My opinionabout why movie screenwriters always change the book before it becomes a movie:

Admit it, you’ve had it happen before. You’ve seen the previews for a totally awesome movie based on one of your favourite books of all time. You can’t wait to see how movie directors/producers bring your favourite characters to life. You’re practically dying to see how the scenery comes to life (in the case of great fantasy books, anyways).

So you fork over 10 bucks, which is practically your entire allowance, to see the movie in your local theatre on it’s opening day. Plus add an extra 3 dollars to get popcorn, more if you’re getting pop. You’re so excited; you can hardly keep your pants on, if you know what I mean.

You see it, spend about 2 hours in a cold theatre, and you completely do not enjoy yourself. The movie was nothing like the book. Everything was completely changed. Even some of the names of characters! The plot line was completely different.

And you ask yourself, why on Earth is it not like the book? Why couldn’t movie screenwriters just follow the plot line? Why did they have to change it so much?

Is it a matter of convenience? Time? Money? I am not completely sure.

Not saying that any movie based off of the book is completely off. Take a look at Lord of the Rings for instance. But even then, there were a few minute changes. Arwen wasn’t nearly as important in the books as she was portrayed in the movie. Harry Potter is another example. The first two barely went off the original story, but the third had some major changes done to it that were not needed.

In some ways, doing a movie based off of the book helps boost that book’s popularity. Most people had never even heard of the book “The Princess Diaries” before the movie came out. But again, that was another example of movie screenwriters going aloof. For those of you who don’t know, the grandmother in “The Princess Diaries” was a total beeyotch in the book with tattooed on eyeliner. And if you read the book, you can figure out many more examples of how the book differed to the movie.

It’s a tragedy sweeping our nation, and yet we are powerless to stop it. The only thing that we can do is try not to be expecting too much of a movie based off of a book. Expect changes, and perhaps we shall survive this terrible plague and sickness.

So all I can say is, damn Hollywood! There are too many good books, and not enough good movies.