Dear John; Book vs. Movie

Dear John; Book vs. Movie Author Nicholas Sparks added to his list of best sellers with the novel Dear John. Dear John is a love story, love stories make big money in movie form, so the novels are popular to make into a movie. Books and movies are two forms of entertainment that are closely related and we overlook the differences among them. There are many similarities between the two, but there are also major differences. If one has never read a novel and then watched the movie version of the novel they may not have experienced this comparison and contrast to the the two forms Even though Dear John contains similarieties and differences the message still remains the same.. Love. The first major contrast is that each form has a different author. Nicholas Sparks wrote the novel and Jamie Linden turned the novel into a screenplay which was then directed by Lasse Hallstrom. Sparks has written both the novel and screenplays for some of his other works but turned the screenplay writing over to Jamie Linden for this project. When there is a separate author on the novel and screenplay the initial story is almost certain to be written differently based on the second authors interpretation of the original authors work. In some instances there is a third interpretation with a director of the movie. A lot can go wrong when the original story is interpreted differently by the author that writes the screenplay and a director that then directs. Michael O’ Sullivan of The Washington Post, wrote in a review of the movie, “I think our relationship is in trouble”. O’ Sullivan is trying to get across to the reader of this article that the movie’s story has problems and disappoints him as a viewer. A.O. Scott of the NY Times reports that “Jamie Linden is careful to respect the vague, whispery tones of Mr. Spark’s writing” but “did however, change the books ending in a way that both deepens and blunts its impact”. The author of the book or movie explains themes,

Cited: Sparks, Nicholas Dear John, (First United States Paperback edition: July 2008 [News York; Warner Brothers, October 30, 2006]). Linden, Jamie Dear John, (Director Lasse Hallstron, Distributor Screen Gems/SONY Pictures, Theater February 5, 2010, DVD, May 25, 2010) O 'Sullivan, Michael, The Washington Post, (http://www.washingtonpost.com/gog/movies/dear-john,1158802/critic-review.html) Web