Movies that are better than the book

[Spirit]

"The book is better" is usually an easy catch-all argument to a movie based on a film for people to appear a little more educated. so much so that its come to the point where if anyone ever says that to me I instantly start quizzing them about the book and the differences between it and the film and how the novel is better... usually they belt up after that.

But its rare that the argument is turned around, so i ask you to name some movies that you think ended up better than the novel it was based on.

 

[Fraxinus]

Twilight didn't set the bar very high, so I suppose the movie was slightly better than the book. And that's on top of Kristen Stewart's terrible acting ability and constant hyperventilating, and Robert Pattinson moaning on a banjo in the soundtrack.

 

[DoomDash]

I'm going to just guess, The Shawshank Redemption. Originally a short story by Steven King, but the movie is the highest rated movie of all time on IMDB.

 

[Mercedes]

The Lord of the Rings. They cast Aragorn better than my head did.

 

[Dio]

Twilight didn't set the bar very high, so I suppose the movie was slightly better than the book. And that's on top of Kristen Stewart's terrible acting ability and constant hyperventilating, and Robert Pattinson moaning on a banjo in the soundtrack.

I thought the books were way better. But I still enjoyed the films, they didn't deviate too much from the source material.

 

[Batman]

The Lord of the Rings. They cast Aragorn better than my head did.

I used to be a pretty confident "the movies are better than the books" kind of person, but in the last few years, my serious reads of the books have totally changed that view. The movies, as wonderful as they are, just barely scratch the surface of the depth and beauty of the books. But of course the movies are beyond phenomenal, and the movies certainly do some things better than the books. I personally like movie Aragorn better than book Aragorn too.

 

[Terminus]

Big Hero Six. It was originally a widely disregarded manga and it become one of the most popular films of last year (with good reason, at that).

 

[Beauts]

Twilight didn't set the bar very high, so I suppose the movie was slightly better than the book. And that's on top of Kristen Stewart's terrible acting ability and constant hyperventilating, and Robert Pattinson moaning on a banjo in the soundtrack.

I kind of get what you mean. The books were terrible, however, I think the movies clearly were rushed and so their quality was still low compared to the films, tjhe casting being a main problem. However, the movies mean you don't have to read chapters and chapters which only consist of 'Edward's golden eyes shimmered and turned dark as he looked at me' rephrased 720 different ways, so, I agree overall

 

[Seth]

I used to be a pretty confident "the movies are better than the books" kind of person, but in the last few years, my serious reads of the books have totally changed that view. The movies, as wonderful as they are, just barely scratch the surface of the depth and beauty of the books. But of course the movies are beyond phenomenal, and the movies certainly do some things better than the books. I personally like movie Aragorn better than book Aragorn too.

This.

The movies are well done, but in no way do they even begin to touch the amazingness of Tolkien's work. I could go on and on and list it but it'd take forever

 

[misskitten]

I'm very "depends on the movie/book" kind of person when it comes to this argument. Like with Harry Potter I'd go hands down that the books are better, although the movies do a good job.

With the Hunger Games, I'm more the middle ground because I feel the books and movies complement each other, they do a great job of showing different aspects of the same story. Yeah, the movies leave out some stuff from the books, but the books are all from Katniss' perspective and the movies show us the outside perspective, the behind-the-scenes.

With Narnia, I was determined to read the books, but found myself put off because the book dialogue was so much simpler than the movie dialogue (which I felt was really well written and felt very natural) - in the first book I tolerated it because there was no movie version of that story, but the minute I reached the Lion, the witch and the wardrobe, I just had to put it down once I reached the scene where Lucy meets Mr. Tumnus for the first time. I still haven't been able to read the book because of it.

I didn't manage to get into the LotR books because it felt like I was reading a history textbook rather than a story, and I don't feel I can properly make a comment on that.

 

[Farore's Chosen]

How to Train Your Dragon, the books weren't bad but I found them a bit flat and a little dull with the exception of the Hairy Scary Librarian

 

[Hanyou]

Blade Runner.

I love Philip K. Dick's original, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, but the movie is a sublime experience. Its visuals, music, and fairly straightforward story, in combination, are transcendent.

The book is a well above-average science fiction book with Dick's usual themes of paranoia, oppression, etc. In this case, it's not that the book is bad, but that the movie is just exceptional. They're also different enough that they're both well worth looking into in any order. One won't spoil the other.

 

[Stitch]

The Shining is a great example of how nobody seems to be able to agree on whether a book/movie is better than the movie/book. I think it's pretty pointless to compare things this way, if you want to understand why try comparing a book with a painting in the same way.