Books that should be adapted into movies - Page 2

I like Stamp, but he seems too refined for that character. He can be ruthless, but he always appears polished to me.

I know it's not in EVERYBODY DIES, but I keep coming back to the scene in A DANCE AT THE SLAUGHTERHOUSE where things go bad and Scudder and Ballou wind up covered in blood. The others that have been mentioned, Connery, Gleeson, Rourke, even Byrne and Crowe, all have that uncaged animal quality about him that I think is essential for the Ballou character.

Also, this thread made me pick up the novel "Eight Million Ways To Die." Great stuff.

Dragonlance could work if it was the "Twins" books they based it on. Although pretted huge in scope its acutally quite a tight little tale about an uhealthy familey realtionship.

Terry Gilliam was interview by Jonathan Ross recently and he mentioned he has been trying to get Good Omens to the screen. He had Jonny Depp and Gary Olman locked into play the main roles but the funding fell apart.

I'd dig a film version of Joe R. Lansdale's MUCHO MOJO, which has Texas slacker buddies Hap Collins (straight, white) and Leonard Pine (gay, black) investigating murder and malfeasance when they discover a child's body buried underneath the house Leonard has inherited from his late uncle.

And I think it'd be the best way to reunite the top-notch WHITE MEN CAN'T JUMP team of Wesley Snipes, Woody Harrelson and Ron Shelton.

Another dream adaptation: Guillermo Del Toro's film version of Mark Frost's THE LIST OF SEVEN, with Ewan McGregor as Doctor Arthur Conan Doyle and PRIDE & PREJUDICE'S Matthew MacFadyen as Special Agent Jack Sparks.

And I know it's already been made once, but Michael Winterbottom's take on Martin Amis's THE RACHEL PAPERS, with Charlie Hunnam as Charles Highway and Keira Knightley as Rachel Noyce, would be a treat.

American Tabloid

That's a book crying out for a film. Coincidentally, I had thought that Clooney would have been a great Kemper Boyd (2nd choice, Jeff Goldblum), for the other roles- Bill Murray for Ward Littel, Bruce Willis for Bondurant (my 2nd choice, Madsen, was the other poster's first, they both are phsically perfect for it, but I think Willis is a better actor). Hoskins is an obvious choice for Hoover, especially after he played him in Nixon and I'd like Ian McKellen to play the aging Howard Hughes.

Hmm....should I say my choice? I've been wanting to write a script based on this story/book for awhile. Anyway...

Book: The Santa Claus Bank Robbery

Synopsis: This is a true story that happened in Cisco, TX in 1927. The jacket of the book goes on to say...

"Once upon a time (just before Christmas in 1927), Santa Claus and three helpers set out to rob a bank. They didn't intend to harm a hair of anyone's head. In fact, they were so pleased with the ingenuity of their plan (it wouldn't take longer than cashing a check) that they laughed and sang hymns all the way to the bank.

Well...I'll just write what the whole jacket says, here's the rest.

But the laughter turns to violence and tragedy as A.C. Greene re-creates one of America's most bizarre bank hold-ups--the famous Santa Claus Bank Robbery in Cisco, Texas, that took the lives of seven men. He tells of the four hapless blunderers, three of them ex-cons, who thought no one would really object to their bank heist "because the bank didn't really own the money"; how one of them wore a Santa Claus costume as a disguise-but didn't expect the children of Cisco to follow him into the bank because of it-how the comedy of errors and miscalculations (they actually forgot to get gasoline for the getaway car) inexorably turned into bloody disaster; and how, after a widespread manhunt, one of the robbers died of gunshot wounds, one in the electric chair, and one, Santa himself, at the hands of a lynch mob. The one who survived is still alive in Texas today, as is this violent and ironic tale of the naive frontier mind encountering the beginning of the end of the Old West.


Now...who doesn't that that would make a really great dark, dark comedy? I can already see the people hanging Santa Claus on some huge oak tree. It's so perverse, and it all happened.

Liotta's a good choice for Durkin, although I'd almost go with someone a little thinner. For some reason, that guy makes me think "paper-pusher," mainly because he's almost always behind a desk when we read him.

Tony Todd has yet to prove he has any acting ablity whatsoever. I stand by my original pick of Jeffery Wright.

And I finally figured out who should play Scudder:

Dennis Quaid.

Coming back to my idea for a "Lords of Discipline" adaptation, Alec Baldwin would be a great Commandant of the Corps. A little young, but he's up there.

Also, how about Bebe Newirth for Elaine. I've also come around on Michelle Pfeiffer, maybe because I just have a hard time seeing her with black hair. But Newirth could be interesting as well.

I'd see that immortal Amos & Andrew combo, Nicholas Cage and Samuel L. Jackson, re-team as Hap and Leonard. Lansdale has said he'd like Coscarelli direct it, so who am I to argue?

Quaid's done the athlete thing on screen before. I always thought he played football in college. Anyway, I believe him as that kind of tough guy.

Right on! I reckon in a few years, the memory of that abortion will have subsided and someone can do justice to a great story. There are things I like about Troy, but ultimately they screwed the pooch big time. Its such a sitter to adapt and they fucked it.

Was reading Behind the Mystery - a collection of interviews by Stauart Kaminsky - and Block's choice for Scudder? John Spencer.

The Discworld Novels- I just got done with The Colour of Magic and seems like with some minor tweeks it be a pretty decent movie, definitely in the vein of Douglas Adams with less need of reference. Simon Pegg for Rincewind!

If you're a fan of mystery writers - those in this book include Lawrence Block, James Lee Burke, Robert B. Parker, Elmore Leonard, Michael Connelly, Tony Hillerman, Mickey Spillane, the late Evan Hunter - I'd say, absolutely. The interviews themselves are not exceptionally deep, but there is a focus on personal lives, and there are some wonderful photographs of each of the authors accompanying them. I'd certainly have bought it for the CHUD gift swap if my givee was a mystery fan.

Jeez, I hadn't thought of Spencer at all. He's shorter than I imagined Scudder. I can actually see him playing Mick Ballou if he can carry the accent, but that's a pretty great choice for Scudder as well. He can do the "I am the toughest guy in the room just by opening my mouth" thing AND he's got the familiarity with alcoholism that the role requires.

I'm not going to be able to get that out of my head for a while.

The Colour of Magic has no plot. Terry Pratchett says so himself.

Small Gods is my choice for a Discworld movie. It's a standalone novel, and the fact that the Discworld is a disc is a major plot point. In the other books, the fact that the world sits on top of four elephants who are standing on a giant turtle is just one of those things.

Simon Pegg's not a bad choice if a book starring Rincewind is ever put to film, though.

I've been thinking about this, too, and was wondering if anyone had other ideas about it.

The biggest problem with the casting is that the characters have to age over a period of 20-30 years. That's why the Stiller, Law, and Connelly triumvurate that's been mentioned back when Sidney Pollack was attached to direct doesn't work--none of those actors would be believable as teenagers/young adults.

Stephen Daldry is currently attached to direct, however, I don't think he's the best choice. I'd really like to see one of the great New York filmmakers tackle this.

Oliver Platt should play the comics publisher who cheats the tititular duo out of their fortune. That, unfortunatly, is the only other bit of casting that I've been able to come up with. Kevin Kline would be great as Rosa's father, though.

And it'd be fun to see Liev Schreiber reprise his role as the director of Citizen Kane for a brief cameo.

No, just on his franchise characters - Keller, Tanner, Scudder, and Bernie.

Who'd he pick for Keller--I know Bridges was attached to star in "Hit List" at one point?

Anyway, the more I think about Spencer, the more I like him for Scudder. Maybe not a movie, but definitely a couple of HBO movies or a series, which the character certainly supports.

Geek Love by Katherine Dunn

But how? Tim Burton had the rights for a while and I know they were "talking about" claymation but that wouldn't do it justice.

It's such a brilliant work of fiction, somebody like Peter Jackson might be able to translate it cinematically (he's one of the very few directors I would trust with it)

Block's picks:

Scudder - John Spencer
Keller - John Malkovich
Bernie Rhodenbarr - Jerry Seinfeld
Tanner - Kevin Spacey

The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien

It's a bunch of short stories about the same characters, and wouldn't work as a straight narrative, but if you made the movie about truth and about how the truth differs from the facts, using the camera to tell us different versions of the same story, it could be a masterpiece.

They actually did a TV movie of one of the stories on Showtime, but it was the least interesting, most narratively standard story, and I'd love to see the entire book adapted.

Great book. This was, oddly, THE hipster's choice read (along with The Prophet) at my high school senior year.

And that story that got the Showtime adaptation was WAY more fucked-up in the book than the film.

Also, Malkovich's a really interesting, unconventional choice for Keller. I'd like to see him play both the winsome aspects of that character alongside the hired killer ones.

This was the only book I read in my senior year AP English class. The last chapter, in particular, hit home for me.

It's a phenomenal book, just unfilmable. Ever since then, I've tried to think of a way to do a film version justice... and I can't.

Which story got adapted, by the way?

I should probably be spanked just for suggesting this, but Eco's "Foucault's Pendulum" I'd like to see.

It'd have to be quite a long film to be effective, but I really liked the book. "The DaVinci Code" is really a waterd-down cliff-note version of Eco's book, which is significantly more challenging.

I was initially thinking Orlando Bloom for Kavalier but then my computer burst into pre-emptive flames. So what about Wes Bentley?

And David Krumholtz is Clay, no doubt.

My selections for Rosa: Scarlett Johansson or Bryce Dallas Howard.

Simon Baker is Tracy Bacon.

Maybe Noah Baumbach to direct? Actually, I'd like to see what Soderbergh would do with this material.

Anyone read Chabon's THE MYSTERIES OF PITTSBURGH? I'm liking Jake Gyllenhaal for Art Bechstein, Anna Paquin for Phlox, Ryan Phillippe for Arthur Lecomte and Ian McShane as Art's father, the gangster. The hellraising character of Cleveland is proving the hardest part to cast - need a younger Russell Crowe type, I'm thinking.

ROGER DODGER's Dylan Kidd to direct.

While Colin Farrell was a possibility, I'm actually leaning towards two Aussie actors for Cleveland:



Joel Edgerton was in the last two STAR WARS prequels and KING ARTHUR...



...while Sam Worthington will soon be seen in ROGUE, the upcoming killer-crocodile movie from WOLF CREEK director Greg McLean.

Lots of good suggestions so far. I'd really like to see Kavalier and Clay as well.

I'm surprised noone has jumped at THE STARS MY DESTINATION or THE DEMOLISHED MAN yet. Or A CANTICLE FOR LIEBOWITZ. Or how about a go at THE MARTIAN CHRONICLES with a good budget?

Considering the success of RAY and WALK THE LINE, how about Harlan Ellison's SPIDER KISS?

Straying from prose to comics, I'm surprised noone has taken a crack at Sgt. Rock yet. Or better yet, how about Enemy Ace while Joe Kubert is still alive?

Chuck Palahniuk - SURVIVOR. Can't think of who'd take the lead, though.

Also, I think American Tabloid combined with Cold Six Thousand, since they share most of the characters anyway, would seriously kick ass as an HBO miniseries. They have too much going on to fit in a single movie.

Actually, I just finished Foucault's Pendulum and, apart from the fact that it's like being repeatedly punched in the face by an encyclopedia, rather enjoyed it. That being said, I can't imagine how it could be translated into a feature film... massive sections of the book are simply the characters stringing together isolated and unconnected (?) events into a narrative of secret history. You really couldn't put all of that information onto the screen, but to remove it would essentially gut the story.

I agree. But the upcoming film of 300 will probably kill off any chance of "Gates of FIre" being filmed.

J.G. Ballard's High-Rise. Alfred Bester's The Stars My Destination. An updated version of Michael Moorcock's The Final Programme (more of a remake, actually, since there's already a filmed version from the early 70s). I'd toss out George R.R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire series, as well, but who knows if he'll ever get around to finishing it.

I really hope that A Confederacy of Dunces can be resurrected, though i'm not sure, and never was, about Will Ferrell in the lead role.

would also love to see Iain M Banks' Culture books brought to the big screen and Isaac Asimov's Foundation series, though with the amount of time jumping it might be difficult.

the book i'm dying to see made though is Porno by Irvine Welsh, with the same cast as Trainspotting. seemed like everyone was keen to do it bar Ewan McGregor, but i hope he changes his mind.