Books that should be movies

sanabas

Psycho Bunny
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All sorts of average books ar getting made into movies lately. Authors like Tom Clancy, John Grisham, Clive Cussler, Dan Brown have seen mediocre pulp turned into mediocre film. Old movies are getting recycled too, with a bigger budget, and usually worse results. Psycho, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Poseidon Adventure, etc.

So with an apparent shortage of ideas for good movies, and plenty of very good books out there, which books should get the film treatment? Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy finally got made, and very good it was too. How about some other nominations?

Three I'd love to see are:

Snow Crash - Neal Stephenson

Good Omens - Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman

American Gods - Neil Gaiman
 
Just about every book becomes a movie or becomes the basis for a movie at some point. There is a large amount of fantasy books being made into movies as of late, and many are planned for the next several years. In reality though, movies are pretty much never as good. Granted, I don't really watch them anymore.
 
War and Peace. Insightful and topical. To me it is a very good book.

It would require about a 20 hour movie though.
 
sanabas said:
Snow Crash - Neal Stephenson

This one would make a great movie. :D
 
Critique of Pure Reason.
 
IMHO NO books should be made movies ... ok maybe just the crappy books that might turn out to be good.
 
The Bible. No, just kidding, it would be 100 hours long and unbearably boring in spots.

Finding Moon, by Tony Hillerman.

The Guns of August, by Barbara Tuchman. There are a lot of WWII movies but few on WWI, and the beginning would be a good place to start.
 
i would like to see an attempt to turn the His Dark Materials (northen lights, subtle knife and amber spyglass) by Phillip Pullman into movies.
 
tomsnowman123 said:
Just about every book becomes a movie or becomes the basis for a movie at some point.

Just about every book? :confused: Far more books get published than movies get made I think. Looking at my bookcase, I'd guesstimate that maybe 5-10% of my fiction titles are also movies. If it wasn't for the 10+ Stephen King titles that are also movies, the figure wouldn't even be that high.

There is a large amount of fantasy books being made into movies as of late, and many are planned for the next several years. In reality though, movies are pretty much never as good. Granted, I don't really watch them anymore.

Yeah, it's a different medium. But some books have been made into movies that are nearly the equal of the source material. Again looking at my bookshelf, Fight Club, To Kill a Mockingbird, A Clockwork Orange, The Godfather, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and Sin City are all very good in both formats.

@Sahkuhnder: Yeah. Done properly, it could be great. It also needs to be read by many more people. Actually, all of Stephenson's work would probably make good film. Or a TV series in the case of the Baroque Cycle.
 
Quinzy said:
i would like to see an attempt to turn the His Dark Materials (northen lights, subtle knife and amber spyglass) by Phillip Pullman into movies.

I love the books, movie is supposed to be out by 2007, it might be one of the few movies I have to see in theatre. Pullman wants Nicole Kidman to play Mrs. Coulter.

Tomsnowman strikes again...again!
 
tomsnowman123 said:

That appears to be a documentary. I would like to see a "fictionalized" account that stays true to what happened but is a story, not just a description.
 
sanabas said:
Just about every book? :confused: Far more books get published than movies get made I think. Looking at my bookcase, I'd guesstimate that maybe 5-10% of my fiction titles are also movies. If it wasn't for the 10+ Stephen King titles that are also movies, the figure wouldn't even be that high.

Well, you know what I mean. Maybe. People don't realize it, but there are more movies that are based on books than you might think.
 
The Tripod Series (John Christopher)!!

Also, The Duplicate by William Sleator!

The Long Walk by Stephen King

The Giver Lois Lowry

yeah, they're all "young adult" books but those make the best movies. :)
 
The Mists Of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley.

It tells the story of the King Arthur legend from the point of view of Morgan Le Fey.
 
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