More Musing on Adaptations

[caliburncy at yahoo.com]

--- In HPFGU-Movie at y..., "Cindy C." <cindysphynx at h...> wrote:
> Luke, I think you hit the nail right on the head.  I have read all 
> of the fabulous reviews, impressions and criticisms on the list,
> and one idea keeps surfacing.  To the extent most listies have
> criticisms of the movie, it is that their favorite lines of
> dialogue or scenes were omitted.  "Are you a witch or not" is a
> frequently cited example.  This omission doesn't bother me at all,
> and as I've said, I wish more had been cut to focus better on what
> mattered.

Actually, although your reply seems to have been written in contrast 
to my comments, I actually agree almost entirely with what you, 
David, Jowitch, et al have said on this topic.  (And even anyone I 
disagree with I, of course, always *love* to have the opinions of, or 
else I would not be here.)  So count me in the "Oddball" camp, if you 
wish.  You see, though I can be a definite L.O.O.N., my L.O.O.N.iness 
simply does not express itself in this fashion, since I expect movies 
to be true to the spirit of the book, even at the blatant expense of 
the letter.

The only level on which I disagree is that I am not entirely sure 
that, as David suggests, reinterpreting the source is *necessary* for 
a good adaptation, at least not on a large scale.  I think that's 
true the vast *majority* of the time, but I have seen one or two 
counter examples that keep me from making it a hard-and-fast rule of 
inherency (probably a hard-and-fast rule was not David's intent 
anyway).  More on this to come.

So here's my new question for ponderance.  What is the ultimate goal 
of an adaptation?  (In one sense, I am referring especially to book-
to-film adaptations, for obvious reasons, but I think most of this 
applies to adaptations of any sort.)  See for me, the *ideal* 
adaptation accomplishes the following:

* Captures the spirit of the source
* Fully avails itself of the advantages and peculiarities of the 
adaptation's medium (otherwise, why adapt at all?)
* Increases appreciation of the source, for those who are already 
familiar with it
* Inspires those who are not already familiar with the source to seek 
it out
* Stands on its own merit, exterior to the source entirely, and does 
not hold appreciation of the source as a prerequisite for 
appreciation of the adaptation

Most people are likely to agree more or less with these criteria, 
though the weight they give to each one is likely to differ heavily.  
But the interesting point that comes out of this is not those 
criteria themselves, but how much disparity this can nevertheless 
cause in the ways an adaptation is approached or understood.  I think 
it depends heavily on the source.

For example, some adaptations may be extremely direct and still 
achieve those criteria to an impressive extent (and these are the 
counter examples to the hard-and-fast rule of reinterpretation).  For 
example, the BBC cartoon production of The Lion, the Witch and the 
Wardrobe is practically identical in letter to the source C.S. Lewis 
book, and I do not feel that this strict adherency was in any way to 
its detriment.  So I can't really say to what extent this adaptation 
reinterpreted anything--even the visuals are about as straight a book 
interpretation as one can get.

By contrast, some adaptation (such as anything that visionaries like 
Stanley Kubric put their hand to) veer heavily from the source to the 
point they may even stretch recognizability, but they often do make 
adaptations that fulfill a great number of the aforementioned 
criteria to a high degree.

And VERY rarely, an adaptation comes along that sticks to the source 
material well enough, but also *improves* on it in such a way that 
the adaptation is in many ways superior to the original.  Needless to 
say this is extraordinarily rare, but the best example that comes to 
mind is The Shawshank Redemption, which, at least in my opinion, was 
in almost every sense better than the Stephen King novella that was 
its source.  Some may say that this means you can only make a great 
adaptation from a mediocre source, but I'm not sure if I'm convinced.

The Harry Potter movie, of course, had an issue that was not present 
for any of these cases, which is that it is one of those fairly rare 
instances where viewers of the adaptation were expected to be largely 
comprised of ardent fans of the source.  It also had a source 
material that is more "dense" than some of the aforementioned 
sources.  In my opinion, JKR would have been wise to tell Kloves and 
Columbus more about the outline for future books than she apparently 
did, because then they might have had more to go on to make some 
tough decisions.  For example, we all assume Percy is going to be 
important in future books, and we're probably right, but we don't 
know for sure.  Neither do the filmmakers, it seems.

But if JKR had said, "This is what happens in Book Five, Six, and 
Seven, at least as it is currently planned" rather than simply 
letting let them know whether they were "Hot or Cold", then perhaps 
they would have discovered something like, "Ooh, we could write Percy 
out of this entirely, if we did . . ."  I'm just using this as a 
possible example, of course; I am NOT specifically recommending it.  
But the point is that such as it is, he has to show up in the first 
movie, even though he serves no plot function in the first movie, 
simply on the faith that he might be important in the future and to 
leave him out entirely would make people wonder where he came from 
all of a sudden in the later movies.  This is what I meant about 
PS/SS being the hardest book to adapt.


So, is a successful adaptation one that:

* Most directly reflects the source in every sense (letter and spirit)
---Meaning that the best adaptation is the one that is the most 
literal transferrance from one medium to another

* Improves upon the source, even at the expense of resemblance to the 
source
---Meaning that the best adaptation is the one that does the most to 
reinterpret the source in a positive fashion

* Adds something fresh and new to the source, without conflicting 
with the original spirit of the source
---Meaning that the best adaptation is the one that gives people 
already familiar with the source some new insight into the source 
(like fanfiction does for some people)

* Makes the best example of that adaptation's medium, completely 
ignoring comparison to the source altogether
---Meaning that the best film adaptation, for example, is also the 
best film, period

Anyone have any other options?

I certainly don't claim to know the right answer, nor do I think 
there necessarily is one.  It seems to me adaptations are something 
of a case-by-case basis.

-Luke