"Lost in Translation" and "The Myth of the Deadbeat Dad"

Readers respond to Joe Mullich on novelized movie novels and Suzy Hansen's interview with an expert on black fathers.

Aug. 10, 2001 | Read "Lost in Translation"

I hate to say it, but the idea of the novelization of a film adaptation of a novel isn't exactly new: it's been around for decades. In most cases, particularly with science fiction novels, the new novelization is pushed by producers who don't want the reading public to see the original material and thereby realize how lame the adaptation was. For instance, after the release of "Total Recall," we received not the original Philip K. Dick short story "We Can Remember It For You Wholesale," but a novelization written by Piers Anthony, a move comparable to letting "Quigmans" cartoonist Buddy Hickerson redraw Leonardo da Vinci's notebooks. The same thing happened throughout the '90s: just look at the novelizations of a novel of "Little Women" and "Mary Shelley's Frankenstein."

As to why this is happening? Well, having to pay royalties to a living writer or the writer's heirs is a factor, as is the ego trip of a director or screenwriter. Unfortunately, though, most of this goes directly to the studio, which honestly figures that the audience might be confused by a novel that conflicts with the carefully focus-grouped film. (One of the better rumors running around was that on the eve of the release of the first "Batman" movie, Warner Communications was calling for a recall of the seminal Frank Miller series "Batman: The Dark Knight Returns" because Warner suits were terrified that audiences "might be confused" by the graphic novel, meaning that they figured that audiences might actually prefer the graphic novel to their atrocity.) And so long as the studios keep micromanaging the final "product" hitting movie screens, this is only going to get worse.

-- Paul T. Riddell

A weirder case (again, science fiction) is "Escape from Witch Mountain," by Alexander Key, a fine kid's book which became an okay kid's movie, spawning a lousy sequel, then renovelized by -- yes! -- Alexander Key.

-- Allen Knutson

"Dr Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb" was based on the novel "Red Alert" by Peter George. The novel was a serious cold war thriller. Kubrick reportedly intended to produce a serious movie, but in working on the screenplay with George, found that there was a very dark humor to the scenario presented in the novel. After the film was released, George wrote a novelization of "Dr Strangelove or ..." in its Kubrick interpretation. However, like the sub-standard novelizations Mullich refers to, this version reads like an extended screenplay treatment.

-- Sam Upritchard

Reading Joe Mullich's observations, I was reminded of the time I saw a mass-market paperback titled "James Bond and Moonraker" on sale more than 20 years ago, when "Moonraker" was in theaters. In that case, Ian Fleming's James Bond novels (unlike Boulle's "Planet of the Apes" today) weren't at all obscure, but the movie essentially used only Fleming's title and nothing else; it even recycled the "Jaws" character from the previous movie. If Fleming's "Moonraker" were the only novel offered, readers would realize what the screenwriters had done to it -- so it was (temporarily) superseded.

The common thread is that if the original novel is any good and the derived screenplay bears little relation to it (or simply stinks), the studios would really rather suppress the original to disguise what they've done to a good book.

-- Jeffrey E. Cook

The most interesting case is the one where James Gunn, author of the novel "The Immortals," was compelled to write the novelization of the movie based on his own novel, being told that if he didn't do it, someone else would. If memory serves, I've even seen a novelization of "The Last of the Mohicans" -- which may be easier.

-- Alex Jablokow

Your article resonated with me, reminding me of the time I found "Great Expectations," the movie novelization, by Deborah Chiel, on a bookstore shelf. I was flabbergasted. The existence of this book is wrong on so many levels, I can't even begin to state them. And as for the "author," who seems to specialize in this sort of book, I suppose she has to look at herself in the mirror each morning ...

-- Ryan Kriger

The same night that I saw the movie "Tomb Raider," I saw a woman on the subway reading a novelization of the movie. Considering that the movie's basis was a video game and that the movie was not even as good as the source, one wonders what pleasure is actually derived from reading such a book. Some stories and ideas cannot survive the transition from medium to medium and become different things entirely, most often of lesser quality too. And while the urge to put in pictures what has only previously been available in words seems like a natural inclination, the reverse seems equally unnatural, unnecessary and undesired. But I am stuck as to why that woman was reading that book.

-- Jonathan Lill

The most amusing one I've ever seen was called "Bram Stoker's Dracula," and was written by someone else. However, the topic loses its anecdotal qualities when I think about the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy. While I am very much looking forward to the upcoming films, lets all hope and pray that no one does anything so blasphemous as attempt to rework those classic books.

-- Sara Quale

This has often been done with films based on classics like "Les Miserables" or "The Man in the Iron Mask." Look for the upcoming reduction of "The Three Musketeers" into "The Musketeer" to generate more paperback pabulum of this kind.

So reflexive is my suspicion, that when I spotted the current reissue of Pierre Boulle's "Monkey Planet" (retitled "Planet of the Apes" to tie it to the movie), I quickly scanned the text to see if it was indeed Boulle's book as I remembered it and not a novelization of the screenplay.

A rare twist on this strange, serial adaptation is when a respected novelist is behind the curve and must catch up to it. Several years ago, Anthony Burgess wrote an original TV mini-series about the first Roman emperors called "A.D." The inevitable commissioned novelization accompanied its broadcast. Some time later, Burgess wrote his own novel based on his screenplay called -- if memory serves -- "Kingdom of the Just." Perhaps the two should have been sold together as a boxed set.

I read neither book, but it's a safe bet which one would have been worth my time.

-- David N. Small

Not only has "Planet of The Apes" spawned a novelization that has nothing to do with the original novel, the same was done a few years back with the Louisa May Alcott classic, "Little Women," the better to immortalize the Winona Ryder version of Jo. Apparently the original was too long and didn't stick closely enough to the plot of the movie.

-- Lauren Walker

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