Solaris is probably my favorite SF novel, therefore I avoided the movie (and the new version as well): adaptation of favorite novels usually disappoint. I know, you shouldn’t compare the two, film is a different medium, but like I said before: you cannot neglect what you’re conscious off, or, in other words, you cannot not know what you do know. I did watch Stalker twice though, the first time in cinema, back in the '80s and a second time on VHS (or maybe on television, I don’t remmeber exactly), a decade later, so I haven’t watched it recently. I can’t say that I was too fond of the movie, it’s interesting, it has good moments and a great, mystic atmosphere, but it seemed definitely overlong and overall I’m not a fan of movies that lack a particular meaning. My favorite Tarkovski is by the way Nostalgia.
I’m actually shocked.
Yep, and precisely this you can say about Solaris too.
Well tomas, I’ve seen so many disappointing adaptations of favorite novels that I usually just don’t torture myself by watching another one. There are exceptions though, overall Dickens seems not too difficult to adapt (much easier than for instance Dostoievski or Chandler, to mentions only two)
Yeah, but wouldn’t that be a loss in case of Clockwork Orange and 2001? Those are imo great adaptations.
I’m the other way around, I have no trouble with bad (or good) movie adaptations of novels I like. I don’t know from Apocalypse Now (in this case I’ve watch the film first and then read the book) to the Lord of the Rings, I actually became curious.
I remember once with some friends we made of contest of Best movie adaptations of Stephen king novels, Shining won of course
In both cases I read the novel after watching the movie (the same goes for Blade Runner/Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep) and in both cases the novels aren’t really personal favorites. I was strictly talking about favorite novels: if you know them very well - and I often read favorite novels three or four times, I even read War and Peace twice). If you’ve read a novel once, as a child or a young man for instance, it’s often nice to watch an adaptation, it brings back good memories. I’m currently watching a Dutch movie that’s an adaptation of a novel I read when i was about 12 years old. The movie gives me a great feeling!
Sure. I just wanted to say that with this attitude of avoiding adaptations of your fav novels you can miss some great ones. Might happen (but probably doesn’t really matter anyway). I would probably watch any adaptations of my favorite novel or comics. Don’t see a problem there. Even if it sucks, nothing will change about my opinion of that particular novel. It will still sit on my shelf.
Actually 2001 was only based on a short story of Clarke called The Sentinel. Kubrick wrote the screenplay together with Clarke, who then wrote the novel, which was released after the film.
Of course. I’ve seen I don’t know how many adaptations of Dostoievski’s novels, they all sucked (so at a certain point I said to myself: no more adaptations for me), but those adaptations have not really changed my opinion about the author. And there’s another thing: instead of adapting a novel, a director or screenwriter can use certain themes of a particular novel. In Taxi Driver Scorsese and Schrader used certain motives from Dostoïevski’s Notes from the Underground. That is, in my opinion, a far more interesting approach than trying to turn a novel into a movie.
Yes, and something one would expect that will happen when one artist takes on material of another artist. Just to use few motives but add also your own stuff. The result might be great, but also catastrophic. 
All this talk about adaptations reminded me that I still didn’t see Snyder’s take on Alan Moore’s Watchmen. 
Tim Burton’s Dark Shadows watched on TV the other day. I like most of his films and Depp is also very good. 8 out of 10 rating.
Why Chandler?
His novels gave birth to a lot of good or even great movies.
And are good examples how different films can adapt a novel, either by staying comparatively close or using it for something different.
Last week’s Tuesday Film Night was…
Blood and Black Lace (Bava / 1964)
Introduced the youngest daughter to a bit of proto-giallo fun with the wonderfully lurid colour pallet of Bava. Some of this film comes across as really quite dated these days but it is still genuinely enjoyable and the colours are fabulous. She really enjoyed it.
And this week’s was…
The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (Bunuel / 1972)
Hadn’t seen this one in many many years and pleased to see it still holds up. Equal parts funny and biting and weird in a way that only Bunuel could ever really pull off. The wife skipped singing this week to join us for this one and we all really enjoyed it.
I recently watched Straight to Hell (Alex Cox) - the only reason being that I read his book “10,00 ways to die” and the movie was set in Almeria.
There has been a few comments about this movie on the forum - not too much on the positive side.
It is interesting for the locations: the opening scene is in the Gran Hotel in Almeria, there are scenes in Tabernas - the main part of the movie is shot in the abandoned set of Nueva Frontera.
Also, the movie stars Elvis Costello/Shane McGowan/Dennis Hopper/Grace Jones etc.
The story is about bank robbers who drive into the desert and arrive in a town full of cowboys who drink coffee all the time. There is eventually a big shootout!
Watchmen - About ten years after the premiere, about time to finally watch it. Zack Snyder gave us many good films and Sucker Punch. Originally, I wanted to write that the difference between this movie and Justice League is astronomical, but then I realized, it is not really his movie. Whedon fucked that one up. I watched some version which was three and half hour long! No kidding. Probably longest movie I’ve ever seen. And it actually didn’t bore me at all, not a single minute. If you haven’t seen this, I recommend you to change that and get yourself a copy asap(there are of course shorter versions), because it is one of those jawdropping movies you should be acquinted with.
One of the best superhero movies made so far. Maybe the best. 
Blade Runner on TV yesterday. Nice futuristic environment, but not that good story and presentation of it I think. A 6/10 rating seems more fair to me than IMDb’s 8.3.
Very overrated … seen it many times, and I just don’t get what the appeal is. Ridley Scott never surpassed ‘The Duellists’ and ‘A L I E N’ , which to me suggests that films on tighter budgets, force the makers to utilise their creative energies more constructively.
How many times has ‘Blade Runner’ been re-cut ? … I’ve lost count. Last time I watched it, a few months back on BD … I gave it my full attention, and tried to feel engaged by the story, but the world we’re supposed to buy into, just doesn’t impress or convince me. It hasn’t aged well, but if the story and characters were strong enough, that wouldn’t matter - all I see is a rather overblown humourless and slightly pretentious would be epic … that doesn’t work.
Also … the version I watched had the Rutger dialogue changed from the famous, “I want more life, fucker!” … to, “I want more life, father!”
As my mother used to say, regarding pimply teenagers, 'It won’t get better by picking at it" 
Recently I bought a Bogart film noir DVD collection and have so far watched The Big Sleep (8/10, Howard Hawks), The Maltese Falcon (8/10, John Huston), To Have and Have Not (7/10, Howard Hawks) and Key Largo (6/10, John Huston).
I like the atmosphere in film noir. Bogart is at his best as detective which is one of the reasons I think especially The Big Sleep but also The Maltese Falcon are most entertaining of these four. I think the serious dark atmosphere somewhat in a sense corresponds to the mood I like in several spaghetti-westerns such as Requiem For Gringo and Ramon The Mexican even if the latter type has far less dialogue and is more slowly paced (and have far better music).
I had seen all before on TV decades ago, and only Key Largo was a little disappointing with a weak Bogart and not much action.