What beloved children's books should not be adapted to the screen?
Posted at 6:00 AM on October 19, 2009
by Eric Ringham
(20 Comments)
Filed under: Culture
The film adaptation of Maurice Sendak's "Where the Wild Things Are" opened this weekend. What beloved children's books should not be adapted to the screen?
Comments texted to MPR:
"A Wrinkle in Time". -Melissa, Duluth, MN
"Goodnight Moon" should not be adapted to big screen. -Lisa, St. Paul, MN
No Dr. Suess should be filmed. Did you see "Cat in the Hat"? -Donna Grandin, ND
"Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs". -Charlie, Minneapolis, MN
"The Giving Tree" by Sendak. -Sue S., White Bear Township, MN
There is no limit to what can be adapted to the screen. To suggest that we should limit it is to stifle creativity. -Matt, Brainerd, MN
As long as someone like Spike Jones directs, the book is in good hands. -Josh
Why don't you just call it "the elderly hate change"? What a silly and loaded question. -Mookie, St. Paul, MN
No children's books should be made into movies. Children should be reading, not watching a screen. -Robert Collins, Eden Prairie, MN
From Twitter:
"Everybody Poops". -@jpwest
Goodnight Moon. -@andreakremer
Share your reply in the comments: What beloved children's books should not be adapted to the screen?
Comments (20)
Lord of the Flies should never have been made into a movie, because it felt somewhat inappropriate for the age that was the movie's intended audience. The book can teach children a lot, but a movie helps them visualize the childish cruelty that I would not want a child to see.
I don't like it when they make any children's book into a movie and market it to adults. I don't think there are any children's books that shouldn't be made into movies as a general principal, but a lot of them would not translate well at all, and when they turn it into an adult movie in disguise, such as Wild Things, Horton, and the live version of The Grinch, they destroy the magic of that movie and, by association, the book for the children. They take it away from the kids and tell them, "It's mine. Go away now!"
Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card. Maybe not a children's book per se but I read it as a child.
BTW - The Very Hungry Caterpillar is already a "video".
My kids got it on a collection of Carle story "videos". (warning: don't buy videos for other people's kids without asking the parents first) ...
It's totally lame with basically a series of still pictures I could probably do with my computer's video editing program. It's really an excuse to put your kids in front of a TV and have "someone" "read" to them, because that's pretty much all it is.
I may have said "The Secret Garden," but the film adaptation was done so well that I like it as well as the book. Same thing goes for "A Little Princess."
Goodnight Moon
The Very Hungry Caterpillar.
Nothing good for children could come from a movie with that title.
Stories are meant to be told. Telling them on a big screen is fine. No limits.
I could see it being difficult to translate "When Sophie Gets Angry".
Hollywood will not leave childrens literature alone! I wish they would either stay true to the story or at least not change the plot in major ways. Great example of an adaptation: Coraline. Bad example: City of Ember.
Any of the Dr. Seuss books.
The Very Hungry Caterpillar! The story is great, but how to get 2 hours out of it??
Everyone Poops.
Harold and the Purple Crayon
The Giving Tree.
One series that should NOT have been made into a movie is "Winnie the Pooh." A generation has been deprived of the delightful combination of A.A. Milne's stories and drawings and the fun of hearing their own parents don various voices to portray the characters.
Where the Wild things are. H.R. Puffenstuff meets E.T.
I wish no children's books written before 1985 would be made into movies. I don't want the pictures I have in my head to disappear!
Alexander and the No Good, Very Bad Day
Where's Waldo.
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