Based on the novel by...

Yesterday I headed to my local Vue cinema, handed over the increasingly hurtful amount of cash to purchase 2 tickets to see 'The Woman in Black', the movie based on the novel of the same name by Susan Hill, a novel I had only completed the previous day, had thoroughly enjoyed and so was really looking forward to the film.

First up the film, yes I enjoyed it! It's not the greatest film, or indeed the greatest horror I've ever seen, but it carried suspense well, most of the acting was good, especially Radcliffe, and I'd go as far as to say it was a good film. I've sat through, and indeed made the wife sit through, much worse films. To be honest if it was called something else I probably would have enjoyed it a hell of a lot more, but that's best explained in a couple of paragraphs time.

Worth seeing? Definitely! Seek out your local multiplex and go for it! The 12A rating on one hand seemed generous, as it was jumpy, and to someone not as used to these things as myself could have been scary, especially for a 12 year old!

Now here's the bug bare, the only thing about the whole experience that p'd me off...

The adverts said, "Based on the novel by Susan Hill', the title is obviously the same, the titles agreed with the advert on the origin of the story. But after that... I'm not sure what happened. I think the screenwriter (Jane Goldman, or indeed Mrs Jonathan Ross) has done good (co) adaptations in the past with Kick Ass springing to mind in particular. But this time, I'm not sure if she even read the book, to be honest for all the similarities between the book and the film she may as well have lifted the list of characters and the first couple of sentences of the synopsis from wikipedia, it was barely recognisable. Let's have some examples, oh and SPOILER ALERT:

Kipps is widowed with a kid vs he's not married, no kids... yet
The whole Kipps character was changed from a promising up and comer, to a about to get sacked failure (following the widowing I assume) making him a less effective lead.
Where was the funeral, and the reason for introducing the title character?
What's with the kids mass deaths? Why would everyone stay??
The whole 'let's fix everything - ghostbusters' section... no that didn't work.
The endings were very (partially forced by the first point) different, I liked both, but the books was far more effective at getting a reaction from me.
The friendly village where he enjoyed his times was turned into a shithole full of superstitious wankers.

Some bits were kept and the film benefited, e.g. the running outside after the noise and seeing the woman in the window, possibly the iconic scene from the book and seeing the woman in the window. The characterisation of the woman was spot on, although I wasn't expecting almost hand to hand combat... hmmm.

This made me think of other books and the films based on them, bad experiences came to mind, e.g. John Hammond not having a awesome death scene in Jurassic Park so he could be in the (rather good) sequel. Tom Bombadill and the songs (both thankfully) missing from the LOTR films. I Am Legend dropping vampires from the film and murdering the ending (as a result the title not making sense). The examples are endless and listing them is getting tedious already.

There are some good efforts, but as a rule of thumb, books and films don't get on. So why go through the trouble of associating the two, past a bit of publicity... I can't see it. Most of the above films are cracking and   among my favourites (Not I Am Legend) so do they need it?