“Like springs, adaptations can only go downhill.”(John Simon)
A Separate Piece written by John Knowles, tells the story of two boys whose friendship is in constant motion of changing, from best friends to rivals. There are many changes in the movie that show a different experience for the audience. The movie adaptation of A Separate Piece has a less personal engagement between the characters and the audience as well as placing less importance on the events and characters. This creates a less interesting experience compared to the book version. The movie narrates in third-person, hence limiting the characters thoughts and their emotions. It also discards and gives less significance to the events and characters, resulting in the audience not …show more content…
This transforms his feeling of jealousy into hatred which even he is unaware of. Gene narrates, “It wasn’t my neck, but my understanding which was menaced. He had never been jealous of me for a second. Now I knew that there never was and never could have been any rivalry between us. I was not the same quality as he” (Knowles 59). When Gene is on the tree with Finny, his emotions gain control of him and make him jounce the tree on purpose thus causing the accident. The book version expresses Gene’s feelings appropriately, which enables the audience to personally and emotionally understand the character. This also makes the audience understand the event in a better way than the movie. Furthermore, the introduction in the movie version of A Separate Piece is completely different from the book version. In the movie version, Brinker arrests Gene and Finny and presents them to the trial. He hopes to clarify the mystery that is surrounding Finny’s accident. The scene from 1:57 to 3:30 creates a feeling of suspense for the audience. The use of suspense in the movie is good, but it does not reflect on the main character as much as the …show more content…
This makes the story less interesting and is not as appealing to a wider audience. This also makes it harder to understand the events due to the removal of some scenes. For example, the Blitzball game in the movie is given very less significance and the movie does not explain the event effectively like it is in the book version. From 7:54 to 9:00, the Blitzball game is introduced in the movie, where the characters invent a new game. Finny comes up with an idea to call it Blitzball and does not explain why he chooses this particular name. In the book version, it explains why the name relates to the war that is occurring during that time, as one of the characters says: “Let’s make it have something to do with the war” (Knowles 37). The book version sheds light on the naming of the Blitzball unlike the movie where the name is given unexpectedly and with no real meaning. The book also incorporates additional contents for Blitzball. For instance, when Finny explains more rules for the game, “They’ll get their chance. Now if you are refused three times in the course of running from the tower to the river, you go all the way back to tower and start over. Naturally” (Knowles 39) and how the Blitzball becomes famous among the students during the summer: “Blitzball was the surprise of the summer. Everybody played it; I believe
A Separate Piece written by John Knowles, tells the story of two boys whose friendship is in constant motion of changing, from best friends to rivals. There are many changes in the movie that show a different experience for the audience. The movie adaptation of A Separate Piece has a less personal engagement between the characters and the audience as well as placing less importance on the events and characters. This creates a less interesting experience compared to the book version. The movie narrates in third-person, hence limiting the characters thoughts and their emotions. It also discards and gives less significance to the events and characters, resulting in the audience not …show more content…
This transforms his feeling of jealousy into hatred which even he is unaware of. Gene narrates, “It wasn’t my neck, but my understanding which was menaced. He had never been jealous of me for a second. Now I knew that there never was and never could have been any rivalry between us. I was not the same quality as he” (Knowles 59). When Gene is on the tree with Finny, his emotions gain control of him and make him jounce the tree on purpose thus causing the accident. The book version expresses Gene’s feelings appropriately, which enables the audience to personally and emotionally understand the character. This also makes the audience understand the event in a better way than the movie. Furthermore, the introduction in the movie version of A Separate Piece is completely different from the book version. In the movie version, Brinker arrests Gene and Finny and presents them to the trial. He hopes to clarify the mystery that is surrounding Finny’s accident. The scene from 1:57 to 3:30 creates a feeling of suspense for the audience. The use of suspense in the movie is good, but it does not reflect on the main character as much as the …show more content…
This makes the story less interesting and is not as appealing to a wider audience. This also makes it harder to understand the events due to the removal of some scenes. For example, the Blitzball game in the movie is given very less significance and the movie does not explain the event effectively like it is in the book version. From 7:54 to 9:00, the Blitzball game is introduced in the movie, where the characters invent a new game. Finny comes up with an idea to call it Blitzball and does not explain why he chooses this particular name. In the book version, it explains why the name relates to the war that is occurring during that time, as one of the characters says: “Let’s make it have something to do with the war” (Knowles 37). The book version sheds light on the naming of the Blitzball unlike the movie where the name is given unexpectedly and with no real meaning. The book also incorporates additional contents for Blitzball. For instance, when Finny explains more rules for the game, “They’ll get their chance. Now if you are refused three times in the course of running from the tower to the river, you go all the way back to tower and start over. Naturally” (Knowles 39) and how the Blitzball becomes famous among the students during the summer: “Blitzball was the surprise of the summer. Everybody played it; I believe