Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.
- 128
- 2
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
Philip K. Dick is famous for writing insane stories that are almost completely rewritten into screenplays for great movies: Total Recall, Bladerunner, Minority Report. I haven't watched The Adjustment Bureau and The Man in the High Castle myself, but I've heard they match the pattern.
A Scanner Darkly, on the contrary, was a faithful adaptation and it was boring despite featuring a great ensemble cast.
The Pilot was great but the show wasn't. A grade or more below True Detective or Fargo. Gave it up after 1st season.
More options
Context Copy link
Interesting to see this and the comment by @FtttG disliking A Scanner Darkly. I don't watch much any more so the odds of me rewatching it (or anything) are low, but I remember it had some incisive commentary about drugs and policing. Perhaps that was boring, though.
And by incisive commentary, I mean as someone who works in the criminal justice system, I found all-too-accurate the film's overall depiction of addicts (including them burning away everything about their personality until they're a hollow shell run by drugs), the drug scene, policing (including undercover work and how it all becomes intertwined with/dependent upon the drug scene), and the parasitic "treatment" industry that has attached itself to the legal system.
All of this was in the novel as well, it's just that the movie was... less than the sum of its parts. It had a great story (it's probably the most personal of Dick's works), a stellar cast, it cleverly used CGI, but it just didn't click together.
In contrast, No Country for Old Men (which I also read as a novel first and watched the adaptation later) is a great movie, despite being a similarly generally faithful adaptation.
Well put! I have a real soft spot for the movie, which is to say that I think it was quite well done while I also agree that it doesn't really hang together on the whole. In isolation, I love the actors involved and their performances, I love Linklater's vision, I think the animation brings an incredible level of surrealism to the movie, the script hews closely to the book in the best possible way... and yet. It's hard to connect to Bob/"Fred" as a protagonist. The drug fueled ranting and general chaos and insanity is a little too on the nose; it quickly becomes grating. And as good as the climax is, the resolution just feels superficial to me.
Maybe the script could have been better. Maybe the performances could have been tweaked just enough to make the difference. Probably the animation in particular hurt more than it helped, particularly with the emotional beats. Perhaps a different treatment would have done the trick. Regardless, I don't feel the need or desire to see it again.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Have you read the book? I found that all the points in the film's favour that you mentioned came across more effectively in the book. I really cared about the characters in the book, and didn't care about the characters in the movie.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Agreed, I was so disappointed by the film of A Scanner Darkly, especially in light of how it was my favourite of the Dick novels I've read.
In fairness, both Minority Report and Total Recall were based on his short stories, so a certain amount of Adaptation Expansion was unavoidable. TV Tropes argues that, while Total Recall explores themes that aren't mentioned anywhere in its source material, they are themes that Dick returned to again and again throughout his oeuvre. So Total Recall isn't so much an adaptation of the specific short story on which it was based, as it is an adaptation of Dick's work as a whole.
In contrast, the film version of Minority Report takes the basic premise but drops most of the philosophical complexities around precognition and completely inverts the message: in the short story,the guy who murders someone in order to protect PreCrime is the hero . But for all that, I still preferred the film to the short story.
I remember reading somewhere that Blade Runner was the only adaptation of one of his works that Dick saw in his lifetime (well, a rough cut anyway), and he said he loved it.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link