Worst Fantasy Book Adaptations?

[DemiNymph]

I'll say the Stardust movie was better than the book actually. The movie had an element of fun which was very enjoyable. The book's writing was too dry for a fairytale type of story.

[Mark Antony]

I thought the first two HP films were pretty good adaptations actually. I felt they did capture the feeling of the first two books, which was much more child-like/innocent than the later novels, but with the second film and book having the darker aspects of the Chamber of Secrets too.

And I would say a good adaptation does need to stay as true to the source material as possible. Whether that makes it a good film is a different matter though. It might be a great adaptation, but an atrocious film, imo

Seriously the first two Harry Potter films are so enjoyable to me because I feel like they got the Hogwarts vibes down right and Richard Harris Dumbleydore > Gambons imo

[HexMachina]

Seriously the first two Harry Potter films are so enjoyable to me because I feel like they got the Hogwarts vibes down right and Richard Harris Dumbleydore > Gambons imo

Yeah, the first Dumbledore was an absolute gem of a casting. It's almost as though JK Rowling had him in mind when she wrote the books. And I agree, they had the feel of Hogwarts and its magical fantastical nature spot on in the first two films two. The scene with the new students sailing across the lake and catching a glimpse of the castle is wonderfully done

[brAnthelAstgreenseer]

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince .

[Alester Florent]

Interesting to see the variety of opinions on here about the Harry Potter films...

I guess it depends what is meant by a "good adaptation". The first two Harry Potter films were, I think, faithful adaptations, a few very minor quibbles aside, but I also think they fail as adaptations because they don't adapt sufficiently to the new medium, and end up being really mediocre films. They're also really quite bad at explaning some of the plot, if you don't already know what's going on. Watching the first film with my mum, she had no idea what was going on or even who Harry's foster family were until Hagrid appeared because it was never explained.

By contrast, I thought the later films were more comfortable with taking liberties with the source material in order to produce a more effective film, while still remaining fundamentally true to it. The sixth stands out as something of a high point for the series, to me.

I do also think that the films suffer throughout from a case of uninspired casting. It seems like in every case they just looked at the who's who of British cinema and grabbed the first name on the list. In some cases this didn't matter at all: Maggie Smith and Alan Rickman were fantastic. But I think Richard Harris was a mistake - he looked the part, and was a fine "wise old man", but he never quite carried Dumbledore's whimsy and quirkiness, and the character felt rather flat. Michael Gambon, I thought, filled the role rather better, although it's hard to know how much of the change was down to the new directorial approach that Cuarón introduced. It does amuse me slightly though that when a character who might as well have been written for Richard Griffiths eventually appeared in the novels, Richard Griffiths was unavailable to play him because he'd already been cast as someone else.

[Veltigar]

Like the Harry Potters. The first two actually harm themselves by trying so hard to get everything in, while not actually putting much care into the charm or the like that really makes Harry Potter. The later films are far better adaptations despite, and in some cases, because of changing stuff.

To each their own I guess. The first two are by far the best HP films imo. Not very hard of course, since all the other films are pretty lousy (save for the seventh one, that had some neat elements as well).

I thought the first two HP films were pretty good adaptations actually. I felt they did capture the feeling of the first two books, which was much more child-like/innocent than the later novels, but with the second film and book having the darker aspects of the Chamber of Secrets too.
And I would say a good adaptation does need to stay as true to the source material as possible. Whether that makes it a good film is a different matter though. It might be a great adaptation, but an atrocious film, imo

:agree:

I think that I am the only one that did not like the movie Stardust. I thought it was overtly cheesy and did not know whether to take itself seriously, or go tongue in cheek. Oh well...

Is Stardust the one with Michelle Pfeiffer playing an evil witch? Because if it is, then I agree with you.

Seriously the first two Harry Potter films are so enjoyable to me because I feel like they got the Hogwarts vibes down right and Richard Harris Dumbleydore > Gambons imo

Yeah, the first Dumbledore was an absolute gem of a casting. It's almost as though JK Rowling had him in mind when she wrote the books. And I agree, they had the feel of Hogwarts and its magical fantastical nature spot on in the first two films two. The scene with the new students sailing across the lake and catching a glimpse of the castle is wonderfully done

:agree:

The sixth stands out as something of a high point for the series, to me.

:shocked: :ack: :stillsick: :thumbsdown: There are not enough emoticons to describe my disgust of the sixth film.

[Magnar of Skagos]

This http://youtu.be/YdXQJS3Yv0Y is a torture to my eyes and ears.

I think I just got ear-cancer.

[Spring Bass]

Ender's Game was the Anti-Hobbit in terms of adaptation. They took a book that's too big to fit into a single movie and tried it anyways, with the results that the first two-thirds of the movie are pretty bad and have the irritating "checking off plot points" feel to them. "Okay, so we have Ender getting into the academy, his sister, the zero-g fight, the fight with shorter-than-him Banso - can we now get to the space fights please?" Those were actually good, and I really enjoyed both the last third of Ender's Game as well as the confrontation between him and Harrison Ford's character at the end (although the way he finds the Queen is rather dumb). Definitely not the worst adaption I've seen.

The worst might be Timeline, as mentioned up-thread. The Crichton book it was based off of was interesting, although not one of his better books. But the movie is terrible - miscasting (especially Paul Walker), not so great looking sets, not so great looking battle, and torturous to sit through. If I wasn't there with other people I would have just walked out in the middle of it.

It's been a few years, but the Sixth Harry Potter movie might be a third place on that list. For some reason, they though it was really important for us to get plenty of Lavender-Ron time at the expense of other stuff, and decided that having Harry act out of character at the end and no fight within Hogwarts was a good idea, while adding a scene where they burn Ron's home (which is actually well shot by itself, but feels completely out of place and made from fear that they'd be losing fans without inserting action there). The reason for the lack of a fight was laughable as well - "we don't want to detract from the Battle of Hogwarts in the final movie". Which ended up being underwhelming as well, but I digress. Among the few things good in it is Draco Malfoy's excellent, almost dialogue-free scenes in the movie and the underground lake.

It's not the worst adaptation of a Harry Potter book, though. That's still the adaptation of the 5th Book, my favorite book in the series. I remember thinking the whole movie felt disjointed, like they had a ton of plot points to hit on and stuff that needed to happen because it needed to happen (meaning it felt really contrived when it did). They didn't even have the excuse of the Fourth Movie, where it was already quite long and adding more would have been too much - the fifth movie was one of the shortest Harry Potter films despite adapting the largest book.

[Corvinus85]

Second tier might be Lynchs Dune. What the heck with the weird voice-overs, the pug and the rain at the end?

I didn't think Lynch's Dune was that bad. I liked that you could hear characters' thoughts. That book was full of that. I think if someone were to take all the good parts from Lynch's Dune and combine it with all the good parts that were in the SciFi miniseries (the one with William Hurt as Duke Leto), you would have a great adaptation.

[eyenon15]

Lynch's Dune has really grown on me over the years.

I thought it was a joke of a movie when I was a kid but I kinda like it now.

[The King in Black]

Apparently Lynch himself didn't like the theatrical version

And I know these are sci-fi , but the crimes against humanity that were I,Robot, I am Legend, The Time Machine, The War of the Worlds and The Day The Earth stood still eclipse anything mentioned in this thread. I,Robot and I am Legend miss the point of their source material to such a degree that they shouldn't even be called Adaptations

[Quijote Light]

Apparently Lynch himself didn't like the theatrical version

And I know these are sci-fi , but the crimes against humanity that were I,Robot, I am Legend, The Time Machine, The War of the Worlds and The Day The Earth stood still eclipse anything mentioned in this thread. I,Robot and I am Legend miss the point of their source material to such a degree that they shouldn't even be called Adaptations

If we're talking about other genres, then I think World War Z deserves a mention.

[Nictarion]

I'll never forgive X-Men Last Stand. I don't know how you fuck up the Dark Phoenix.

[Corvinus85]

Apparently Lynch himself didn't like the theatrical version

And I know these are sci-fi , but the crimes against humanity that were I,Robot, I am Legend, The Time Machine, The War of the Worlds and The Day The Earth stood still eclipse anything mentioned in this thread. I,Robot and I am Legend miss the point of their source material to such a degree that they shouldn't even be called Adaptations

Oddly enough both starred Will Smith. hmm...

[Guest]

I'll never forgive X-Men Last Stand. I don't know how you fuck up the Dark Phoenix.

Being Bret Ratner. That's how.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

REG,

Because this is a ASoIaF forum and because ASoIaF fans are petulant that AGoT is not exactly the same as ASoIaF. Just a guess.

My problem with GoT is not that it is bad. It is that it is so terribly small in comparision to the world I envision when I read the books. For example, the Hand's tourney in the first season. It looks like a Ren Faire. Not a major event held in the capital of a continent sized kingdom. Everything seems... reduced from the way GRRM describes it in the books. I understand that budget is a problem but still..."small" is not how I see the world that GRRM created.

[RenlyIsNotRight]

The worst might be Timeline, as mentioned up-thread. The Crichton book it was based off of was interesting, although not one of his better books. But the movie is terrible - miscasting (especially Paul Walker), not so great looking sets, not so great looking battle, and torturous to sit through. If I wasn't there with other people I would have just walked out in the middle of it.

Lol I actually wasn't expecting anyone to back me up on that one, mostly because I think most people have forgotten that piece of shit movie even existed by now.

Actually Michael Crichton adaptations in general tend to be bad - Congo was also pretty bad as a movie, not quite as bad as Timeline but still pretty bad. And though I haven't read the book myself I've heard its much better than the movie. Also The Thirteenth Warrior was based on Eaters of the Dead, which to be fair wasn't exactly a story so much as a translation of a historical account, and the movie...wasn't as bad as some of the above mentioned but still definitely not very good.

[Spring Bass]

I liked the Thirteenth Warrior as a kid, so I have no idea how it holds up now. But I agree that Congo was terrible - the only good things in that film were the awesome laser weapon and the night attack with the automated turrets.

Crichton's books in general are very exposition-heavy, with the characters' voices occasionally dimming so that a Voice from On High can give us a lesson about [insert year of publication] beliefs and fears about [insert technology X used by irresponsible company Y] here. It's very tricky to adapt those without the adaptations feeling rather shallow, like with Sphere. The only one that does it right is Jurassic Park.

And I know these are sci-fi , but the crimes against humanity that were I,Robot, I am Legend, The Time Machine, The War of the Worlds and The Day The Earth stood still eclipse anything mentioned in this thread. I,Robot and I am Legend miss the point of their source material to such a degree that they shouldn't even be called Adaptations

The original cut for 2007 I Am Legend gets closer to what is going on in the book, and is just generally a much better and more consistent movie. I really like it, even if it doesn't actually set up the "he has become a monster, a legend" aspect of it very well to the audience because the creatures are mostly non-stop killing machines for 90% of the movie. Whereas the theatrical cut is just godawful thematically, and noticeably ignores the hints they'd been setting up throughout the movie that the creatures were intelligent and forming a society in favor of Stand-style supernatural bullshit.

I'll have to disagree with you on War of the Worlds. It's great at building emotional intensity, and I think Cruise does a genuinely good job with what he's given - and on top of that, it's a largely faithful adaptation besides being set in 2000s New York City instead of 1890s England. The only real flaw I see in it is that the movie didn't capture that feeling of false security that the the book had, wherein the layers of human defenses appear to work at first before being overwhelmed, with the destruction of the Thunder Child being the final signifier that there was no hope of armed resistance and victory anymore. That's something that modern invasion movies mostly don't seem to be able to do - instead they make the aliens invincible until the One Weakness brings them down (one of the few exceptions is Battle: Los Angeles).

[Nictarion]

I liked 13th Warrior. Was suprised how poorly it was received. It's not great, but not bad either. I thought it was entertaining enough. Haven't read the book though.

[HexMachina]

The later Harry Potter films also had terrible depictions of magic. I mean, I know it was never really described in detail in the books, or in the first films, but still. The later films were basically *swish* oooooh, pretty fireworks! With green fireworks for Death Eaters and Red Fireworks for the good guys...

REG,

My problem with GoT is not that it is bad. It is that it is so terribly small in comparision to the world I envision when I read the books. For example, the Hand's tourney in the first season. It looks like a Ren Faire. Not a major event held in the capital of a continent sized kingdom. Everything seems... reduced from the way GRRM describes it in the books. I understand that budget is a problem but still..."small" is not how I see the world that GRRM created.

I think that scene in particular might be a reflection of the shows budget at the time, though I can't be sure. There was no real idea of how the series would be received, so they had to limit budget I imagine. I agree it looked bad though.