Film adaptation is the transfer of a written work to a feature film. In the Film industry, a feature film is a Film made for initial distribution in theaters and being the "main attraction" of the screening It is a type of derivative work. In Copyright law, a derivative work is an expressive creation that includes major basic copyrighted aspects of an original previously created first work
A common form of film adaptation is the use of a novel as the basis of a film, but film adaptation includes the use of non-fiction (including journalism), autobiography, comic book, scripture, plays, and even other films. A novel (from Italian novella, Spanish novela, French nouvelle for "new" "news" or "short story Journalism is the profession of writing or communicating formally employed by publications and broadcasters for the benefit of a particular Community of people An autobiography, from the Greek αὐτός autos "self" βίος bios "life" and γράφειν graphein "to write" A comic book (often shortened to simply comic and sometimes called a comic paper or comic magazine) is a Magazine or Book of narrative A play, or stageplay, is a form of Literature written by a Playwright, almost always consisting of Dialogue between Fictional characters From the earliest days of cinema, adaptation has been nearly as common as the development of original screenplays. See also Pre-production Screenwriting A screenplay or script is a written plan authored by a Screenwriter, for a Film or Television
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Novel adaptations
Novels are frequently adapted for films. For the most part, these adaptations attempt either to appeal to an existing commercial audience (the adaptation of best sellers and the "prestige" adaptation of works) or to tap into the innovation and novelty of a less well known author. Inevitably, the question of "faithfulness" arises, and the more high profile the source novel, the more insistent are the questions of fidelity.
Elision and interpolation
| “ | I like to remember Paul Schrader's rule: "A film scene should be like a party. Paul Joseph Schrader (born July 22, 1946 in Grand Rapids Michigan) is an American Screenwriter and Film director You arrive late and leave early. " That helps to get to the crux fast and know what to lose. | ” |
Erich von Stroheim attempted a literal adaptation of Frank Norris's novel McTeague in 1924 with his film, Greed. Roger Lichtenberg Simon is an award-winning mystery author Blogger and screenwriter living in California. Erich von Stroheim ( September 22, 1885 &ndash May 12, 1957) was an Austrian star of the silent film age lauded for his directorial Benjamin Franklin Norris Jr ( March 5 1870 – October 25 1902) was an American novelist during the Progressive Era, writing McTeague is a novel by Frank Norris. First published in 1899, it is set in San Francisco. Year 1924 ( MCMXXIV) was a Leap year starting on Tuesday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar. Greed is a 1924 dramatic Silent film. One of the most famous Lost films in cinema history it is also considered one of the greatest The resulting film was over sixteen hours long. A cut of the film only eight hours long, then one running to four hours, appeared. Finally, the studio itself cut the film to around two hours, resulting in a finished product that was entirely incoherent. Since that time, few directors have attempted to put everything in a novel into a film. Therefore, elision is nearly mandatory.
In some cases, however, film adaptations will also interpolate scenes or invent characters. This is especially true when a novel is part of a literary saga. Incidents or quotes from later or earlier novels will be inserted into a single film. Additionally, and far more controversially, film makers will invent new characters or create stories that were not present in the source material at all. Given the anticipated audience for a film, the screenwriter, director, or movie studio may wish to increase character time or invent new characters. A movie studio (aka film studio) is in the established sense of the term a company that distributes films. For example, William Kennedy's Pulitzer Prize winning novel, Ironweed, had a very small section with a prostitute named Helen. William Kennedy may refer to William Nassau Kennedy (1839&ndash1885 second Mayor of Winnipeg Manitoba Canada William J The Pulitzer Prize, ˈpʊlɨtsɚ PULL-it-sər is an American award regarded as the highest national honor in Newspaper journalism, This article is about the novel For the film see Ironweed (film. Because the movie studio anticipated a female audience for the film and had Meryl Streep for the role, Helen became a significant part of the film. Mary Louise "Meryl" Streep (born June 22, 1949) is an award-winning American Actress who has worked in Theatre, However, characters are also sometimes invented to provide the narrative voice.
As Sergei Eisenstein pointed out in his landmark essay on Charles Dickens, films most readily adapt novels with externalities and physical description: they fare poorly when they attempt the Modern novel and any fiction that has internal monologue or, worse, stream of consciousness. Sergei Mikhailovich Eisenstein (Сергей Михайлович Эйзенштейн January 23, 1898 &ndash February 11, 1948) was The first modern novel has generally been ascribed to a series of Picaresque Novels, most famously Don Quixote (1605 by Cervantes When source novels have exposition or digressions from the author's own voice, a film adaptation may create a commenting, chorus-like character to provide what could not be filmed otherwise. The Greek chorus ( choros) is believed to have grown out of the Greek Dithyrambs and Tragikon drama in tragic plays of the ancient Thus, in the adaptation of John Fowles's The French Lieutenant's Woman, the director created a contemporary Englishman in a romance with a woman to offer up the ironic and scholarly voice that Fowles provided in the novel, and the film version of Laurence Sterne's "unfilmable" novel, Tristram Shandy had the main actor speak in his own voice, as an actor, to emulate the narrator's ironic and metafictional voice in the novel. John Robert Fowles ( March 31, 1926 &ndash November 5, 2005) was an English Novelist and Essayist. The French Lieutenant's Woman is a 1969 novel by John Fowles. Laurence Sterne ( November 24, 1713 &ndash March 18, 1768) was an Irish -born English Novelist and an Anglican The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy Gentleman (or more briefly Tristram Shandy) is a novel by Laurence Sterne. Irony is a literary or Rhetorical device, in which there is an incongruity or Discordance between what one says or does and what one means or Metafiction is a literary term for a type of Fiction that systematically and self-consciously addresses the devices of fiction including the relationship between fiction and Early on, film makers would rely upon voice over for a main character's thoughts, but, while some films (e. The term voice-over refers to a production technique where a non-diagetic voice is broadcast live or pre-recorded in Radio, Television, Film, g. Blade Runner) may self-consciously invoke the older era of film by the use of voice over, such devices have been used less and less with time. Blade Runner is a 1982 American Science fiction Film, directed by Ridley Scott.
Interpretation as adaptation
There have been several nominees for non plus ultra of inventive adaptation, including the Roland Joffe adaptation of The Scarlet Letter with explicit sex between Hester Prynn and the minister and Native American attacks on Salem (changes introduced, according to Joffe, to increase the market and to make an entirely new morality tale out of the novel). Roland Joffé (born November 17, 1945 in London) is a Film director who began his career in The Scarlet Letter is the Magnum opus of Nathaniel Hawthorne. At nearly the same time, Daniel Defoe's Moll Flanders was creatively adapted to make it a romance. Daniel Defoe (1659/1661 — April 24, 1731 was an English Writer, Journalist, and Pamphleteer, who gained enduring fame for The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders (commonly known as simply "Moll Flanders") is a Novel written by A television mini-series of Gulliver's Travels changed the sexes of characters, made some vanish, and changed the character of Master Bates from a single 3 sentence obscene pun into a villain. Gulliver's Travels (1726 amended 1735 officially Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World in Four Parts The Charlie Kaufman and "Donald Kaufman" penned Adaptation. was an intentional satire and commentary on the process of film adaptation itself. Charles Stuart Kaufman (born September 20, 1958) is an American Playwright, Film producer, theater and Film director Adaptation is a 2002 Comedy-drama Satire film directed by Spike Jonze and written by Charlie Kaufman. All of these cases of "outrageous" or "unfaithful" adaptation were interpretations of the source work. Joffe argued that his changes were a recasting and revitalizing of Hawthorne's point. Nathaniel Hawthorne (born Nathaniel Hathorne; July 4 1804 – May 19 1864 was an American novelist and Short story writer The creators of the Gulliver miniseries interpolated a sanity trial to reflect the ongoing scholarly debate over whether or not Gulliver himself is sane at the conclusion of Book IV. In these cases, adaptation is a form of criticism and recreation, as well as translation.
Change in adaptation is essential and practically unavoidable, mandated both by the constraints of time and medium, but how much is always a balance. Some film theorists have argued that a director should be entirely unconcerned with the source, as a novel is a novel, while a film is a film, and the two works of art must be seen as separate entities. Since a transcription of a novel into film is impossible, even holding up a goal of "accuracy" is absurd. Others argue that what a film adaptation does is change to fit (literally, adapt), and the film must be accurate to either the effect (aesthetics) of a novel or the theme of the novel or the message of the novel and that the film maker must introduce changes where necessary to fit the demands of time and to maximize faithfulness along one of these axes.
Theatrical adaptation
Films sometimes use plays as their sources. William Shakespeare has been called the most popular screenwriter in Hollywood. William Shakespeare ( baptised Not only are there film versions of all of Shakespeare's plays, but there are multiple versions of many of them, and there are films adapted from Shakespeare's plays very loosely (such as West Side Story, Kiss Me, Kate, O, and 10 Things I Hate about You, as well as Akira Kurosawa's adaptations in Throne of Blood and Ran). West Side Story is a 1961 film directed by Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins. Kiss Me Kate is a musical with music and lyrics by Cole Porter. O is a 2001 Drama film, a loose adaptation of William Shakespeare 's Othello. is a 1957 film directed by Akira Kurosawa, which transposes the plot of William Shakespeare's play Macbeth to medieval Japan. is a 1985 film written and directed by Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa.
Similarly, hit Broadway plays are frequently adapted, whether from musicals or dramas. Broadway theater, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 39 large professional theaters with 500 seats or more located Musical theatre is a form of Theatre combining Music, Songs spoken Dialogue and Dance. On the one hand, theatrical adaptation does not involve as many interpolations or elisions as novel adaptation, but, on the other, the demands of scenery and possibilities of motion frequently entail changes from one medium to the other. Film critics will often mention if an adapted play has a static camera or emulates a proscenium arch. Proscenium theatre is a Theatre space whose primary feature is a large Archway (the proscenium arch) at or near the front of the stage, through Laurence Olivier consciously imitated the arch with his Henry V (1944), having the camera begin to move and to use color stock after the prologue, indicating the passage from physical to imaginative space. Laurence Kerr Olivier Baron Henry V is a 1944 film adaptation of William Shakespeare 's play of the same name. Prologue ( Greek πρόλογος prologos, from προ~ pro~ - fore~, and lógos word) or prolog, is a prefatory Sometimes, the adaptive process can continue after one translation. Mel Brooks's The Producers was a film that was adapted into a Broadway musical and then adapted again into a film. Mel Brooks (born Melvin Kaminsky; June 28, 1926) is an American director, Writer, Composer, Lyricist The Producers is a 2005 comedy - Musical film starring Uma Thurman and The Lion King 's Nathan Lane and
Television adaptation
Feature films are occasionally created from television series or television segments. A television program (US television programme (UK or television show (U In these cases, the film will either offer a longer storyline than the usual television program's format or will offer expanded production values. In the adaptation of The X Files to film, for example, greater effects and a longer plotline were involved. The X-Files is a Peabody, Golden Globe and Emmy Award -winning American Science fiction television series created by Chris Carter Additionally, adaptations of television shows will offer the viewer the opportunity to see the television show's characters without broadcast restrictions. These additions (nudity, profanity, explicit drug use, explicit violence) are only rarely a featured adaptive addition (film versions of "procedurals" such as Miami Vice are most inclined to such additions as featured adaptations). Miami Vice is an American Television series produced by Michael Mann for NBC.
Because the film makers are adapting established characters with expected behaviors, introducing obviously non-broadcast elements may alienate a core audience. Films will sometimes try to offer a "real" story, as if commercial television were inherently censored for complexity. Some adaptations of television shows are nostalgic and usually ironic.
At the same time, some theatrically released films are adaptations of television mini-series events. A miniseries (also mini-series) in a serial Storytelling medium is a production which tells a story in a pre-planned limited number of episodes When national film boards and state controlled television networks co-exist, film makers can sometimes create very long films for television that they may adapt solely for time for theatrical release. Both Ingmar Bergman (notably with Fanny and Alexander, but with other films as well) and Lars von Trier have created long television films that they then recut for international distribution. Ernst Ingmar Bergman ( pronounced) (14 July 1918 – 30 July 2007 was a nine-time Academy Award -nominated Swedish film, stage Fanny and Alexander ( Fanny och Alexander) is a 1982 Golden Globe and Academy Award -winning Swedish Film written and Lars von Trier (born Lars Trier, April 30, 1956) is a Danish Film director and Screenwriter.
Even segments of television shows have been adapted into feature films. The American television variety show Saturday Night Live has been the origin of a number of films, beginning with The Blues Brothers, which began as a one-off performance by Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi. The United States of America —commonly referred to as the Saturday Night Live ( SNL) is a weekly late-night 90-minute American Sketch comedy / Variety show based in New York City The Blues Brothers are a Grammy Award -nominated American blues and soul revivalist band founded in 1978 by comedians Dan Aykroyd Daniel Edward "Dan" Aykroyd, CM (born July 1, 1952) is an Academy Award -nominated and Emmy Award -winning Canadian-American John Adam Belushi ( January 24, 1949 – March 5, 1982) was an American Comedian, Actor and Musician The most recent of these Saturday Night Live originated films is a case of double television origin: Fat Albert, which began with an impression of another television show based on the comedy routine of Bill Cosby. Fat Albert is a 2004 live-action/animated film based on the Filmation animated series Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids. William Henry Cosby Jr (born July 12 1937 is an American Comedian, Actor, Author, Television producer and Activist. Rowan Atkinson has starred in three British films that originated on television: Johnny English, Bean and its sequel Mr. Bean's Holiday. Rowan Atkinson (born 6 January 1955 is an English Comedian, actor and writer famous for his title roles in the British television comedies Blackadder The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom, the UK or Britain,is a Sovereign state located Johnny English is a British comic Film Parodying the James Bond Secret agent genre released in 2003 Bean is a common name for large plant Seeds of several genera of the family Fabaceae (formerly Leguminosae used for human food or animal Mr Bean's Holiday (also known as Bean 2, Bean on Holiday and French Bean) is a Comedy film starring
Radio adaptation
Radio narratives have also provided the basis of film adaptation. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, for example, began as a radio series for the BBC and then became a novel which was adapted to film. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is a science fiction comedy series In the heyday of radio, radio segments, like television segments today, translated to film on several occasions, usually as shorts. Dialog-heavy stories and fantastic stories from radio also adapted to film (e. g. Fibber McGee, Life with Father and Superman, which was a serial on radio before being adapted to film). Fibber McGee and Molly was a radio show that played a major role in determining the full form of what became classic old-time radio. Life with Father is the title of a humorous autobiographical book of stories compiled in 1935 by Clarence Day Jr Superman is a fictional Comic book Superhero widely considered to be one of the most recognized of such characters and an American Cultural icon
Comic book adaptation
- See also: Superhero film and List of films based on comics
Comic book characters, particularly superheroes, have long been adapted into film, beginning in the 1940s with Saturday movie serials aimed at children. A Superhero film is an action, fantasy or science fiction Genre film that is focused on the actions of one or more Superheroes who This is a list based on comics. It includes films that are adaptations of Comics and those films whose characters originated in those comics A comic book (often shortened to simply comic and sometimes called a comic paper or comic magazine) is a Magazine or Book of narrative A superhero (sometimes rendered super-hero or super hero) is a Fictional character "of unprecedented physical prowess dedicated to acts of derring-do Superman (1978) and Batman (1989) are two later successful movie adaptations of famous comic book characters. Superman (also known as Superman The Movie) is a 1978 Superhero film based on the DC Comics character of the Batman is a 1989 Superhero film based on the DC Comics character of the same name. In the early 2000s, blockbusters such as X-Men (2000) and Spider-Man (2002) ) have led to dozens of superhero films. X-Men is a 2000 Superhero film based on the fictional Marvel Comics characters of the same name. Spider-Man is a 2002 American Superhero film based on the fictional Marvel Comics character Spider-Man. The success of these films has also led to other comic books not necessarily about superheroes being adapted for the big screen, such as Ghost World (2001), American Splendor (2003) and Sin City (2005). Ghost World is a 2001 Film by Terry Zwigoff, based on a Graphic novel by Daniel Clowes. American Splendor is a 2003 Biopic about Harvey Pekar, the author of the ''American Splendor'' comic book series. Sin City is a 2005 film written produced and directed by Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez.
The adaptation process for comics is different from that of novels. Many successful comic book series last for several decades and have featured several variations of the characters in that time. Films based on such series usually try to capture the back story and “spirit” of the character instead of adapting a particular storyline. Occasionally aspects of the characters and their origins are simplified or modernized.
Self-contained graphic novels, many of which do not feature superheroes, can be adapted more directly, such as in the case of Road to Perdition (2002) and V for Vendetta (2006). A Road to Perdition is a 2002 period drama directed by Sam Mendes. V for Vendetta is a 2006 action - thriller Film directed by James McTeigue and produced by Joel Silver In particular, Robert Rodriguez did not use a screenplay for Sin City but utilized actual panels from writer/artist Frank Miller's series as storyboards to create what Rodriguez regards as a "translation" rather than an adaptation. Robert Anthony Rodriguez (born June 20 1968 is an American director, writer, producer, Cinematographer, editor and Musician See also Pre-production Screenwriting A screenplay or script is a written plan authored by a Screenwriter, for a Film or Television Frank Miller (born January 27, 1957) is an American Writer, Artist and Film director best known for his dark Sin City is the title for a series of comics by Frank Miller, told in a Film noir -like style (now known as Neo noir) See also Pre-production Storyboards are graphic organizers such as a series of Illustrations or Images displayed in sequence for the purpose of
Furthermore, some films based on long-running franchises use particular storylines from the franchise as a basis for a plot. The second X-Men film was loosely based on the graphic novel X-Men: God Loves, Man Kills and the third film on the storyline Dark Phoenix Saga. X2 (also known in promotional materials as X2 X-Men United, X-Men 2 X-Men United, and X-Men 2) is a God Loves Man Kills (more fully Marvel Graphic Novel #5 X-Men God Loves Man Kills) is a Graphic novel published in 1982 by X-Men The Last Stand is a 2006 Superhero film and the third in the X-Men series The Dark Phoenix Saga is an extended X-Men storyline in the fictional Marvel Comics Universe, focusing on Jean Grey and the Phoenix Force
Adaptations from other sources
Documentary films have been made from reportage, as have dramatic films (e. Documentary film is a broad category of visual expression that is based on the attempt in one fashion or another to " Document " reality g. All the President's Men, and, most recently, Miracle, which was adapted from a deadline written book after the 1980 "miracle on ice"). All the President's Men is a 1976 film based on the 1974 non-fiction book by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, the two journalists investigating Miracle (2004 is an American biographical Sports film about the United States men's hockey team led by head Year 1980 ( MCMLXXX) was a Leap year starting on Tuesday (link displays the 1980 Gregorian calendar) The An Inconvenient Truth is Al Gore's documentary film about climate change. An Inconvenient Truth is an American Documentary film about Global warming, presented by former United States Vice President Albert Arnold Gore Jr (born March 31 1948 is an American environmental Activist, author Businessperson, former Politician, and former Documentary film is a broad category of visual expression that is based on the attempt in one fashion or another to " Document " reality Climate change is any long-term significant change in the “average weather” that a given region experiences It is a film adaptation of a Keynote multimedia presentation and is an adaptation, therefore, of a lecture. Keynote is a presentation software application developed as a part of the IWork productivity suite (which also includes Pages and Numbers Presentation is the process of showing and explaining the content of a topic to an audience Some films have been made based on photographs (e. g. Pretty Baby, directed by Louis Malle), and movies have adapted movies (e. Pretty Baby is a 1978 Historical fiction, Dramatic Film directed by Louis Malle. Louis Malle (30 October 1932 &ndash 23 November 1995 was a French Film director, working in both French and English. g. Twelve Monkeys deriving from La Jetée). La jetée ( English: The Jetty and The Pier) ( 1962) is a 28-minute black and white Science fiction Many films have been made from epic poetry. An epic is a lengthy Narrative poem, ordinarily concerning a serious subject containing details of heroic deeds and events significant to a culture or nation Homer's works have been adapted multiple times in several nations. Homer ( Ancient Greek:, Homēros) is a legendary ancient Greek epic Poet, traditionally said to be the author of the epic poems the Finally, both Greek mythology and the Bible have been adapted frequently. Greek mythology is the body of stories belonging to the ancient Greeks concerning their gods and Heroes the nature of the world and the origins and significance Etymology According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, the word bible is from Latin biblia, traced from the same word through Medieval Latin and Late Latin In these cases, the audience already knows the story well, and so the adaptation will de-emphasize elements of suspense and concentrate instead on detail and phrasing. The specifics of the acting take precedence over cinematic techniques. Acting is the work of an Actor or Actress, which is a person in Theatre, Television, Film, or any other Storytelling
Adaptation of films
When a film's screenplay is original, it can also be the source of derivative works such as novels and plays. In Copyright law, a derivative work is an expressive creation that includes major basic copyrighted aspects of an original previously created first work For example, movie studios will commission novelizations of their popular titles or sell the rights to their titles to publishing houses. A novelization is a Novel that is written based on some other media story form rather than as an original work These novelized films will frequently be written on assignment, and will sometimes be written by authors who have only an early script as their source. Consequently, novelizations are quite often changed from the films as they appear in theaters.
Novelization can build up characters and incidents for commercial reasons (e. g. to market a card or computer game, to promote the publisher's "saga" of novels, or to create continuity between films in a series)
There have been instances of novelists who have worked from their own screenplays to create novels at nearly the same time as a film. Both Arthur C. Clarke, with 2001: A Space Odyssey, and Graham Greene, with The Third Man, have worked from their own film ideas to a novel form (although the novel version of The Third Man was written more to aid in the development of the screenplay than for the purposes of being released as a novel). Sir Arthur Charles Clarke, CBE (16 December 1917–19 March 2008 was a British Science fiction Author, Inventor, and For other uses see 2001 A Space Odyssey. 2001 A Space Odyssey ( 1968) is a Science fiction Novel Henry Graham Greene OM, CH (2 October 1904 &ndash 3 April 1991 was an English writer best known as a novelist but who also produced Short stories The Third Man ( is an award-winning British Film noir directed by Carol Reed and starring Joseph Cotten, Alida Valli, Both John Sayles and Ingmar Bergman write their film ideas as novels before they begin producing them as films, although neither director has allowed these prose treatments to be published. John Thomas Sayles (born September 28 1950) is an American Independent film director and Screenwriter who frequently Ernst Ingmar Bergman ( pronounced) (14 July 1918 – 30 July 2007 was a nine-time Academy Award -nominated Swedish film, stage
Finally, films have inspired and been adapted into plays. John Waters's films have been successfully mounted as plays; both Hairspray and Cry Baby have been adapted, and other films have spurred subsequent theatrical adaptations. John Samuel Waters Jr (born April 22, 1946) is an American filmmaker, Actor, Writer, Celebrity, Spamalot is a Broadway play based on Monty Python films. Monty Python's Spamalot is a musical comedy "lovingly ripped off from" the 1975 film Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Monty Python (sometimes known as The Pythons) is the collective name of the six creators of Monty Python's Flying Circus, a British Television In a rare case of a film being adapted from a stage musical adaptation of a film, in 2005 the film adaptation of the stage musical based on Mel Brook's classic comedy film The Producers was released. The Producers is a 1968 feature-length Comedy film written and directed by Mel Brooks.
See also
References
- Eisenstein, Sergei. A " remake' " is a term used to described something that has been done again sometimes with better Quality, and usually with more features "Dickens, Griffith, and the Film Today. " Film Form Dennis Dobson, trans. 1951.
- The history of Erich von Stroheim's Greed, from welcometosilentmovies. com
- The Art of Adaptation from hollywoodlitsales. com
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