It’s a commonly accepted bit of wisdom that the book is usually better than the movie when it comes to film adaptations of literature. But when is the opposite true?
That was exactly the topic of discussion the Reddit user u/wraithwraven brought up on the r/Movies subreddit, citing the example of Robert Zemeckis’ groundbreaking film Who Framed Roger Rabbit? arguably outshining the book source material, Who Censored Roger Rabbit? by Gary K. Wolf. This is due in no small part to the addition of Christopher Lloyd’s character, the antagonist Judge Doom, in the user’s opinion.
One of the most highly-upvoted examples in the discussion was Steven Speilberg’s 1975 horror film which put him on the map as a director, Jaws. The film was actually based on a now-lesser-known 1974 book of the same name by Peter Benchley. Is it really Jaws without that iconic John Williams score?
Winston Groom’s 1986 novel Forrest Gump was also name-dropped for its more well-known movie counterpart found in the 1994 Zemeckis-directed adaptation starring Tom Hanks. Zemeckis sure was on fire during this time!
David Fincher’s Fight Club was also named a favorite when compared to the novel of the same name by Chuck Palahniuk, though that is an opinion that will likely ruffle the feathers of the author’s fans. For one Reddit user, Palahniuk has penned some much better books since that debut novel.
Other Reddit users claimed the changes Alfonso Cuaron made to Children of Men from the book’s source material were for the better, although a decent amount of respect was still leveled at the P.D. James novel.
While some Reddit users championed Christopher Nolan’s movie version of The Prestige, compared to the Christopher Priest book of the same name, such as making the Angier character more sympathetic, not everyone was ready to throw the novel under the bus.
As long as movies based on books continue to exist, the debate over which narrative form is superior will continue to rage on.
