It 's probably the same for most but, when I read a book, I see the movie play out in my mind. Books are a major source for some of the best movies that get made. Adapted successfully, the transition from page to screen has given us some of the most iconic of movie characters. Sherlock Holmes, Hannibal Lecter, Harry Potter, Lisbeth Salander, Bridget Jones, James Bond, Michael Corleone, Jack Ryan - they all began their journeys into our consciousness on the page. However, as we know, the passage from hit bestseller to blockbuster is not always a smooth one. One of my favourite books is Philip Pullman's The Subtle Knife, the middle of his fantasy trilogy His Dark Materials. It was the most emotional and epic of the three novels and would have made an excellent movie. Unfortunately, the failure to adapt its predecessor into a good movie destroyed any chances of a sequel following. Hopefully, one day long in the future, someone will decide to take it forward and do justice to the trilogy.
There are some authors whose work always seems to be suitable for film. Stephen King certainly stands out as probably the most prolific storytellers to have his novels and short stories take to the screen. I'd be leaving out so much to list The Shawshank Redemption, The Shining, Misery, Stand By Me and The Green Mile amongst the movies adapted from the results of his typing. For all of the great adaptations of King's, it should also be pointed out that there are plenty of awful movies to have emerged from his work as well.
John Grisham is another regular on the shelves as well as the multiplexes, his stories generally revolving around the justice system. Since his novel The Firm headed for the big screen with Tom Cruise as it's star in 1993, his novels have continued to make the journey, with his 1997 novel The Partner currently being adapted by a screenwriter.
One of my favourite authors is Michael Crichton, whose passing in 2008 meant we lost one of the most imaginative writers of modern times. His high-concept visions leapt from the page, beginning with The Andromeda Strain in 1971 and leading to such diverse experiences as Jurassic Park, Rising Sun amd Sphere.
Another great writer whose work the movie studios took inspiration from was Philip K Dick, who died in 1982 aged 53. It's because of him that we ended up with Blade Runner, Minority Report, Total Recall and even The Adjustment Bureau as recent as 2011.
But what about the future? Which authors are writing the stories that will sell to the studios? Which established novels are crying out for an adaptation? Which classics are just unfilmable?
I've read a coupe of Jo Nesbø novels recently, The Redbreast and Nemesis. Martin Scorsese has signed on to direct an adaptation of the seventh in the series of his novels featuring hardboiled Oslo detective Harry Hole. There has been a wave of Scandinavian crime on the page as well as on the screen recently with Henning Maskell's Wallander series and Steig Larsson's Millenium Trilogy amongst them, The second of Larsson's trilogy, The Girl Who Played With Fire, will follow on from the success of David Fincher's version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo with Daniel Craig and Rooney Mara reprising their roles.
It's a dream that a novel of mine one day becomes successful enough that it is adapted into a movie.
For now, if you want to visualise the movies of tomorrow today, check out the following novels:
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, The Passage, The Uglies, Fallen, Maximum Ride, Blood Meridian, The Great Gatsby, The Perks of being a Wallflower, Heist Society, The Maze Runner, The Host, Forgotten, The Giver, The Hypnotist, Beautiful Creatures, Ender's Game, Odd Thomas, The Guernsey Literary Potato Peel Society, The Devil in the White City, World War Z, The Dogs of Babel, Alfred Hitchcock and The Making of Psycho, Back Roads, The Alchemist, Another Bullshit Night in Suck City, The Big Biazarro, The Boston Stranglers, Cell, The Creed of Violence, The Dark Tower, Beautiful Disaster, The Wolf of Wall Street, City of Bones
If you know of any more, please let me know...
Wednesday, 8 August 2012
Wednesday, 18 July 2012
Jane Was Here by Sarah KernochanMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
There's a story behind why I ended up reading this book. I was on my annual holiday down in Constantine Bay, Cornwall, back in May this year. I was reading an interview with Clark Gregg in Empire Film magazine. He was featured because his recurring character, S.H.I.E.LD. Agent Phil Coulson, was returning in The Avengers. The article revealed a couple of surprising things about him. As well as learning that he is he married to Jennifer Grey (Dirty Dancing), I discovered that he has had quite a successful screenwriting career as well - The Harrision Ford and Michelle Pheiffer movie What Lies Beneath being referred to specifically as something he co-wrote in the article. Anyway, "what has all of this got to do with anything?" you may ask. The very next day, I noticed that a lady who had begun to follow me on Twitter that day had a profile which described her as an Oscar winning filmmaker, screenwriter and author of paranormal suspense thriller Jane Was Here. My new follower's name was Sarah Kernochan. Intrigued, I searched google to find out if she had done anything I had heard of. Indeed, she had. Her first screenwriting credit had been for the Mickey Rourke and Kim Basinger movie 9 1/2 weeks. She also co-wrote the 1993 Richard Gere and Jodie Foster movie Sommerbsy, but I was amazed to learn that she was credited with co-writing What Lies Beneath. It struck me as an astonishing coincidence, and it just goes to show how small a world it is with so many unlikely connections emerging within such a short space of time. It had only been the day before that I had been surprised at Clark Gregg's involvement in What Lies Beneath and now I had been found by the lady who had passed the draft onto him to take forward (I sent her a message about it at the time and she replied that she had only met him once. She did the draft and he took over when she left to work on another film.) So, it just seemed right that I bought her novel. It was like something from that Kiefer Sutherland TV show, Touch.
It took about a month, but the novel arrived. After reading it, I felt compelled to share my story and what I thought about the novel.
Jane Was Here is a multi-layered story about the arrival of a young woman in a small town affecting the lives of many of its residents. Whilst it has the potential to seem like the author has chosen to fill sections of the novel with pointless plot strands shooting away from the main plot, nothing is unnecessary and everything is ultimately significant. The young woman brings a mystery with her, which imaginatively fuses the past with the present whilst addressing reincarnation, religion and fate. It may be Sarah Kernochan's screenwriting talent that contributes to the vivid way in which this suspenseful tale is told. The reader is compelled by the twists thrown along the puzzling path towards the far-reaching climax. As Past and Present powerfully collide, the author masterfully takes the reader on a breathtaking ride. With a mixture of well-formed characters, this is one recommended read that fate thankfully brought to my door.
View all my reviews
Monday, 16 July 2012
2012 in The Movies - A Truly Great Year So Far
2012 could be the best year we’ve had for
movies in a long time. My initial
opinion was formed by a glance at the blockbuster highlights, but the
supporting offerings are certainly doing their bit to back my conjecture. Coinciding with Paramount Pictures and
Universal Pictures celebrating their 100th anniversaries, it seems
to me that the bar has been raised.
Recent years gone-by had seen the frequency
of my trips to the cinema diminish, but 2012 has brought an abundance of
‘event’ movies demanding to be seen on the big screen. It is rare this year to come across a month
where you cannot find a crowd-pleaser.
Maybe it’s because of how relatively dire last year’s selection was, but
this year’s revival provides probably the most interesting selection since
1999. I’ll remind you, that was the year
of American Beauty, Fight Club, The
Matrix, Magnolia, The Sixth Sense, American Pie, The Blair Witch Project
and Toy Story 2, amongst others.
So far, this year has given us Joe
Carnahan’s The Grey, in January for
instance, with Liam Neeson on stunning form leading a group of stranded oil
workers in a struggle for survival when they are hunted by a pack of wolves in
Alaska. When it was released, Carnahan suggested it be re-released in cinemas later in the year so that Neeson would be eligible for Best Actor at next year’s Oscars. He was last nominated for playing a completely different kind of role as Oskar Schindler in 1993. Since then he’s been a Jedi Knight, Scottish Highlander Rob Roy, Revolutionary Irish Leader Michael Collins, The voice of Aslan in Narnia, One-Man-Army in Taken, Batman’s nemesis Ra’s Al Ghul and a God in Clash of The Titans, in which he played Zeus, brother to Ralph Fiennes’ Hades
With Voldermort behind him, Ralph Fiennes,
in his directorial debut, brought political relevance in a vivid and
intelligent adaptation of Shakespeare’s Coriolanus. Meanwhile, Daniel Radcliffe left his
spectacles behind and played the grieving widow in the spine-chilling Woman in Black, showing there’s a
promising career still ahead.
Then there’s been The Hunger Games, which turned out to be an essential modern
science-fiction action-adventure blockbuster satirising modern principles in a
dystopian-future setting. It was as
accessible to the teen audience, which the novel upon which it was adapted from
was aimed, as much as the mature.
2012 has not been without its glitches
however. Disney lost around $200million
with John Carter. It was not the big-screen E.R. spin-off for
Noah Wyle’s character from the Chicago-based hospital drama after all, but a
fantasy-romance adventure of an American Civil War soldier transported to
Mars. Fortunately for Disney, The Avengers subsequently assembled and
are still breaking box-office records worldwide.
Nobody can deny how much of a box-office
draw Will ‘Mr Summertime’ Smith is, yet he’s had a four-year hiatus since his
arguably underwhelming drama Seven
Pounds. He’s back and, despite it’s
relatively luke-warm reviews, Men in
Black 3 is pulled the audiences in, ten years after the sequel that nobody
thought would lead to another.
Men in Black 3 opened in a month when the
Cannes Film Festival showcased more filmmakers adding to their respectable
pedigree, opening with Wes Anderson’s Moonrise
Kingdom. Similar to previous
Anderson movies, Moonrise Kingdom boasts an encouragingly bold and eclectic
cast, with Bill Murray returning for a sixth collaboration following Rushmore, The Royal Tenenbaums, The
Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, The
Darjeeling Limited and The Fantastic
Mr Fox. Joining him are Bruce
Willis, Edward Norton, Tilda Swinton, Harvey Keitel, Frances McDormand and
other Anderson alumna Jason Schwartzman.
The end of the year will
see the conclusion to the Twilight Saga
when Breaking Dawn Part Two
hits. In the meantime, its two stars
presented their latest work at the festival.
Robert Pattinson stars in Cosmopolis,
directed by David Cronenberg. He plays a
28-year-old billionaire assets manager travelling across Manhattan in a stretch
limo on his way to getting a haircut.
However, this being Cronenberg territory, his day deteriorates into a
chaotic journey as various characters rip his life apart. It’s the first Cronenberg movie in ten years
that hasn’t starred Viggo Mortensen.
However Mortensen and Cronenberg’s partnership could increasingly be
likened to De-Niro and Scorcese, Burton and Depp, or Almodavar and
Banderas. Whilst in London promoting A Dangerous Method in February,
Mortensen popped into Empire Magazine’s office to participate in a
webchat. My wife is a huge fan of his
and, since she was conveniently off-work that day, she decided to ask him if
there was any news on a sequel to 2007’s Eastern
Promises. Astonishingly, he replied
and she was on cloud nine for the rest of the week. Schedules permitting, Eastern Promises Part
Two may be on the way. He said, “I wouldn't say it's
a definite, but it's looking more possible that that may be our next job
together. But you never know with David, because he always has several projects
in the works, hoping that one of them will come to pass.” Meanwhile, Mortensen played Old Bull
Lee alongside Twilight’s other star, Kristen Stewart, in an adaptation of Jack
Kerouac’s celebrated novel On The Road.
Ridley Scott's Prometheus kicked off the summer in style. I’d say it's one of the grandest films released so far this year. Whilst it received a mixed response from cinemagoers, I thought it was an outstanding piece of modern cinema. Many were expecting another ‘Alien’ film in the vein of the Sigourney Weaver series, but this is truly an original story, distancing itself from the xenomorphs (the alien monsters from the Weaver movies) and delving into a mysterious adventure controversially addressing evolutionary theory and spiritual beliefs. It is not the horror film that many may have been expecting, but it still has moments of suspense and scenes to make you squirm. When I came out of the cinema, I was quick to point out certain inconsistencies with 1979’s Alien. In Alien, Tom Skerritt, John Hurt and Veronica Cartwright discovered the bodily remains of what became referred to as the ‘Space Jockey’ in a derelict spaceship. Prometheus is set thirty-odd years prior and involves a team of scientific explorers finding a derelict spaceship identical to that which will later be found by the crew of Alien’s Nostromo. However, it would not be a spoiler to reveal that these two ships cannot be the same one after all. Excuse my geekiness for a moment, but the planet in Alien is called LV426, whereas the planet in Prometheus is called LV223. It’s not essential to the plot and far from obvious to the viewer – it’s just an example of how the movie has been written. The writer, Damon Lindelof, was one of the showrunners on hit TV show LOST, so the use of vague and mysterious mythology scattered throughout should come as no surprise.
Another much-loved and respected franchise
returning this summer is the Bourne series, which made an action star out of
Matt Damon. The fact that he does not
feature in the latest instalment, The
Bourne Legacy, may concern fans of the previous trilogy. However, trailers centring on another CIA
operative, Aaron Cross (Jeremy Renner), suggest that his character would give
Jason Bourne more than a run for his money.
It boasts a stellar cast, with Edward Norton and Rachel Weisz joining
returning contributors Joan Allen, Albert Finney, David Straitharn, Scott Glenn
and Paddy Considine (one of whom was shot dead in The Bourne Ultimatum, suggesting events are tightly interwoven with
those previously witnessed). Renner’s
star-power is on the rise after last year’s Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol suggested he could front the
series moving forward sans Tom
Cruise. He played ace-archer Hawkeye in
this year’s The Avengers, but his
breakthrough performance came in 2008’s The
Hurt Locker, directed by Kathryn Bigelow - winner of most of the Directing
awards that year with the movie subsequently winning Best Picture. So far, the movie she will be releasing later
this year is still untitled, yet I can tell you that it stays in Middle-Eastern
territory with a thriller focussing on Navy Seals tracking down Osama Bin
Laden.
Friday, 8 June 2012
Versatile Blogger Award!
I received the Versatile Blogger Award (VBA) from blogger, Kate from Kate's Reads
Click here to see her post.
Kate has provided an explanation as to what it is all about:
What is it?As far as I can tell — details are rather sketchy and only
the creator knows for sure — this
lofty-sounding award is basically a mutual admiration society where bloggers recognize
their peers for writing quality blogs that touched them in some way. The VBAs
honor the blogger rather than specific posts. It’s a chance for bloggers to pat
themselves on the back like the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences does with the Oscars. Until someone
starts giving out Blogscars, the VBAs will have to
suffice.
What are the criteria?
If you are nominated, you’ve been awarded the Versatile Blogger Award. I nominated 15 outstanding bloggers below. Congratulations!
Thank the person who gave you this award. That’s common courtesy.
Thank you, Kate, I'm very grateful for your recognition.
Include a link to their blog. That’s also common courtesy — if you can figure out how to do it.
What are the criteria?
If you are nominated, you’ve been awarded the Versatile Blogger Award. I nominated 15 outstanding bloggers below. Congratulations!
Thank the person who gave you this award. That’s common courtesy.
Thank you, Kate, I'm very grateful for your recognition.
Include a link to their blog. That’s also common courtesy — if you can figure out how to do it.
This is a link to Kate's BLOG: http://kates-reads.blogspot.co.uk/
Next, select 15 blogs/bloggers that you’ve recently discovered or follow regularly. (I would add, pick blogs or bloggers that are excellent!)
The envelope, please…
Nominate those 15 bloggers for the Versatile Blogger Award — you might include a link to this site.
And my nominees/winners are (in no particular order):
1. Morgen Bailey's Writing Blog by Morgen Bailey
1. Morgen Bailey's Writing Blog by Morgen Bailey
2. My Name is Sarah by Sarah Elle Emm
3. All For Writing by Desiree
4. Blaire Kensley by Blaire Kensley
5. Dangling on The Edge of (In)Sanity by Renee Miller
6. The Adventures of Caitlin in Wonderland by Caitlin Darrell
7. The Writing Bomb by Jeff Bennington
8. Writer Girl by Megan Cooley
9. Jarrett Writes by Jarrett Rush
10. Reading and Writing are Fattening by Marla A Madison
11. Do You Write Under Your Own Name by Martin Edwards
12. The Daring Novelist by Camile Laguire
13. Rebecca Burgess Taylor by Rebecca Burgess Taylor
14. The Tainted Archive by Gary Martin Dobbs
15. The Vandal by Derek Haines
Well done everyone.
Finally, tell the person who nominated you 7 things about yourself. Here we go...
1. LOST was, and always will be, my favourite TV show.
2. I work full-time as a Mortgage Adviser.
3. I'm a good cook, even if I do say so myself. I can't understand how someone could say they can't cook. I belive that, as long as someone follows the recipe, anyone can do anything.
4. I drive a Blue Motion VW Golf.
5. I got married in Mauritius in 2005.
6. At time of writing, my wife has torn her achilles, which has bled and then bone has calcified around it. So, today she went to the fracture clinic and is now wearing a bulky boot to take the pressure off when she walks. It's going to take a long time to heal, if ever, so it's going to mean a lot of changes. No driving for her, more responsibilities for me.
7. I was on TV quite a lot because of the following clip. Check out the 1 minute 16 seconds mark, and that's me. It was used on a lot of news reports, tv sports shows, etc, all over the world. It was the end of the first game of Wales' Grand-Slam-Winning 2005 Six Nations campaign. It was quite burst of adrenaline and I had a thumping headache from all of the excitement about 30 minutes later.
There you go
Thursday, 31 May 2012
FIRST BOOK TRAILER
Searching for another method of promotion, I came across the notion of posting a book trailer. The thought of it seemed daunting in that it was going to take a lot of time and effort to create it. Yet, as I've found since deciding to self-publish, nothing is ever as difficult as you anticipate it's going to be. It took me just a few hours and I have to credit my accomplishment to the extremely useful instructions provided by Kingdom ElectLady here. I'll have to get cracking on a book trailer for Barren Endeavour next, but, for now, here is my trailer for The Ellroy Deflection...
Thursday, 10 May 2012
Word count widget
I've started using a new widget for updating the word count of my current novel. If you're interested in using it for your blog, click here. I'm using the Writertopia meter, a cartoon that lets you show your current mood as well as the word count. As your word count increases, the stack of pages in the graphic rises.
I'm using it on my UPCOMING PROJECTS page and it's very easy to use. I've set a provisional target of 80,000 - but, who knows? My stories tend to take on a life of their own and it may finish before or after that target.
It's turning into a murder mystery at the moment, but it did not begin that way. It's set in Birmingham, England, which is where I live. Writing what you know is, of course, a lot easier - but I find that one of the most initially rewarding aspects to writing has been the research into areas upon which my writing needs to be more informed. For example, my second novel, Barren Endeavour, was set in 1930's USA. Researching the history and events of the time gave me an enormous sense of satisfaction and, for a time, I was obsessed with knowing more about The Great Depression as much as I was the writing of my novel set during that time.
My current novel started off as a relatively straight-forward story about four couples, their relationships, adultery, secrets and lies. It has now changed direction and it means that the writing is going to becoming more challenging than it has been thus far. The strands are sprawling in many directions and I'm going to have to retain control along the way.
I'm using it on my UPCOMING PROJECTS page and it's very easy to use. I've set a provisional target of 80,000 - but, who knows? My stories tend to take on a life of their own and it may finish before or after that target.
It's turning into a murder mystery at the moment, but it did not begin that way. It's set in Birmingham, England, which is where I live. Writing what you know is, of course, a lot easier - but I find that one of the most initially rewarding aspects to writing has been the research into areas upon which my writing needs to be more informed. For example, my second novel, Barren Endeavour, was set in 1930's USA. Researching the history and events of the time gave me an enormous sense of satisfaction and, for a time, I was obsessed with knowing more about The Great Depression as much as I was the writing of my novel set during that time.
My current novel started off as a relatively straight-forward story about four couples, their relationships, adultery, secrets and lies. It has now changed direction and it means that the writing is going to becoming more challenging than it has been thus far. The strands are sprawling in many directions and I'm going to have to retain control along the way.
Wednesday, 25 April 2012
Short Book Review: Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins
Catching Fire by Suzanne CollinsMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
View all my reviews This is your classic 'middle' of a trilogy. Takes longer to get to the action than the first book, but when it does it effectively 'repeats' the most successful elements that have come before. Still being just as addictive as the Hunger Games was, and just as easy to read, means that you fly through it, ready to immediately pick up the final book after the cliffhanger. Once again, it's vividly thrilling and compulsive reading.
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