7 Hollywood Book Adaptations That Deserve A Do-Over

We all say it. Sometimes we suppress it, extinguishing its power, knowing we’d come across as pretentious otherwise; and yet, more often than not, we unleash it onto the world, reputation be damned. Don’t play coy: You know what I’m talking about. It’s that famous phrase popularized by English majors the world over: “The book was better than the movie.”

Yes, many liberal arts majors brandish this line to assert their intellectual superiority at cocktail parties, but they’re often right. The rest of us just have the decency to avoid such clichés in mixed company and whip them out in Thought Catalog listicles instead. So, here are seven instances where … *sips from mocktail and looks meaningfully into the distance* … the book was better. 

The Da Vinci Code

Look, I’m no book snob. I can appreciate the silly, breathless suspense of The Da Vinci Code just as much as I can appreciate the realism and intricacy of Anna Karenina. Dan Brown may not win a Pulitzer anytime soon, but he’s found a winning formula and he can fashion a good yarn. On the other hand, that formula doesn’t necessarily translate well onto the screen. In Brown’s novels, revelations arise organically from long, didactic passages about history. However, in the 2006 adaptation of The Da Vinci Code, that startling sense of intellectual discovery is replaced by scenes of actors yelling pedantically about art history. In movies, unlike in books, every line needs subtext, and there’s no real subtext to Tom Hanks explaining the cultural significance of a paintbrush. This movie is boring, and deserves a remake with snappier dialogue to heighten the stakes.

The House of the Spirits

Speaking of intricate novels, Isabel Allende’s La Casa de los Espíritus (The House of the Spirits) is a breathtaking work of magical realism that boasts some of the most haunting passages in world literature. It’s also an allegory for the dark, complicated history of Chile, and therein lies the problem. When Hollywood decided to adapt this moving and culturally complex work of literature in 1993, they did so with an almost all-white cast. They also handed the film to a Danish writer-director, who unsurprisingly missed the book’s point completely. By isolating the story from its Chilean context, the director sapped it of its unique power and transformed it into a bargain bin Merchant-Ivory trainwreck. The acting was great, though.

The Hobbit

How did Peter Jackson mess this one up? He did so well with Lord of the Rings! Well, money. That’s how. Due to some studio buffoonery, his adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien’s singular Hobbit turned into three films, necessitating an army of invented, superfluous plotlines that amounted to a bloated spectacle in the end. There was fun to be had along the way, but not enough to justify all of those many, many scenes of dwarves singing.

All the King’s Men

This 2006 adaptation had real pedigree in its Pulitzer Prize-winning source material and its all-star cast, but not even Sean Penn and Kate Winslet could breathe life into this stuffy dud. The only reason I saw it was for extra credit – and it did help me get an A in my AP Government class – but I now hate that teacher forever.

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter

This 2012 movie had such potential! Just look at that title. Think of the campy cult icon that this could have been. Instead, this movie was a murky, nonsensical, and overly-serious action-drama that somehow wasn’t directed by Zack Snyder. How can you make a movie about Abraham Lincoln fighting vampires and not make it fun? Go read the book by Seth Grahame-Smith instead – and while you’re at it, read his Pride and Prejudice and Zombies as well (which was also better than its adaptation).

Running with Scissors

Before removing all the spirituality and poignancy from Eat, Pray, Love, director Ryan Murphy did the same with Augusten Burroughs’ 2002 memoir Running with Scissors, warping the remarkable and heartbreaking confessional into a soulless, frustrating shock-com. The only funny part of this 2006 movie was when it smash-cut to a close-up of Gwyneth Paltrow in dreadlocks – but you can look that up on YouTube. 

3 Body Problem

I am among the many Game of Thrones fans who grew frustrated with its creators D.B. Weiss and David Benioff after they sped through the show’s final two seasons, abandoning all nuance and cleverness in the hopes of landing a Star Wars directing gig. That said, I still had high expectations for their 3 Body Problem; after all, they had the completed Remembrance of Earth’s Past series to work from, and thus wouldn’t have to invent their own ending. Unfortunately, they just couldn’t translate The Three-Body Problem’s long, revelatory passages about mathematical formulas into compelling dialogue. Ultimately, 3 Body Problem ended up being one of the most torpid and pretentious series that I have ever fallen asleep to. And it didn’t even win me extra credit.