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How faithful to the original written work should a film version strive to be?
Fidelity Criticism is the name given to critique of a film adaptation which is based on a novel. The fidelity issue probably stems from the fact that the novel came first. However fidelity criticism implies that there is a single, correct meaning which the filmmaker either adhered to or violated or changed. This correct essence however is difficult to interpret as literary critics vary in their views. The hope that the Filmmaker's view will coincide with that of his viewers is therefore near to impossible.
In Reading the Movies, Costanzo quotes George Bluestone, one of the first to study film adaptations of literature. Bluestone believes the filmmaker is an independent artist, "not a translator for an established author, but a new author in his own right." Thinkers like Bluestone agree that a literal translation of a book is often foolish - even, some have said, a "betrayal" of the original work. Instead, the filmmaker has to refashion the spirit of the story with his or her own vision and tools.
Geoffrey Wagner in 'The Novel and the Cinema' (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press: Rutherford, NJ, 1975, suggests three possible categories which are open to the film-maker and to the critic assessing his adaptation: he calls these
Transposition, 'in which a novel is given directly on the screen with a minimum of apparent interference'
Commentary, 'where an original is taken and either purposely or inadvertently altered in some respect . . . when there has been a different intention on the part of the film-maker, rather than infidelity or outright violation'
Analogy, which must represent a fairly considerable departure for the sake of making another work of art'.
Below are some renditions of Shakespere's Macbeth which critics believe illustrate such criteria.
Akira Kurosawa turned Shakespeare's Scottish clan tension ridden Macbeth to Medieval Japan's Samurai feuds in Throne of Blood. His use of the Noh theatre was a courageous interpretation of the play, with static mask like faces with grotesque expressions, the walking forest scene, the porcupine arrow studded Macbeth facing his tragic end, the decor, the fog….. The list is endless. The film an acclaimed success. Kurosawa's portrayal of the witches is also in line with the horror Noh tradition and turns the role into a forest soothsayer forever spinning the wheel around the spider web castle. Compare Akira Kurosawa's 'witches' in Throne of Blood with those of Orson Welles and Roman Polanski's below.
Lean's 'Great Expectations' sees Pip as the culprit behind the burning of Miss Havisham’s House to illustrate the idea of the over reaching Prometheus bound to catastrophe, which enhances the Greek Tragedy aura that pervades the Icarus like Pip throughout Charles Dickens' novel.
How important is the original author for the work?
We have back full circle to the original author and his novel. It seems that a director is justified with giving his interpretation to the book, for a variety of reasons and arguments discussed throughout these pages. After all from a legal standpoint an author owns the rights to the work.
When A Clockwork Orange came out in 1971, the author of the book, Anthony Burgess did not like it saying it glorified sex and violence. He slammed director Stanley Kubrick as preying on youth culture’s obsession with ultra violence without judgement. Burgess is adamant that there is judgement in the book – there is a comment about a criminal who will always be a criminal – about rehabilitation being a sham – about authorities being criminal – the fact that society on the whole is responsible for the violence that happens within it. Unfortunately Burgess had given away the rights in his wish for the book to be filmed. However he felt that he had been cheated. Kubrick had never consulted Burgess as he believed that the writer knew nothing about film. The film was a great success and together with the book has become an all time classic.
Other directors did not get off with such action that easily. One of the first film adaptations of Stoker's story Dracula caused Stoker's estate to sue for copyright infringement. In 1922, silent film director F. W. Murnau made a horror film called Nosferatu: eine Symphonie des Grauens ("Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror"), which screened the story of Dracula and set it in Transylvania and Germany. In the story, Dracula's role was changed to that of Count Orlok, played by Max Schreck. The Stoker estate won its lawsuit, and all existing prints of Nosferatu were ordered destroyed. However, a number of pirated copies of the movie survived to the present era, where they entered the public domain. Eventually the Stoker family agreed to Tod Browning's rendition of the story and although the director's screenwriters carefully studied the Nosferatu silent film when drawing up the screenplay. Tod Browning's Dracula was released in 1931 and was an instant success.
The Burgess - Kubrick case is a complicated affair as Burgess had given up his rights and in spite of everything the film was a success and ironically both Kubrick and Burgess profited from this success, the former in financial gain, the latter in prestige and fame. The Dracula case is one of law infringement. It is obvious that the authorship of a written book or novel is supreme, but a published book is out in the public domain, out for criticism and interpretation by third parties. This is subject to the regulations of authorship and plagiarism. I also believe that Kubrick could have consulted Burgess, in other words he could have given the author greater credit and the respect he deserved, after all he was the author and it is not everyday that a director can consult the original author.
Other Justifications In Defence of the Director
Sometimes filmmakers make changes to highlight new themes, emphasize different traits in a character, or even try to solve problems they perceive in the original work.
"Breakfast at Tiffany's" (1961) needed a Hollywood ending to the novella. The male character in the story is gay, and Holly Golightly disappears at the end and never returns which is not a particularly happy ending. It would have been a very different film, and perhaps not the classic it is today if the directors had stuck to the plot. One wonders whether the author Truman Capote was happy with director Blake Edwards turning his gay protagonist into a straight guy to fulfill the needs of the romantic comedy genre.
One must also take a closer look between differences in both the medium and audience involved. Charles Dickens wrote his novels in weekly or monthly installments, Shakespeare produced his plays with his audience in mind, Herman Melville gave his readers a lot of information about whales, at the time a nearly mythical creature which most of his readers had never and would never see. The film is a different medium geared towards a different audience and the end result must achieve this aim. It is obvious therefore that a film's content will veer away from the book content and that it's relevance depends on such maneuvering.
These changes are inspired by a desire to make the original story interesting and applicable to a contemporary audience. Francis Ford Coppola's 1979 Apocalypse Now features Willard as an assassin dispatched to kill Kurtz. This strays far away from Joseph Conrad's book 'Heart of Darkness,' on which it is based. The setting is moved away from the original Congo Free State and the problems of colonialism to the Vietnam War, a war very close to American hearts. Critics however agree that nevertheless, the depiction of Kurtz as a god-like leader of a tribe of natives and his malarial fever, Kurtz's written exclamation "Exterminate the brutes!" (which appears in the film as "Drop the bomb. Exterminate them All!") and his last words "The horror! The horror!" are taken from Conrad's novella. (Check this on Wikipedia.) Other episodes adapted by Coppola, the Playboy Playmates' (Sirens) exit, the lost souls, "taking me home" attempting to reach the boat and Kurtz's tribe of (white-faced) natives parting the canoes (gates of Hell) for Willard, (with Chef and Lance) to enter the camp are likened to Virgil and "The Inferno" (Divine Comedy) by Dante. While Coppola replaced European colonialism with American interventionism, the message of Conrad's book is still clear.
Last but not least different adaptations of the same book give a plural outlook on the book and serve as a rich clash of perspectives, almost like a literary debate. Furthermore it will make use of actors popular at that point in time, changes the face and appearance of a James Bond, to keep up with the times, applies newer technology, new trends in the cinema world and its appeal to the ever changing demands of its audience. Check out these different versions of Charles Dicken's 'Great Expectations. David Lean's much applauded 1946 adaptation, Mike Newell's 2012 and Alfonso Cauron's 1998 versions below.
In the end all it boils down to is which Estella would be appealing to the Pips in today's audience?
The attractiveness of film depends on the attractiveness of the visuals, actors, action, sound, effects used apart from the plot and storyline. The complexity of so many factors at play within a film alienates it from the complexities of the factors at play in a novel. Both mediums are within our reach and both contribute to the rich spheres of knowledge that are man's inheritance and fluttering flag in the face of the odds in our insignificant existence in the cosmos.
Continued in Part 4
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