Not So Great Adaptations

We've been reading about a number of adaptations of A Christmas Carol, have seen one and now read one. Are the ones we are reading great? I think they're pretty good. And their stand-alone merit gives us a lot to talk about in terms of the idea of adaptation and fidelity.

But I always find it extremely entertaining to examine terrible adaptations and think about what made them come into existence. For instance, the newest Romeo and Juliet with Douglas Booth is pretty bad, but my students loved to hate it (and some of them just loved it––Paul Giamatti as Friar Laurence "was throwin' more shade than a gazebo" according to one student). 

Brown talks about directors who long for "pageantry and place setting and hoopskirts" (85). Why? How does our nostalgia for a fabricated past manifest itself today? I want to look at some not great adaptations, just briefly enough to entertain myself and question their origins.

So what not-so-great adaptations have you seen? What are your thoughts on them?

Last night, I watched a snippet of the Kelsey Grammer Christmas Carol. I couldn't have said it better myself, TheSoulMan8 (or is it TheSoleMan8?!):

TheSoulMan8

6 months ago

wow, this film is awful, but in a very enjoyable sort of way

Dickens Forever

Evelyn Waugh's 1934 novel A Handful of Dust follows "civilized man" Tony Last deep into the Amazon jungle, where he falls ill, loses his guide, and is "saved" by Mr Todd, an illiterate man with a deep and abiding passion for Dickens. In this clip, from the 1988 film, Tony Last (played by James Wilby) comes to understand his new position in Mr Todd's (Alec Guiness) world.