> 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.

I'm not trying to blame anyone but the filmmakers. :) Obviously a good movie can be produced even if the people who produce it are total scum (otherwise, very, very few movies would ever be produced). I just don't think it should be done, because it is, IMIAO, somewhat immoral to, as you put it, cash in on the name of some famous author to sell your movie. It is, for lack of a better word, disrespectful.

> 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.

I'd disagree on "Great Expectations," actually. But that's purely a matter of opinion.

> "William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet" is a more extreme example.
> Should the name have been changed? No way.

Not arguing that. "Romeo + Juliet" kept the basic story-line almost identical (in fact, they used almost as much of the original dialogue as that horrible Zeferelli version). What bothers me isn't so much the alteration of a single line or scene; I'm not a total purist. What bothers me is the alteration of the story, which is a less easily-defined thing. An example: if you've ever seen the movie version of Dune, you'll be aware that there's quite a large difference between the books and the movie. Now, it didn't bother me that they added a bunch of material to the beginning that is only revealed later on in the books, or put in some dialogue to establish the relationship between Paul and his father. What bothered me was the fact that Baron Harkonnen, who was a sadistic, slimy, incredibly evil person in the books turns into some big shouting dumb fat guy in the movie. And the fact that Paul's knife-fight is removed. And so forth. The fact that it was a bad movie probably didn't help, but even if it had been a great movie, these things would still have bothered me.

> How about Disney's version of "The Hunchback of Notre Dame"? It's
> not very faithful.

...And consequently, I never went to see it. And I don't think I ever will. It's probably a wonderful movie, but this is something of a moral issue for me. Probably my loss, too, but what the hell. There are other movies around, and I don't want to give my financial support to this sort of undertaking.

> 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!"

This is the approach that I'd favor. This is just my opinion, though.

> *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.

This is true. I'd tend to suggest that people not do loose adaptations, then. But more on that in a moment.

> 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.

What works for engineers doesn't necessarily translate directly into art. I'd liken it more to a cook trying to improve some other cook's soup by adding more salt to it without consulting him. The resulting soup may not be bad in itself, but it's not what the original cook intended. Now, if someone else wanted to use the same recipe with a few alterations, that's a different matter... as any fan of literature (in any form) knows, there are only so many stories floating around, and all current stories are basically instances of these proto-stories with a few variables set differently. I'm not going to go too deeply into this, since Joseph Cambell has already done it for me, but suffice to say the main issue for me isn't one of originality, but one of respect for the author.

> 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.

Maybe this is just a personal quirk, but I winced every time one of those departures occurred. Ruined the movie for me, really.

> 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."

I would have referenced Blade Runner. You'll notice the name change there, naturally. The story was basically the same, despite the fact that all the characters were different, material was added and subtracted almost at random, and so on. Of course, Phillip K. Dick did produce some guidelines for turning his books into movies, and I think a lot of the changes they made were actually suggested by him, so this didn't really bother me.

> 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.

Hey, no problem. I can't post a message in a public forum without expecting some form of response, right?

Everybody has their own views, anyway. Jeez. Now -I've- gone and written something longer than I intended.