Continuing On

I’ll admit, I haven’t written much this weekend, only a couple hundred words between yesterday and today, but I’m still going to get this done. I may even write some more today. Besides, weekends are never my friend because I’m a procrastinator and when I have all day I always say “I’ll do it later, I have time” only to find it to be later and I have written nothing. I know, not a great quality to have as a writer, but I did get pushed up over the 25K mark on Friday. I’m glad I’m starting in on the bulk of the plotline, now, because I think that’s going to rejuvinate my interest in the project. Not that I’m not enthralled with the concept, it’s just that I feel like the story is a bit bogged down at this point. Ah well, that’s what editing is for!

I have also spent my weekend at the movie theater. Friday evening, I went to see Angels & Demons and decided to head back to see it again today at the matinee. Needless to say I loved it. So many people are slamming it because it’s a very streamlined version of the story, and it cuts out much of the subplots from the book, but what people need to realize is that there was no earthly way that a 400-500 page novel was going to fit in a 2 and 1/2 hour timeframe without some major trimming. Honestly, this was one of the best book to film adaptations I’ve ever seen. I’m not judging on the criteria of how closely it followed the book’s many subplots, I’m judging it on how well the story flowed, how well they made the film make sense around the cuts, and how good it was from the standpoint of time and plot.

For example: the first 20-30 chapters of the novel are spent at CERN, something that, if it had made it into the film, would have taken up 1/4th of the film. It just wouldn’t have worked, you would have spent far too much time setting up the story when you needed to be in Vatican City following the main plot, which makes up the bulk of the book. This film could have easily been longer than 3 hours, and in the rough cut, before any editing was truly done, it probably was. There were too many unnecessary factors that worked in the book which could not work on screen.

All I’m saying is that when anyone goes into a film based on a book, remember that these are two entirely different mediums you’re dealing with. What might work in one may not work in another.

Sorry for the rant, I just wanted to post my opinion on that topic.

Guess I had better wrap it up. Again, sorry for going off on a bit of a tangent there!

~ by stagecraft on May 17, 2009.