> I disagree. If you're going to adapt a book unfaithfully, it's time to change the name. Too often, it seems, some poor (and possibly dead) author is ripped off so that something vaguely approximating their story with the guts ripped out is paraded around with their name stamped onto it for the purpose of selling more tickets.

You probably have a point. But I think it's a different point. I don't think it's right to judge the quality of a movie by what the apparent motives behind it were. A friend suggested that it was to the critical detriment of "A Bug's Life" that the rendering of looked like plastic -- and therefore much like the movie-related toys that would be sold. But however irriting this may or may not be on the side, it's irrelevant to the question of whether the plastic-looking bugs was a good artistic choice. Likewise, even if it appears -- in fact, even if it *is* -- that the motives of the filmmakers were to cash in on a recognized literary work, only the filmmakers can be blamed for it. The film itself can't be blamed unless this was somehow also a poor artistic choice.

Whew. Now, that said, let me try to think of some relevant examples. The recent "Great Expectations" and "Wings of the Dove" are more or less faithful adaptations of literary works that take place in slightly different times and cultures. "William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet" is a more extreme example. Should the name have been changed? No way. But "You've Got Mail" (very loosely based on "The Shop Around the Corner") and "Sleepless In Seattle" (even more loosely based on "An Affair To Remember" [which in turn was a remake of the 1939 version of "Love Affair"]) both had title changes. (Of course those weren't based on literature, but the idea still carries over, I think.) All of the named examples, I think, made correct choices regarding the title, except for "William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet," because I hate the trend of putting author's names in the titles -- but that's a separate issue.

How about Disney's version of "The Hunchback of Notre Dame"? It's not very faithful. Should it have had a title change? No way. What if it had? People would be screaming "Rip off!" even louder than they scream "Unfaithful!" now. Maybe it should have been named "The Hunchback" and had "Inspired by Victor Hugo's 'The Hunchback of Notre Dame'" during the opening credits, in a large enough font that people would notice it and scream neither "Rip off!" nor "Unfaithful!" *shrug* I'm not convinced it would work. If the credit is "inspired by," the cry will be "Rip off!" and if it says "based on," the cry will be "Unfaithful!" Bottom line: It is almost impossible to do a loose adaptation of a book and not offend a significant portion of the potential audience.

And that bothers me. Between "faithful adaptation" and "totally original story" there is a wonderful, beautiful range of artistic opportunity. Engineers constantly build off one another's work to create bigger, better, and stronger things. Why can't artists do that? Who says an artist has to start inventing the wheel again with every project? What kind of exciting works can one artist do by building on the work of another artist? Rarely are such efforts appreciated. Disney's "The Black Cauldron" -- not that I'm claiming it's great art or anything -- was quite entertaining, and yet it takes pieces of plot elements from two of Lloyd Alexander's books, shuffles them together, then adds some original material. Not faithful at all. Most of the best James Bond movies were faithful to the corresponding Ian Fleming book, but one of the best, "For Your Eyes Only," throws in elements from three of Fleming's stories (including the one entitled "For Your Eyes Only") along with a healthy dose of new material as well. I wish I could think of a truly classic movie that was unfaithful to its source material, but I can't right now. Um. "Oliver!", the 1968 musical version of Charles Dickens' "Oliver Twist."

Wow. That post was *way* longer than I intended it to be. I hope I didn't come across as berating you for your opinion -- it wasn't my intention. Artistic theories like this, especially with regard to movies, are just a particular interest of mine.