ITT: Unfilmable books

[Anonymous No.21600728]

[Anonymous No.21600739]

[Anonymous No.21600751]

>>21600728
Haven't read Blood Meridian. What exactly makes it unfilmable?

[Anonymous No.21600761]

>>21600728
The objective perspective of blood meridian lends itself greatly to film though

[Anonymous No.21600782]

>>21600761
The problem is that vast (and I mean vast) stretches of Blood meridian are sustained entirely on McCarthy's language. It is McCarthy's language that renders the landscape in a way that constantly keeps the reader engaged even when there is zero narrative drive and all the characters have been deliberately shafted to the side (it's not a character based work anyway). I don't see how it will work as purely a visual. Film doesn't have the privilege of the simile after all.

There is some marginal concerns about the ultraviolence too.

[Anonymous No.21600795]

>>21600751
My guess is he means the descriptive, portentous prose is unfilmable, and that would just leave the contents of the plot, which you could maybe argue is not the same as making a film out of the book.

[Anonymous No.21600806]

>>21600782
>The problem is that vast (and I mean vast) stretches of Blood meridian are sustained entirely on McCarthy's language. It is McCarthy's language that renders the landscape in a way that constantly keeps the reader engaged even when there is zero narrative drive and all the characters have been deliberately shafted to the side (it's not a character based work anyway). I don't see how it will work as purely a visual. Film doesn't have the privilege of the simile after all.
Exactly. Yeah.
>There is some marginal concerns about the ultraviolence too.
There's probably some European filmmakers who would be willing to film that amount of gratuitous violence. Maybe even an American, but they would probably make it too "gory" and "hardcore" for it to have much of an effect.

[Anonymous No.21600813]

>>21600795
In this case the plot is also quite quite barebones, and the middle of the novel is entirely plotless.

[Anonymous No.21600822]

>>21600782
I think it'd still make a nice western if it just follows the glanton gang, but the prose is definitely carrying every other element. It's sort of like the Lolita adaption. You can recreate the story but you miss out on HH's humor

[Anonymous No.21600826]

>>21600813
yeah that too

[Anonymous No.21600828]

>>21600751
1. The extreme violence. If it were faithfully adapted, it would get an NC-17 rating from the MPAA (or worse). This alone is a financial kiss of death.
2. The book's depiction of Native Americans probably wouldn't go over too well with the PC police.
3. The religious themes.
4. Much of the novel consists entirely of passages describing the landscape in a manner that is difficult to translate into film.

[Anonymous No.21600836]

>>21600822
I think you would have to engage in typical movie exaggerations of events and plot points to make it interesting for the viewer. Nobody would then regard it as a true adaptation. Basically What happened with Lolita but worse because the subject matter is even more grotesque and plot is even more inconsequential.

[Anonymous No.21601056]

[Anonymous No.21601067]

>>21600728
It would make a sick animation.

[Anonymous No.21601093]

[Anonymous No.21601107]

>>21601056
Most pynchon adaptations are doomed to fail (except IV, which was written specifically to be adapted). I recently watched a bad German pseudo-adaptation of GR

[Anonymous No.21601110]

>>21600751
There's this movie called El Topo by Alejandro Jodorowsky. Not a substitute. However, watch it, if you haven't. Make sure not to be too sober.

[Anonymous No.21601130]

>>21600751
An (accurate) depiction of Native Americans that would not fly with the Disney tier revisionist version we have now.

ISIS tier level of brutality and violence. Back then they were literally thought to be demons sent by the devil by many early settlers

[Anonymous No.21601131]

>>21600828
How could those characteristics be deemed unfilmable when Cannibal Holocaust and The Tree of Life exist already.

[Anonymous No.21601138]

>>21601130
Has anyone here heard of Apocalypto?

[Anonymous No.21601173]

>>21601138
1. Apocalypto got shit for its depiction of Central Americans.
2. We’re not talking about Central Americans in blood meridian (aztecs and mayans have always been synonymous with human sacrifice), we’re talking about native Americans muh trail of tears muh eat all of the buffalo spirit animal dream catcher

[Anonymous No.21601185]

>>21600751
Muh evil dead baby imagery and muh heckin pupperino river scene. The book is plenty filmable. Just can't be tackled by pussies.

[Anonymous No.21601208]

>>21601173
You know violence is still violence, right?

[Anonymous No.21601215]

>>21601131
Because Mccarthy fanboys are dumb zoomers with no idea about anything. they only read blood meridian becaause it's "le based /lit/ book"

[Anonymous No.21601258]

>>21600751
Attempting to film it sticking to the book as closely as possible would mean vast, long scenes of nothing happening except thirsty greasy men riding horses around. I don't even think the violence would be the problem, it would be the pacing.
Of course a talented screenwriter could get past this by having The Kid (Gaten Matarazzo) narrate to the viewer loudly and clearly what is happening while Judge Holden (Samuel L Jackson) plays a guitar in the background.

[Anonymous No.21601326]

>>21601258
There is a lot of slow, atmospheric western films.

[Anonymous No.21601385]

[Anonymous No.21601388]

>>21601093
Epics as a genre are unfilmable, I think.
>>21601258
>vast, long scenes of nothing happening except thirsty greasy men riding horses around.
It wouldn't be commerically viable, but it could be done. Kind of like the 5 hour long adaptation of The Deluge.

[Anonymous No.21601409]

>>21600751
Nothing.

[Anonymous No.21601518]

>>21601388
Laurence of Arabia?
>>21601215
Surely it can't be that simple but the idea of posting books that are unfimable when the only thing you need to film something is a camera, it's pretty dumb.

[Anonymous No.21601539]

>>21601518
Lawrence of Arabia was based on a biography, not an epic.

[Anonymous No.21601542]

>>21601539
How about the Napoleon movie?

[Anonymous No.21603016]

>>21601215
Weird rant.

[Anonymous No.21603030]

>>21601326
>>21601388
The middle of Blood meridian would be basically 2 hours of killing and riding around with panormic shots of the desert if it has to be true to source material. No cinematographer can make it interesting for that long. If narration is included then it is a concession.

[Anonymous No.21603129]

Most literary books would lose something if brought to the big screen. Those books use words as an art form which is untranslatable to the big screen

[Anonymous No.21603232]

[Anonymous No.21603296]

>>21600728

[Anonymous No.21603309]

[Anonymous No.21603322]

>War never changes

[Anonymous No.21603405]

>>21600728

[Anonymous No.21603471]

>>21600751
Killing underaged folks
Raping underaged folks
Killing indians/mexicans
Extorting people while killing them.
Naked men
Racism
Shooting puppies while they're drowning
Boring

[Anonymous No.21603517]

>>21603322
get this naked mole rat off my screen this instant

[Anonymous No.21603526]

>>21600728
Film adaptation bears out that the medium is closer to poetry than prose, or the novel. The problem Blood Meridian presents is that the expectation is Apocalypse Now on the prairie. The director will have to bring a considerable something extra on the level of Kubrick and The Shining to pull it off. It's a career killer if you failed. It could be great, get critical acclaim, and still fall flat on box office.

>>21600782
>t is McCarthy's language that renders the landscape in a way that constantly keeps the reader engaged even when there is zero narrative drive and all the characters have been deliberately shafted to the side
Wildlife. Scenes and scenery that ought've involved it were chintsy in No Country For Old Men, especially the CGI antelope & buzzard. The landscape shots would be chasing sunsets, have to be National Geographic levels of enrapturing. Ultraviolence is best delivered through suggestion-- a Hitchcock theater release cut and Terrifier 2 home release to turn it into a slasher hybrid could work.

>>21600828
>depiction of Native Americans probably wouldn't go over too well with the PC police.
retweet /=/ endorsement Baiting 'de-colonialists' communists is trivial. Whitey's playing the heel, maybe the entire West is the Judge ect. You lie to the investors for the ESG bucks then submit something else having final cut. Let the yellow press sort it out after the fact.

[Anonymous No.21603574]

>>21601131
Cannibal Holocaust came out a really long time ago and the question of whether or not it was a decent movie or was a commercial success is something I don't know the answers to but doubt. If Blood Meridian were to be like Cannibal Holocaust it would not be a commercial success, and so no one would want to make it in the world we live in today.

[Anonymous No.21603583]

>>21601258
>Of course a talented screenwriter could get past this by having The Kid (Gaten Matarazzo) narrate to the viewer loudly and clearly what is happening while Judge Holden (Samuel L Jackson) plays a guitar in the background.
That sounds absolutely awful man I'm not gonna lie to you. For multiple reasons. Narrating shit from the book that you can't express on camera alone is often a really bad idea me feels

[Anonymous No.21603589]

>>21603471
>Killing underaged folks
>Raping underaged folks
>folks
Please, please go back to Hell. You are not wanted here, fiend.

[Anonymous No.21603595]

>Dune
>Witcher

[Anonymous No.21603621]

>>21603574
No one is talking about commercial or critical success here. That's not what filmable means

[Anonymous No.21603650]

>>21603621
I mean everything is filmable then.

[Anonymous No.21603653]

>>21603621
>That's not what filmable means
It certainly has to be a part of the conversation then, at least. You could film Gravity's Rainbow too if you had a hundred years and an unlimited budget.

[Anonymous No.21603700]

>>21603650
EXACTLY, thank you!

[Anonymous No.21603715]

>>21603653
>>21603650
Yes

[Anonymous No.21604645]

>>21601539
>>21601542
>>21601518
How are you two arguing and not a single one of you nitwits pointed out that he equivocated the word "epic"?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epic_poetry

My God, the absolute state of /lit/. Lol.

[Anonymous No.21604675]

>>21600728
>WSJ: People have said "Blood Meridian" is unfilmable because of the sheer darkness and violence of the story.

>CM: That's all crap. The fact that's it's a bleak and bloody story has nothing to do with whether or not you can put it on the screen. That's not the issue. The issue is it would be very difficult to do and would require someone with a bountiful imagination and a lot of balls. But the payoff could be extraordinary.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748704576204574529703577274572

[Anonymous No.21604715]

>>21601131
This anon is correct. Do the people on this board only watch mainstream American films? Blood Meridian already has on paper ideas that would make it more conventionally "engaging" than any film from something like the slow cinema movement. It just requires someone with talent for visuals and a way to sculpt an inherently cinematic structure from the novel. I also think voice-overs would work well; if anyone has seen Malick's The Thin Red Line, for example, it would use them in a way roughly similar to it. I actually see Malick being the contemporary director best suited for tackling BM - his use of jump cuts, his handheld camera, and ability to capture natural beauty in spite of human violence would all work well - but I imagine it goes somewhat against his sensibilities (see: The New World).

[Anonymous No.21604719]

>>21601107
GR should be adapted as an anime. By the director of Evangelion.

[Anonymous No.21604742]

>>21604715
Malick is a friend of Cormac's.

[Anonymous No.21604744]

Only Studio SHAFT would be willing to do justice to Nabokov's masterpiece

[Anonymous No.21604752]

is there something unfilmable that happens in the second half of bm? cuz i'm halfway through and so far hasn't been anything that isn't a well worn cowboy movie trope.

[Anonymous No.21604760]

>>21604752

>>21600782

[Anonymous No.21604763]

>>21604742
Where about did you read that? I've never come across anything connecting the two

[Anonymous No.21604766]

>>21604760
there are plenty of films, including westerns, where dudes wander around the countryside with nothing happening. go watch any of those artsy westerns on criterion channel.

[Anonymous No.21604778]

>>21604766
This one springs to mind

[Anonymous No.21604821]

>>21604766
Rec? How many of them were commercial successes?

[Anonymous No.21604834]

>>21604766
Dude wandering is not the point though. The invoked imagery is. Can't do that in film. Or at least not conventionally. Most of those artsy films still centralize the character or are Character dramas at heart. A bit like The Road. BM is not like The Road.

[Anonymous No.21604849]

>>21604821
the proposition was that the book was in fact quite filmable not that it would be a hollywood hit.

[Anonymous No.21604854]

>>21604834
can't invoke imagery on film? damn, if only there were way to show images in films.

[Anonymous No.21604869]

>>21604849

>>21603650

[Anonymous No.21604875]

>>21601056
>>21601107
Inherent vice is one of my favourite films, I think a very few directors can capture the aesthetics but it's possible

[Anonymous No.21604891]

It could work, I can imagine The Thin Red Line, The Assassination of Jesse James and 3 Women (Altman) aesthetics being fit quite nicely

[Anonymous No.21604892]

>>21601107
can't say gravity's rainbow is unfilmable when the most memorable scene in trainspotting is a direct ripoff. that said i hope they never make a gr movie. i refuse to watch the white noise movie.

[Anonymous No.21604897]

>>21600728
Although I read somewhere that Eisenstein wanted to do it, but I can't find anything about it now.

[Anonymous No.21604898]

>>21604891
days of heaven director could probably do ok with it who i think someone already mentioned

[Anonymous No.21604922]

kubrick most definitely could have done it

[Anonymous No.21604960]

Malick lack the necessary brutality, From current living directors I think Coen brothers could do a very good job, maybe even Jonathan Glazer and Zahler

[Anonymous No.21605006]

>>21604854
>small coals scampered down the plain and sand crept past in the dark all night like armies of lice on the move
Translate this to screen.

[Anonymous No.21605127]

>>21604645
>falling for bait instead of beating him in own logic

[Anonymous No.21605129]

>>21604875
Midwit

[Anonymous No.21605245]

>>21603309
This was the first thing to come to mind when I saw the OP.
How It Is would also be pretty much impossible.

[Anonymous No.21605358]

>>21603309
>>21605245
Some anons are suggesting that the books must be filmable regardless of commercial business. I think you can do them then. It would bore non-reading public to tears but whatever. Literalize the Unnamable's imaginings to break monotony of continuous monologue.

[Anonymous No.21605564]

>>21603405
>John Belushi and John Candy were both considered for the role but died before the film could happen
cursed adaptation

[Anonymous No.21606135]

>>21605564
exactly

[Anonymous No.21606266]

>>21600751
The only reason why anyone cares about it is because of how it's written. The chances of a filmaker adapting it with a style that reflects the way it's written is zero. All other answers are wrong and belong to tourists

[Anonymous No.21606827]

>>21600728
bump

[Anonymous No.21606836]

>>21606266
the encyclopedia of rock formations is the least important part of the book and could be dropped with nothing of value lost.

[Anonymous No.21606894]

>>21604715
>Do the people on this board only watch mainstream American films?
This place is /lit/ not /tv/

[Anonymous No.21606899]

>>21606894
Nu-/lit/ is just /tv/, honestly.

[Anonymous No.21607018]

>>21604922
god I can only imagine, what a fucking adaptation that would be

[Anonymous No.21607697]

>>21601131
there is a scene in blood meridian, where a man carries two babies by their legs in each hand, and smashes their heads on a rock, the gore erupting out the front of their skulls. Thats not getting filmed.

The child chained to a pole...not getting filmed, the children in bed with the judge not getting filmed, the child with the broken neck last seen with the judge, not getting filmed...the word nigger to describe Indians, not getting filmed. and on it goes.

[Anonymous No.21607704]

>>21604922
>>21607018

It would be fucking awful like all his other movies

[Anonymous No.21607859]

The ideas would be to broad to convey to a normal audience. It would be hard as well to make Severan into a likable protagonist due to the nature of his profession and the various faux pas he makes during the story.

[Anonymous No.21607895]

>>21600751
Absolutely nothing. It's just burgerpolcucks who think only disney movies exist

[Anonymous No.21607900]

>>21604875
Yeah I loved it. It makes you feel stoned just watching it.