Thursday 22 March 2012

Hunger Games, Harry Potter and other films made about the books. Is it a good idea?


It is something I have been scratching my head about recently.

The Hunger Games movie is being released on 22nd March 2012 in the UK. It is quite obvious, that when your book is considered for a film, you can officially say you have made it. The Harry Potter films, have raked in over $300,000,000 worldwide. Don't get me wrong, I have enjoyed most films that have been inspired by books, but the films don't always show the books off to their full potential.
I have read all of Roald Dahl's books. I have watched several of the films after reading the books and have found them not to entertain me as much as the books did. Roald Dahl is my favourite children's author, he is my inspiration. I would look forward to going to bed of an evening and lose myself in one of his imaginative books. The movie equivalent never does the book any justice. Often the film makers leave out crucial chapters or characters to ensure smooth running of the film and to keep the running time to the recommended average.
Having a book made into a movie brings in a large sum of revenue. It also helps to boost sales of the books, due to worldwide publicity. I wonder, if letting your book become a movie can sacrifice all the hard work that you have put into writing the book. Afterall, with most movie producers deleting chapters and characters and sometimes changing the titles, the end product may be considerably different to the original book itself. The book being a mere skeleton frame for the special effects and famous cast.
My most worrying thought as a writer, is that if I had any of my books made into films, would I lose my soul because of the large sums of cash and would I still have my drive to write as my heart has always wanted to? I would like to feel that no amount of money would be enough for me to let some movie producer strip my book down to its bare bones and make a film based upon it. If I have put my heart and soul into writing the book, having somebody do such a thing would be soul destroying.
I wish the greatest amount of luck to any author who has landed a movie deal about their book. However, please stay true to your heart and remember what your first objective was when you first starting writing. Never lose the spirit that you put into a book.

No comments:

Post a Comment