Should People Read Books Before Seeing the Movie? -- Stanek's Comment

Teshale raises a timeless but ultimately irrelevant question: do I have to read the book first? The answer, she rightly concludes, is absolutely not. Movies are more easily enjoyed when viewed only on a superficial level. Never tell me the book was better; frankly my dear, I don't give a damn shit. I paid eight bucks to catch a flick, not read a book on a screen. Movies are about over-salted, under-buttered, over-priced buckets of popcorn; sticky armrests awkwardly shared with a stranger not gracious enough to leave the obligatory open seat between you; jibber-jabberers that fail to appreciate that “please don't spoil the movie by adding your own soundtrack” does not just mean turn your phone off, it means shut the fuck up(!); obnoxiously distinct laughers who fail to trail off with the rest of the crowd; littering; etc.

You most certainly do not get that experience from the book. And if you do, your reading habits leave serious room for improvement. Besides, if you have to ask the question of whether or not you should read the book, the answer is decidedly no. Suppose the movie can only be appreciated by fans of the book: well, in that case forget it. It does not want or need you, and you do not need to surrender your dignity--by giving in and reading the book--just so you can catch a matinee. And honestly, it's for readers who enjoyed the book, not for posers who might come to like the book someday. Get over yourself. On the other hand, an adaptation that is accessible to everyone is designed for people like yourself. Why insult the moviemaker's hospitality? Reading the book under those circumstances is not prudent, it is positively rude.

Now I started off by saying the question is ultimately irrelevant. Be honest with yourself: broaching the question is merely a formality. You were never the literary type. Sure, you may consider yourself an intellectual (though not a public intellectual, like Teshale) and perhaps you even have a stack of novels you've bought for “when I have the time.” But you do not really want to read the book first. Books are inscrutable; they revel in being unjudgeable based only on their covers. Movies are your friend, mercifully willing to do your thinking for you (unlike those haughty books!). They will tell you whether or not you want to try giving the book a read. If trusting the movie's judgement is wrong, hey you don't wanna be right. Teshale may view this attitude as a cardinal sin but I place it all under the blanket category of “meh.”

Having said all that, I want to end on a note of caution: some of you may have the silly idea that if someone coughed up the money to adapt a book into a movie there must be a reason. Ergo either the movie will be good or—the worst case scenario—the movie will be a bad adaptation of a good book. Unfortunately, there is no guarantee that this rosy scenario will play out in reality. I present one of the finest examples of a crappy book being adapted into one of the worst films ever made: Battlefield Earth. You may be asking yourself why anyone would make this tripe. Well, Vinnie Barbarino is a force of nature and people do crazy things, not just for love but for their crazy cultish sci-fi religions (the late Isaac Hayes—hello, children!—went so far as to hang up his animated chef's hat for it and it was humanity's loss). But they also do it to fraudulently overinflate their budget to scam investors. To each his own (don't worry, the story ended happily: the studio went bankrupt).