoughts/emotions taking place are too complex and abstract to be realized well in any visual medium -- it takes the _word_ to even approach them.

The same can be said for several of Moorcock's other books, as well as a fair amount of J. G. Ballard. Can you imagine making a film out of, say, *The Atrocity Exhibition*? Certainly this is one of his landmark books, and remains a controversial as well as iconic book of the New Wave; but making a film of this one would either be boring as blazes, or maddeningly confusing. Next to it, *Naked Lunch* is a piker's dream. Yet the book can be (and I would argue _is_) a fascinating, disturbing, challenging, and mind-expanding experience.

I'd also argue that *Stranger in a Strange Land*, *Time Enough for Love*, *I Will Fear No Evil*, and, frankly, the majority of Heinlein's later work, is largely unfilmable. Granted, a film might be made of them, but none could even come close to capturing the sprawl (a term to be taken however one's personal preference runs) or complexity of the stories, let alone their themes.

*The Immortality Machine* (a.k.a. *They'd Rather Be Right*) is another that simply wouldn't work on the screen; getting just the story is possible, but again, you'd leave out the heart of the book in doing that, as this depends on the various philosophical discussions within the book -- which, in visual form, would bring any pacing to a complete halt. Ditto for *A Case of Conscience*, I think.

And then there's always Phil Farmer's "Riders of the Purple Wage" or *Strange Relations*....


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## Tillane (Jun 4, 2009)

Couldn't argue with any of that, JD - and I'd add a couple more that would be damn near impossible to film (or at least film well).

The first that sprang to mind for me was Sam Delany's *Dhalgren*: so much of the novel hinges on Delany's use of language and form, and I wouldn't even know where to start translating it to the screen.  Another would be Iain Banks' *Excession*, though for different reasons.  The story itself, while complex in places, is pretty coherent - but how you'd convey all the inter-Mind discussions (and there are many) and make them watchable and coherent to someone who hadn't read the book...I haven't a clue.


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## dask (Jun 4, 2009)

I know his stuff has been adapted several times but I still feel Ray Bradbury is particularly difficult to translate for the screen. I've always found him better read then viewed.


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## Connavar (Jun 4, 2009)

RAH is like Philip K Dick, his books are so much about his ideas,themes that you cant make a movie that becomes as good as the book was,in the same vien. 

Thats why PKD movies by hollywood are closer to John Woo stories than a PKD original.  Maybe thats why they use his early 50s short stories,simple straight pulp like stories like Paycheck,Adjustment Team etc.....


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## AE35Unit (Jun 5, 2009)

I kind of agree with ian regarding Foundation,but for different reasons. I just found it all boring and clunky,too much politicing and not enough S in the F. 
And J.D. I'd love to see Stranger in a Strange Land as a movie,excellent story.


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## AE35Unit (Jun 5, 2009)

Urlik said:


> getting away from the Foundation debate, after the 2 attempts made by Sky, I would have to say that Terry Pratchett's Discworld books are unfilmable (although that could have been down to poor casting and too many liberties taken with the plot)



Have you not seen Hogfather?


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## j d worthington (Jun 5, 2009)

Tillane said:


> Couldn't argue with any of that, JD - and I'd add a couple more that would be damn near impossible to film (or at least film well).
> 
> The first that sprang to mind for me was Sam Delany's *Dhalgren*: so much of the novel hinges on Delany's use of language and form, and I wouldn't even know where to start translating it to the screen. Another would be Iain Banks' *Excession*, though for different reasons. The story itself, while complex in places, is pretty coherent - but how you'd convey all the inter-Mind discussions (and there are many) and make them watchable and coherent to someone who hadn't read the book...I haven't a clue.


 
Yes, Dhalgren came to mind with me, too; but, as I had already listed several New Wave pieces, I thought I'd go on to other aspects of the genre. Let's face it: a LOT of the New Wave would be impossible to transfer to the screen. *Barefoot in the Head*, anyone? *Report on Probability A*? "The Heat Death of the Universe"? 

(Oddly, though, I think *Breakfast in the Ruins* could be done quite well as a film; it would mean using a storytelling approach similar to those used in *Johnny Got His Gun* and *Slaughterhouse-Five*, but it could be done....)




AE35Unit said:


> ...J.D. I'd love to see Stranger in a Strange Land as a movie,excellent story.


 
They probably _could_ make a film capturing the basic storyline... but that simply wouldn't be a film of _that novel_, which is far too involved in various philosophical, religious, cultural, and political issues to come across as anything other than either (as I said earlier about another piece) boring or confusing onscreen....


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## iansales (Jun 5, 2009)

First of all, the books of the Foundation trilogy are pretty much collections loosely stringed-together stories. There's a story-arc but no overall plot. So a film could only be made of one story in the books. That doesn't make the books unfilmable, unless you consider *all* books to be unfilmable. As for the ideas... what few there are in the Foundation trilogy can easily be represented on film.

The problem is that no film can really capture a book's essence, because the two media are too different. There's also the time factor - you can't squeeze a 400-page novel into 2 hours, never mind a 800-page novel. But you can get *a* story out of a book and film that, and Hollywood has been doing that relatively successfully for decades.

So no novel is truly unfilmable. It would just be a film, and not a novel in moving pictures.


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## Connavar (Jun 5, 2009)

I think its the other way around.  Only the best scriptwriters and the ones who  can capture the essence of a book and make a film out of it.

In that sense many books are unfilmable cause of lack of those kind of script writers.  The Godfather is a perfect example, the movie is the best version of a book there is.  Why because the writer wrote the book too.

Getting a story of out a book that can be made by any fool in hollywood.

Look at the superhero movies.  Many of them are true films of great works of comics. Because the writers,directors admire the comics they make a movie of.  
Rodriguez in Sin City was a fan and captured the essence.  The same with Spiderman,300 etc


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## Fried Egg (Jun 5, 2009)

When I think about filming the Foundation, one particular scene always springs to mind; the psycological battle between the Mule and the leader of the second foundation. A scene that contains a dramatic and tense battle between the two with many cuts and thrusts but all taking place in their heads. On camera it would just be the two sat there facing each other, maybe the odd bead of sweat occaisionally breaking out.

Generally, many of the stories centre around dialog and crisis points are resolved without action and violence. Ok, that doesn't necessarilly make it unfimable but Hollywood just doesn't tend to handle science fiction like that. Would they be able to resist the temptation to introduce some battle scenes, and chase sequences?


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## AE35Unit (Jun 5, 2009)

Good point there Conn!


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## iansales (Jun 5, 2009)

Conn - there are plenty of films that are better than their source novels. *Marnie* is a good example, so is *The Commitments*. Neither script was written by the original authors. I actually think that getting the novelist to write the screenplay is less likely to result in a good film - because writing a novel is not the same as writing a screenplay.

Superhero movies don't really belong in this discussion. The story is immaterial, it's about the character(s). There are such a vast number of stories in the comics, there'd be no way to represent them in a single film, or trilogy of films. all a filmmaker can do is remain true to the character of the superhero - and even then, they don't always do that. Look how many times Batman has been re-imagined, in both comics and films and television.

As for the "essence" of a science fiction novel... What would that be? The author's voice? Can't be that, because so many sf authors write bland prose with little or no voice. The story? In many cases, there's very little that's not been done before in that department - don't forget that the Foundation trilogy is a sf version of *The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire*. And there was a movie made of that. The ideas, then. So for something like *Rendezvous with Rama* that means, er, Rama. And for *Ringworld*, it means, well, the ringworld. Easy enough to do on film these days with CGI. Of course, you'd have to come up with a proper three-act story with character arcs for it to play in a movie. But that's not very difficult.

I wrote a blog post back in Febrary about sf novels that I thought would make good films - see here.


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## Connavar (Jun 5, 2009)

Better or worse wasnt what im saying.  I said a film that captured the essence of the original book.  I can respect film that is bad but atleast they tried to adapt the book.

Superhero movies always adapt a famous story of the character.  The origin,or original famous stories.   The newest Batman film was based on 2-3 famous stories.  Which was easy to see for the comics reader.  It was good because they didnt make their own take on Batman, they took inspiration Frank Miller,Alan Moore stories like Year One,The Dark Knight Returns,The Killing Joke.

The essence is simple, its catching the tone of a book,what the author was trying to tell.   Its not about effects or action.  Hollywood can remake Roman empire story like you mentioned but they want effects,action from SF.  The problem is the people that make SF movies in hollywood.   They are Spielberg type directors....

They arent directors,writers trying to make a serious movie.


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## Rodders (Jun 5, 2009)

Wasn't Dune supposed to be unfilmable in it's day? 

I'd have to agree with AE. I don't think that any book is now unfilmable. With todays Special Effects and a certain amount of licence by any studio, anything is good for the screen. How we feel about a movie based on our most beloved books as fans however is a different story and it could be argued that it's only out subjective opinion that would make a book seem to be unfilmable.


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## iansales (Jun 5, 2009)

Conn - even some superhero origin stories have changed over the years. In the Tim Burton's film, Batman's parents are killed by a young Joker; in *Batman Begins*, they're not. But I take your point that most are in some way based on a story originally published as a comic.

As for the "essence"... I'm still not sure what you mean. What would the essence of *Foundation* be? And how would that be difficult to translate ot film?


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## Urlik (Jun 5, 2009)

AE35Unit said:


> Have you not seen Hogfather?


 
yes I have seen Hogfather and Colour of Magic, but the humour wasn't there. it looked fantastic but just felt flat.
in contrast, I have seen a local AmDram production of Guards Guards and found it to immensly enjoyable and in the spirit of the book.

there was a lot of money thrown at the Sky productions and there were some great actors in them, but somehow it didn't quite translate onto the screen.


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## Connavar (Jun 5, 2009)

iansales said:


> Conn - even some superhero origin stories have changed over the years. In the Tim Burton's film, Batman's parents are killed by a young Joker; in *Batman Begins*, they're not. But I take your point that most are in some way based on a story originally published as a comic.
> 
> As for the "essence"... I'm still not sure what you mean. What would the essence of *Foundation* be? And how would that be difficult to translate ot film?



The essence can be for Foundation that the historical sweep of Foundation  in the stories ,psychohistory that is more important the characters.  


If you were gonna make a film on RAH story you should focus on ideology,characters,the culture the story is set in.  Moon is a Harsh Mistress for example.  About lunar revolution,the growth from prison to thier own culture,nation.  A film about it shouldnt be a simple war,action story.   I hope you understand what i mean.   Essence can be what makes a book what its about,what the writer was telling about.

Fantasy like LOTR has got films that showed what the books is all about.  I hope a classic SF story can become like that.  Not in popularity,BO money but the quality of the film.


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## iansales (Jun 5, 2009)

It would be difficult to show the historical sweep of anything in a movie. Nor, I think, will modern cinema audiences want a film to do so. The new Star Trek seemed to prove they don't even particularly care about common sense or science. Likewise, psychohistory simply isn't dramatic.

And if you make a film focusing on the ideology of Heinlein's novels, well, you might as well make a party political broadcast. You can get away with things like that in a novel but not in a film. If any movie was made of *The Moon is a Harsh Mistress*, then it would be about the actual revolution and the fighting. Because that's what cinema audiences want.


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## Urlik (Jun 6, 2009)

I've worked out why the Sky adaptations of Terry Pratchett's books didn't work for me.
they had the dialogue and the characters did what they did in the books, but they didn't have the book.
so much of Pratchett's genius is in the footnotes and the passages that describe the setting rather than what is said and done. that is where the real humour and the social observation is and without that, the screenplay is missing at least half the story.
a good example is the recurring theme of economies built on the carrying capabilities of little old ladies dressed in black. not once, to my recollection, does any character ever mention this. a little old lady may appear in a screenplay carrying a large bundle, but without the reference the joke and social comment are lost.

this is why the stage adaptation worked for me though. that has the book at the side of the stage and we get all those wonderful footnotes and the added depth to the scenes and characters.


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## j d worthington (Jun 6, 2009)

iansales said:


> Conn - there are plenty of films that are better than their source novels. *Marnie* is a good example, so is *The Commitments*. Neither script was written by the original authors. I actually think that getting the novelist to write the screenplay is less likely to result in a good film - because writing a novel is not the same as writing a screenplay.


 
Ian, if you are referring to those who are only used to writing prose for the printed page, I think you'd be 100% correct. However, those who have also had some experience writing screenplays (or radio plays, or stage plays) often do quite well at transferring their work to other media... though they also have the advantage of being able to take liberties no one else would be likely to (didn't Agatha Christie completely remove Poirot from the stage version of *Death on the Nile*, for instance?).



> As for the "essence" of a science fiction novel... What would that be? The author's voice? Can't be that, because so many sf authors write bland prose with little or no voice. The story? In many cases, there's very little that's not been done before in that department - don't forget that the Foundation trilogy is a sf version of *The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire*. And there was a movie made of that. The ideas, then. So for something like *Rendezvous with Rama* that means, er, Rama. And for *Ringworld*, it means, well, the ringworld. Easy enough to do on film these days with CGI. Of course, you'd have to come up with a proper three-act story with character arcs for it to play in a movie. But that's not very difficult.


 
I think it's a good deal more complicated than that, in man cases. The ideas may not be a single symbol, entity, or situation, but a host of different things addressed throughout the book, but which may all be interrelated. Heinlein's *Stranger* is a good example of this, as he brings into question numerous themes, including religion, politics, myth, anthropology, humor, psychology, art, philosophy, the media, sexuality, morality, and many more. Moorcock's Cornelius stories address a lot of the same themes, but in quite different ways -- and I think neither of these -- and these are, really, the "essence" or "heart" of the books -- would transfer well to the screen. They would be too cumbersome, unwieldy, and confusing if you wish to capture the feel or essence of these books, rather than simply transferring the skeletal plot elements. Hence, the books are unfilmable.


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## gully_foyle (Jun 7, 2009)

Hugh Jackman as Gully Foyle? I don't think so. It has to be someone alot less attractive, cold and brutal yet charismatic and aristocratic. A Daniel Craig type, but without the star power, because it is a Monte Christo story of someone rising up from anonymity to the heights of society, and having a too familiar face would kind of go against that.

And as for being un-filmable (and I probably amn't the first to point this out), it is apparently in production.


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## kythe (Jun 7, 2009)

Snow Crash by Neil Stephenson is one book I love that I would say is unfilmable.  How would you capture that "world" while maintaining the satire and the nature of the characters?  I don't believe any cyberpunk books have been made into movies, or will be.


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## J-Sun (Jun 7, 2009)

kythe said:


> I don't believe any cyberpunk books have been made into movies, or will be.



Johnny Mnemonic, duude.

Actually, that's a cyberpunk story rather than book/novel, though, and I've never seen the movie, so it may not qualify as actually being based on the story.


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## High Eight (Jun 12, 2009)

biodroid said:


> Looks very interesting. I haven't read Hyperion yet, is it any good?


 

I found it .....OK. Meh. It went on a bit, but was readable. The ending was quite good (I'm not going to spoil it).

The sequels were, however, hideously pretentious and overwritten to within an inch of their collective life.

But then I've never been a Simmons fan.


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## Rodders (Jun 14, 2009)

I really liked it. I must admit that it did take me a while to actually get round and read it, but when i did, i found the experience rewarding enough. I also enjoyed the sequels too.


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## Jev (Jul 7, 2009)

Of course, I may be setting myself up for a fall (COMING THIS SUMMER: 'Siddhartha', by Michael Bay!) -- but Hermann Hesse's books strike me as distinctly unable to film. I initially say this because as a naive teenager, I thought 'Journey to the East' would make a good short screenplay project to try. It, uh, didn't.

As an exception, 'Steppenwolf' might work if handled by the right person. I'm thinking Tarsem Singh ('The Fall'/'The Cell') would be a good choice, but I don't know anyone else who would get the tone exactly right without overselling it or Matrix-izing it, which would be about twenty different kinds of wrong.


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## AE35Unit (Jul 7, 2009)

Hmmm Galactic Pot Healer by Philip K Dick. Now that would be a challenge to film!


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## j d worthington (Jul 7, 2009)

Jev said:


> As an exception, 'Steppenwolf' might work if handled by the right person.


 
Ummmmm....

Steppenwolf (1974)


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## Jev (Jul 7, 2009)

Haven't seen it. Has anyone? If it's worth it, I might add it onto Netflix, but it's still no doubt a tough book to handle, anyway.

Adding in: James Joyce, Flann O'Brien, Italo Calvino.


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## j d worthington (Jul 7, 2009)

Joyce, at least, has had several adaptations of his works (including *Ulysses*). 

James Joyce (I)

Here are the other two:

Flann O'Brien

Italo Calvino

As for that adaptation of *Steppenwolf*... I've not seen it myself, but I know it got a lot of favorable response, and people I know who saw it (and had read Hesse) thought it was a good adaptation to a different medium....


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## Rinman (Jul 7, 2009)

Howsabout they "try" and do the Warhammer 40 000 stories...err they'd destroy them


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## ktabic (Jul 7, 2009)

Well, there was an attempt at a W40K film a few years back. It failed because Games Workshop refused them film rights. Seeing this was to be a Uwe Boll movie, it's probably a good thing.

It wouldn't be nessercary to make a W40K film based on any of the books, the W40K universe is huge (I have the first edition book here as well as the next two, quite massive changes), and you could make dozens of action packed, massively CGIed war films with just the throwaway little bits of background in the rulesbooks. In fact the big problem is the size of the W40K universe. You are going to annoy some fans by not including thier favourite species.


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## revelshade (Jul 8, 2009)

As far as the article is concerned, I was willing to play along right up until the last book.  Anyone who thinks Peter Jackson should be let anywhere near _The Book of the New Sun_ is barking mad.  Jackson doesn't have a subtle bone in his body, and Gene Wolfe is all about the subtle.

 I'm afraid when I try to think of unfilmable books I just come up with really obvious ones like Stapledon's _Last and First Men_ and _Star Maker_.  Also, I couldn't help thinking of a Wolfe story called _The Eyeflash Miracles_: the viewpoint character is a blind child; the story doesn't include any visual information at all - except when he dreams.
OK, how about _Valis_?  How do you get all the bits from PKD's exegesis in there?  There's not much point to it all without them.  And what about the very important film the characters go to midway through the book?  Interrupt the film to show ten or fifteen minutes of another film, then ten or fifteen minutes of the characters talking about it?

But I must be an optimist cause mostly I keep thinking of books and thinking _why not_?  That's a different thread though.


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## paranoid marvin (Jul 8, 2009)

I would have said the later  HArry Potterbooks would be difficult to transfer to film , but they made them . I defy anyone though to understand what the heck is going on in Order Of The Phoenix without having first read the book. The first two were very nicely done , and imho were the closest repesentation of book-to-film translation ever.

I guess iwth a big enough budget and with plenty of 'directors interpretation' ANYTHING is translatable. I guess The Silmarillion would be pretty tricky though


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## j d worthington (Jul 9, 2009)

paranoid marvin said:


> I guess iwth a big enough budget and with plenty of 'directors interpretation' ANYTHING is translatable. I guess The Silmarillion would be pretty tricky though


 
Well, given the numerous film/television versions of (at least parts of) the _Mahabharata_... I'd say it could be done......

IMDb Search


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## Teresa Edgerton (Jul 9, 2009)

I can think of a lot of books that are simply too big and complex for one movie, that would work very well filmed in several parts.  Which doesn't always stop film-makers from trying to cram them into just one ... but that doesn't make the books unfilmable, it just means they've been filmed the wrong way.

But something like the Silmarillion, which is tends to be rather episodic, and contains some shorter stories that are complete in themselves, I could definitely see how the right director and producer could do justice to certain parts of it.


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## kythe (Jul 10, 2009)

I don't think there is a chance of the Silmarillion ever being filmed.  The Tolkien estate has never released the rights to that book.  

Most of the individual stories could probably be filmed, but I don't know how the Valar and the creation of the world could be portrayed.  It's too spiritual in nature, not really "visual".  Yet without that part, you don't have much basis for the rest of the story.  Maybe a way around that would be to have a short narration in the beginning, then launch into the other stories.  But each one of those stories is epic enough to be a full movie in itself.  It probably is better left as a book.


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## HareBrain (Jul 10, 2009)

I liked the way the creation story was told at the start of the film "Watership Down"; I imagine the Music of the Ainur could be done in a similar way. But I agree that there's just too much in the Silmarillion to make even a series of films (given how film tends to expand narrative rather than contract it; many of the best films are adapted from short stories rather than novels). It would be like trying to film the entire Old Testement. And I can think of nothing in the Silmarillion that's as self-contained as, say, the Book of Exodus, so telling one part of the story without explaining what came before just wouldn't make sense.


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## j d worthington (Jul 10, 2009)

There isn't anything _inherently_ unfilmable about *The Silmarillion*, so it could be done. Look at John Huston's *The Bible: In the Beginning* (1966). While by no means entirely successful, it did adapt rather successfully the opening chapters of the Bible (including the creation story) and made a complete film; so something of the same sort could be done for *The Silmarillion*. And, as I noted earlier, if you can have a series of adaptations for the _Mahabharata_, then the complexity of *The Silmarillion* isn't a barrier, either.

The difference between this and, say, *Stranger in a Strange Land*, is that Tolkien's book is a compendium of various tales (though linked), whereas *Stranger* is a single novel which covers a considerable amount of material the lack of which would make any attempt at filming it bear no resemblance to the novel in either structure, feel, or intent.

To me, the question would be: what books are inherently unfilmable? That is, they either contain something (which is indispensable to any version of the book unless one completely leaves the original material behind) or are as a whole, the sort of material which simply cannot be translated well (if at all) to the visual media? I would argue that there aren't that many books of this nature, but they do exist.....


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## HareBrain (Jul 11, 2009)

On that basis I would suggest that *Riddley Walker *by Russell Hoban would be impossible to film successfully, because a large part of the book is the degraded and distorted post-apocalyptic language in which the first-person narrative is told.


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## Jev (Jul 11, 2009)

Dhalgren (Samuel R. Delany). I dare you to film _that_. You'd have to have someone utterly nuts. Uwe Boll!


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## j d worthington (Jul 11, 2009)

Jev said:


> Dhalgren (Samuel R. Delany). I dare you to film _that_. You'd have to have someone utterly nuts. Uwe Boll!


 
I don't know whether to respond with a "LOL" or a shudder....


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## The DeadMan (Dec 16, 2009)

gully_foyle said:


> Hugh Jackman as Gully Foyle? I don't think so. It has to be someone alot less attractive, cold and brutal yet charismatic and aristocratic. A Daniel Craig type, but without the star power, because it is a Monte Christo story of someone rising up from anonymity to the heights of society, and having a too familiar face would kind of go against that.
> 
> And as for being un-filmable (and I probably amn't the first to point this out), it is apparently in production.


I was looking at some of the older posts and found this one by you. I think that Michael Chiklis of "The Shield" and "Fantastic 4" fame would make a great Gully Foyle. He is a good actor without being really well known. Plus it would be easy for the makeup people to do the tattooing on his face and head.


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## Lamont Cranston (Jan 15, 2010)

The Book of the New Sun.


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## Vladd67 (Jan 15, 2010)

I don't know about unfilmable, but would anyone have the nerve to make a film of The Satanic Verses?


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## Thadlerian (Jan 15, 2010)

Vladd67 said:


> I don't know about unfilmable, but would anyone have the nerve to make a film of The Satanic Verses?


Thousands.

Though one would have to ask how they'd intend to successfully tell all the parallel stories. There were four, right? Including the main story? Remove the "Mahound" part, and there's hardly anything offensive about the book, as far as I can recall.


I'd say The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco is unfilmable. They made a film, yeah, but it was a severe disappointment. There's no way you're getting Eco's story, with all the history, debate, politics, philosophy and wonderful, wonderful sarcasm, into anything that's played textless in front of your eyes.


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## Interference (Jan 15, 2010)

Read and you see pictures, hear words and sounds, you make the film in your head.  Every book can be filmed, maybe some should be serialised, others made as mini-series for TV, but is it necessary.

Read and you see pictures, hear words and sounds - but they're _your_ pictures, words and sounds.  No one will ever film those.


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## AlexM (Jan 15, 2010)

Eldest in the Inheritance cycle, 

they killed the first movie and I doubt they can ressurect any form of a second. 

The first movie may has well been based on something else with different names as they cut out some of the important bits that come into play in it.

So yeah, that's what I think.


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