Freaks and The Fly

David Cronenberg’s The Fly is an appropriation of an adaptation. Where the original adaptation of The Fly follows the short story of the same name, Cronenberg uses to send a very different message.

Cronenberg portrays the side effect of the transporter accident as a gradual end for our hero. The fly aspects become a metaphor for disease, and so does the entire movie. It becomes more about testing the love between Veronica and Brundle, rather than about correcting the mistake itself.

I’ve always liked the dream sequence for Veronica, and how it’s never really resolved (well, till the piece of shit sequel). Rather than being used as a shock ending, it becomes more like a terrifying inevitability, and I think that sets the tone for what kind of movie it is.

The important thing to remember is that as this disease slowly mutates our charming, witty protagonist, it is against his will. Rather than being a Godfather type story where the main character is paying for his sins, Brundle is portrayed as a good person that something bad happened to, just like real life. How’s that for a concept?

Tod Browning’s Freaks is an appropriation, but also an adaptation. See the difference? Fly = Appropriation of an adaptation, Freaks = Adaptation that appropriates.

Anyway,now that we’ve got that out of our system, let’s look at what it appropriates.

It’s interesting that the message of the movie is that the “normal” people in the movie are cruel, and the Freaks are not, but at the same time the Freaks are exploited by the director just by being in the movie. In the end they are also the entire reason the movie is classified as “horror.”

In “Spurs,” the story it was based off of, the main character is still a midget marrying a normal looking person, but that’s about all that remains.

I like that this movie definitely implicates the audience, but it also implicates itself. By having a name like “Freaks,”  and featuring actual deformed people playing the roles, it feels cruel, but we are dealing with a movie about the cruelty and ugliness within, so maybe that just makes the story more compelling.

A Face In The Crowd

When I discussed Ghost World, I mentioned the advantages of having the writer of the source text write the script. This is another example of that working out excellently.

A Face in the Crowd was Andy Griffith’s big break, and it’s easy to see why. Griffith shows more emotion and range in this role than in the entire rest of his career, and it’s hard to see why he wasn’t used that way more often.

When Budd Schulberg set about adapting this picture, he made two big interesting changes from the story. Lonesome does not die in the movie like he does in the story, and he conquers television in the movie as opposed to radio in the story. This might be because of the visual aspect of the story, but it also might be because of television’s increasing influence in the 1950s. Though the story was published just four years before the film, television’s role was significantly altered between that time.

Marcia’s character was similar to her character in the movie, but dialed down. This makes her actions in the final scene that much more shocking. You almost forget how capable she is as a character.

The decision to let Lonesome live with his sins is a lot more cynical, despite the fact that he doesn’t die. It’s implied that his career won’t even take a big hit, and I think that shows real forethought from the writer and director.

I thought the movie was better than the story in just about every way, but it helps that the cinematography was great. I wish they’d given Griffith more roles like this in his career.

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is an interesting, and somewhat meta-fictional, adaptation of the book. As a movie, it works great, but as a memoir, it strays from the source text quite a bit.

But I didn’t really mind that, because I really don’t give a shit how people remember Jean-Dominique Bauby.

So let’s talk about the film.

It was interesting how we don’t see Bauby until he sees himself in the mirror. Before that the camerawork was really creative. The lens on a camera is designed to work like an eyeball, and that’s exactly what it becomes. Not only are we doing the usual panning, but instead of cuts for blinks, we’ve got actual “blinks,” and tears welling up on the lens. This was a unique decision, and really added to the visuals of the movie.

And that’s the coolest part. A movie about a disabled guy lying in his hospital bed has some incredibly beautiful scenery and cinematography.When Bauby talks about living in his imagination, we get to visit it with him.

The juxtaposition of that with all the shots of him laying helplessly while life happens around him perfectly capture the title of the book. The diving bell represents Bauby’s body and the butterfly represents his spirit, and we get to see plenty of both.

And no matter how inaccurate, I like his relationship with the women, and how he is portrayed as being colder to the ones that show the most care and affection to him, and drawn to the woman who won’t come visit him, or to the speech therapist who talks to him like he’s a small child.

I didn’t have trouble telling the women apart like most of the class seemed to, but I do feel like if they were going to take that many liberties with the source text, they could have at least combined a few of those characters for a better story flow. It was strange constantly being introduced to new characters and then to just accept them as a large part of the story.

The idea that his girlfriend actually was there everyday might have taken away from the feeling of isolation that the movie conveys, and I can’t help but wonder how much the movie would have been changed had it been accurate. In this case it feels like it would have changed quite a bit, and so in that sense perhaps it fails as an adaptation in capturing the essence of the original work, but it’s a pretty compelling story none-the-less.

The Night of the Iguana

The Night of the Iguana was an interesting adaptation because the source material was larger and more expansive than the movie. Drive was a similar situation, but because of the structure the film was able to add things in. Here we are looking at an example of the opposite, where the writer and director were tasked with stripping the story away to what is necessary to it without compromising the original vision.

While some might argue that the film removes everything interesting or risque (the Nazis, Shannon’s more ambiguous moments, etc.), I see it as a confidence in the heart of the story. But I also don’t see this as an “improvement,” or a trimming of the fluff, rather both are equally appropriate for their mediums.

The fantastic is more acceptable in plays, and because there is a lack of camera angles, etc., more has to happen. Film on the other hand relies heavily on pacing, which is completely different for a play, and having too much going on is distracting from the plot.

We are left with the essentials, which is that while Shannon can do what is necessary to free the iguana, has cannot do the same for himself.

The character is equally stubborn in both the play and the film, but his morality is much more ambiguous in the play. But what I think is interesting about the film version is that it chooses to focus on his stubborn qualities, which is ultimately his downfall.

Shannon feels he has to make the best of a bad situation, rather than creating his own situation and living in it. Hannah is the same, but ultimately when her rope is cut she chooses to run for freedom like the iguana, while Shannon chooses to live in unhappiness.

So the message comes across pretty loud and clear in both, and that comes from knowing the heart of your source text. The other decisions are important, but ultimately minor to the message, and more essential to ensuring that the audience is interested long enough to get that message. And that’s how mediums work, and connect, and compliment each other. Now if only more writer/directors could see that.