Monday, June 30, 2008

10 SF Novels (or stories) that Were Better Off Unfilmed

Failures Of Cinema: 10 Books That Were Better Off on Paper: "It's happened to all of us. We read a novel that blows us away, and a few years later its title appears on posters underneath the face of Harrison Ford or Natalie Portman. But at some inevitable point in that darkened theater, the movie takes a turn we didn't expect. Our eyebrows go up, our lips turn down, and the disappointment begins. Maybe the wrong director or writer can curse an otherwise excellent project — or maybe some things were just never meant to be filmed. Here are 10 books that we think should never have been committed to celluloid."

Hat tip to Gerard Saylor.

17 comments:

Sam said...

Oy. V for Vendetta was pretty awesome and timely from a political standpoint (one could argue). I know it's not your list, I just thought I would weigh in. I do agree with "Dune" and "I, Robot". Neither is very good. "Dune" would be pretty awesome material for an update not that the technology exists.

Unknown said...

I liked V FOR VENDETTA, too.

Anonymous said...

Well lucky us Sam they are going for the third go round with Dune. Peter Berg will be directing this one.

hopefully this time when I see it in the theater I won't be given a crib note sheet. To explain everything.

Anonymous said...

I didn't hate the V film, but it is a much lesser work than the graphic novel.

While I took this DUNE to be a good graphic novelizing on film of what I could hack through of that book.

Anonymous said...

How did the unwatchable BICENTENNIAL MAN (story by Isaac Asimov) not make this list?

Unknown said...

Good question. Another Robin Williams disaster.

Fred Blosser said...

A 1980s version of NIGHTFALL is said to be pretty bad. Two other movies "based on Philip Dick stories" -- PAYCHECK and ... I don't recall the title offhand, it starred Nicolas Cage and came out a couple of years ago -- were the usual "blow em up good" action films that had few traces of Dick left. Didn't Sci-Fi Channel do a remake of DUNE that was pretty underwhelming?

Anonymous said...

Fred - That would be "Next"

Randy Johnson said...

I finally saw A Sound of Thunder the other Saturday night on the Sci-Fi Channel. Which was appropriate as it could have been one of their made for specials, albeit a little larger effects budget.

Todd Mason said...

NIGHTFALL the first featuring, if that's the word, David Birney and more skin oil than any other movie I've seen aside from THE KAMA SUTRA...that NIGHTFALL beggars any other miserable film mentioned so far. Though I understand the next film of NIGHTFALL was similarly dire.

Todd Mason said...

Other miseries:
SOYLENT GREEN (from Harrison)
ROGER CORMAN'S FRANKENSTEIN UNBOUND (from Aldiss)
supposedly, THE MONITORS (loosely from Laumer)
MILLENNIUM (from Varley and with his script, slapped around)
much of THE ILLUSTRATED MAN (from Bradbury)

on the fantasy/horror side of the street:
WEIRD WOMAN (from Leiber)
THE LEGEND OF HILLBILLY JOHN (from Wellman)
ASYLUM (from Bloch, and with another slapped-around script by the original author)
LATHE OF HEAVEN (the theatrical release, from Le Guin)
THE LORD OF THE RINGS (the Bakshi cartoon)

Anonymous said...

Hmm... I like "Fahrenheit 451" both as novel and movie.

Cap'n Bob said...

I'd mention BATTLEFIELD EARTH but I doubt it was good in either form.

Todd Mason said...

You'd doubt correctly. Still better than the Birney NIGHTFALL. Really.

Randy Johnson said...

I dunno. It's hard to believe the movie Battlefield Earth would be better than anything. Well, maybe Plan 9 From Outer Space.
Which just happens to be my favorite "bad" movie. I like to watch it and do my own personal Mystery Science Theater 3000.

Todd Mason said...

Well, hell, PLAN 9 is better than BATTLEFIELD EARTH. The sequence with Tor Johnson rising from the grave is actually eerie, and Gregory Walcott gives something like a professional performace, while BE is without good moments or any sense of professionalism (and still is only this little bit worse than ID4/INDEPENDENCE DAY).

While NIGHTFALL is antiprofessional, and so very actively unpleasant to deal with in every way. Literally hard to watch and listen to, in every way. And not because it's in any way artistically challenging, so much as challenged. It's hard for me to realize that theres a film I'm less willing to see again than ID4, but this is one.

Anonymous said...

FAHRENHEIT 451 was a much better movie than most folks realize. Absoutely dream-like in its imagery. The book, on the other hand, seemed to me kinda simplistic.