I know I am stereotyping every movie made from books here.
That is forthright wrong. Because a few of such movies are exceptionally good.
Some movies I wouldn’t have known there were books preceding before it had they
not shown the ‘Adapted from_ _ _’ in the rolling credits. Also, some movies
have such wonderful cinematography that you almost equally love the book and
movie. . . blah blah . .
And the biggest BUT of them all(which my brother pointed out
to me quite pointedly one day when I made the grave mistake of saying out
aloud, “But the movie ain’t even half good as the book” in my grumbling tone)
is “Books and movies should not be compared simply because they are different
genres.”
Even after this, I am geared to write this article. I
clearly discard evident logic. If you agree with this conclusion, then I
suggest you stop reading the article and carry on with whatever it is that you
do. STOP here.
I see you decided not to stop. I am writing this article in
spite of the evident logic simply
because I feel this way. Feelings don’t grasp logic. And no matter, how hard
you try, you can’t unfeel a feeling. Believe me, I tried.
There is no other feeling that I so strongly feel other than
“hate” and its synonyms when I hear they are making a movie based on another of
my favorite books. I still have not forgiven Daniel Radcliffe for destroying my
mind image of Harry Potter. I had a crush on HP, not Daniel. Every time I try to picture my crush, Daniel
steps over his crumpled image. That is heinous, not letting a girl picture her
crush.
This being the sad story of how I got over my HP crush, I
have desperately tried to not let other character crushes evaporate, but in
vain. Hermoine lost herself to Emma Watson. Gandalf to Sir Ian McKellen. Willy
Woka to Johnny Depp. Katniss to Jennifer Lawrence. … ‘Tis a heart rending
massacre.
I tried desperately, but the imposters are everywhere, on
every fandom page in Facebook, grinning and leering out of hoarding boards,
stickers…anything, you name it.
And what is worse: the movie watchers. They think they know
the HP I grew up with. They think they know Gandalf. They think they know Prim.
And they think it is okay to say “I think HP is overhyped” or “LOTR is soooo
boring.” It is sad to let them think that they know what they are talking
about.
Once, actually it was on my convocation day, I was reading
“The Book Thief” because I’d just started it and you know how a good book
doesn’t let you put it down unless you finish it. So there I was, clad in a
saree for the first time in my life, engrossed in yet another book for the
umpteenth time in my life. And this girl from my batch sees me. “Whatchya
reading?” I wordlessly show her the cover page so that I can keep reading. Then
all of a sudden,"Oh, that one." I stop in mid sentence. I swivel my head in her
direction in anticipation of a book review. She continues,"I and my friend
watched that movie last night. But we couldn’t complete it on account of it
being so boring. Nothing happened. It was so slow."
Fury. I wished for a moment not to have been gifted with a
human mind full of neurons which are capable of processing information in less
than a blink of eye. But the damage had been done, you see. I was about to retaliate
with a number of appropriate responses. But the old adage “'Never argue with an
idiot. They will only bring you down to their level and beat you with
experience.” chose that moment to dress itself in a shining armor and came to
her rescue. A battle enraged within me for few moments. Then the storm clouds
cleared. I sighed heavily and went back to reading the book. This is indeed a
cruel world we live in. At least, the Beatles have already sung ‘Let It Be’ for
moments like these.
P.S. I heard that they are going to make ‘TFIOS’ in Hindi.
All I can say is: don’t you understand that Augustus wouldn’t be Augustus
without his blue eyes?
P.P.S. My heart goes out to Augustus Waters and Artemis Fowl
both of whom are likely to die in the immediate future.
