“I liked the book better than the movie” isn't something a filmmaker wants to hear.
Although novels and films are a very different medium, they are equally good at storytelling. Sometimes an author's fictional world is so magnificent that it undoubtedly feels as if it should receive a visual interpretation. But adapting a novel into a feature film can be a tricky endeavor, especially since bookworms have high expectations.
While Hollywood loves turning great books into movies, there's no guarantee that the end product will remain faithful to the original story or that it'll even retain the same quality. Remember Baz Luhrmann's The Great Gatsby or Roland Joffé's The Scarlett Letter (even Gary Oldman couldn't save this one)? Some cinematic changes are just downright unforgivable.
However, there have been loads of successful book to movie adaptations in the past, so taking a literary gamble like this can pay off big time. Here are 10 films that truly deserve to be translated from the page to the big screen with grace and careful planning in 2016.
1. The Secret History by Donna Tartt
Set in Vermont, The Secret History centers around six close-knit friends who attend the relatively small but posh Hampden College. After many years, the narrator, Richard Papen, reflects back on his time at the university and how he — along with four of his friends from the same tight-knit group — turn on one of their own and murder that friend. Ultimately, they all have to deal with the long-lasting academic and social ramifications that come with committing such a heinous crime.
Dream-casting:
Richard: Joseph Gordon-Levitt
Charles: Jamie Bell
Camilla: Mia Wasikowska
Francis: Eddie Redmayne
Henry: Cillian Murphy
Bunny: Michael Pitt
2. Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson
This young adult novel follows the painful and crippling experience of an eighteen-year-old girl's battle with anorexia nervosa. As the narrator, Lia, shows us her struggles to cope with her best friend Cassie's death and her obsessive behavior which includes counting calories and constantly berating herself. Wintergirls also focuses on Lia's tense relationship with her parents, and young readers have found her character to be relatable and sympathetic. At the end of the book, Laurie Halse Anderson highlights a powerful message for her audience: The only person who can save Lia is herself.
Dream-casting:
Lia: Taissa Farmiga
Cassie: Sasha Pieterse
Elijah: Douglas Booth
3. The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen
Farrar, Straus and Giroux
This National Book Award winner was in negotiations for multiple adaptations, but things never worked out. The Corrections relates the story of the Lamberts, who are a middle-class family from the Midwest, and their devastating experiences with things like Parkinson's disease, clinical depression, and economic failure. The Lamberts' complicated family dynamic is one of the driving forces of the book, and there's a beauty in the way Jonathan Franzen handles opposing sentiments like humor and fury with such balance and grace.
Dream-casting:
Chip: Ryan Gosling
Alfred: Gene Hackman
Enid: Dianne Wiest
Gary: Jason Bateman
Caroline: Judy Greer
4. The Interestings by Meg Wolitzer
There's something so inexplicably wonderful about being a child. Now, what would happen if you carried that sense of feeling special as an adolescent well into adulthood? The Interestings follows a group of teens who meet at an artsy summer camp called Spirit-in-the-Woods in 1974 and become inseparable. By weaving the stories of Jules' camp friends, Meg Wolitzer gives us a wider glimpse of the characters — starting from their teenage years and carrying all the way into middle age. Yet the novel is navigated under the guidance of its protagonist, Jules Jacobson, who struggles to understand if her compulsion to be extraordinary could ultimately lead to happiness.
Dream-casting:
Jules: Zoé De Grand Maison (younger version), Jessica Chastain (older version)
Ash: Lily Collins (younger version), Mädchen Amick (older version)
Goodman: Miles Teller (younger version), Matt Damon (older version)
Cathy: Vanessa Marano (younger version), Paz Vega (older version)
Jonah: Rupert Grint (younger version), Domhnall Gleeson (older version)
Ethan: Nat Wolff (younger version), John Krasinski (older version)
5. As She Climbed Across the Table by Jonathan Lethem
This science fiction book takes places on the fictional campus of a northern California university and is narrated by Philip Engstrand — a professor of anthropology. His girlfriend, Alice Coombs, is a physicist who falls in love with a self-constructed void called Lack. Laced with sharp wit, As She Climbed Across the Table satirizes academia, questions societal values, and comments on the nature of the universe and human. After all, it's not like Philip is losing Alice to another person; he's essentially losing her to nothing. Given the success of movies like Her and Lars and the Real Girl, there's definitely potential for As She Climbed Across the Table to be turned into a successful film.
Dream-casting:
Philip: Edward Norton
Alice: Thandie Newton
6. Just Listen by Sarah Dessen
As a revered young adult author, Sarah Dessen is particularly good at capturing the loneliness and isolation of her adolescent protagonists. Just Listen follows Annabel Greene, who seemingly has it all on a surface level. Despite appearing in a few TV commercials and achieving some mild success as a model, Annabel has no interest in this part of her life. Instead, she feels crippled by the events of a particular night that irrevocably changed her life. Annabel eventually finds herself friendless, but in the midst of her isolation, she meets another loner. Owen is her music-obsessed classmate with a serious anger management problem, yet he is exactly what Annabel needs most in her life: A good listener.
Dream-casting:
Annabel: Dakota Fanning
Owen: Daniel Sharman
7. The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion
Joan Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking is a nonfiction account of what transpired during the year following the death of Didion's husband, John Gregory Dunne. It is a classic story about mourning, but it also incorporates psychological research on illness and grief because, if anything, Didion's known for her reportorial observations. The Year of Magical Thinking is permeated with a sense of insanity and anxiety brought on by grief, but it also offers hope and always ventures to tell an honest narrative.
Dream-casting:
Joan: Blythe Danner
John: Richard Jenkins
Quintana: Kate Winslet
8. Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Jeffrey Eugenides' Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, Middlesex, is a coming-of-age story of an intersex man, Cal Stephanides (born Callie) whose sex characteristics do not fit the typical binary that differentiates male and female bodies. The novel also chronicles three generations of Cal's Greek family to show the effect of the mutated gene and to provide commentary on issues like rebirth and nature vs. nurture. Middlesex also explores other expansive themes such as the pursuit of the American Dream, assimilation, and the formation of gender identity.
Dream-casting:
Cal: Tahar Rahim
Callie: Alia Shawkat
Chapter Eleven: Robert Sheehan
Obscure Object: Ella Purnell
9. Swamplandia! by Karen Russell
13-year-old Ava Bigtree is raised at her family's island home and gator-wrestling theme park called Swamplandia! However, things begin to unravel quickly for the family when Ava's mother, who is also the park's principal headliner, falls ill. Unable to handle the chaos, Ava's father withdraws from the family; her sister falls into a complicated love-haze; and her brother leaves to help the family financially. But Ava doesn't give up on them. Instead, she sets out on a mission to travel through the magical swamps in an effort to save her family. Swamplandia! brings issues regarding disease, environmental disasters and, climate change to the forefront.
Dream-casting:
Ava: Maisie Williams
Kiwi: Thomas Mann
Ossie: Olivia Cooke
Chief Bigtree: Bill Murray
Hilola Bigtree: Sigourney Weaver
Bird Man: Tom Waits
10. Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
When they are young and living in military-ruled Nigeria, Ifemelu and Obinze fall in love and decide to leave for the West. Ifemelu goes to America and despite her academic accomplishments, she learns what it means to be black in the U.S. This shocking realization about race inexorably determines Ifemelu's identity. On the other side, Obinze is forced into leading an undocumented life in London, but the two lovers eventually reunite fifteen years later. Americanah illustrates what it means to belong or not belong in various global landscapes through the eyes of observant and wonderfully-crafted characters.
Dream-casting:
Ifemelu: Lupita Nyong'o or Samira Wiley
Obinze: Michael B. Jordon
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