Stardust: Book vs. movie: Both charming, but film shines with supporting cast (reposting after listening to the audiobook) Originally posted at FantasyStardust: Book vs. movie: Both charming, but film shines with supporting cast (reposting after listening to the audiobook) Originally posted at Fantasy Literature Stardust (Novel): Stardust began as a graphic novel illustrated by Charles Vess in 1997. It was then published as a standard book without illustrations in 1999. The novel is a charming fairytale about a young man who ventures into the land of Faerie beyond the Wall to fetch a shooting star to impress a girl. He has many adventures on the way, as it turns out the shooting star takes the form of a woman, and there is a coven of witches after the star’s heart. In addition, the surviving heirs of Stormhold are also hunting for the gem that belongs to the rightful ruler of the kingdom, which they do not realize has knocked the star out of the sky and is now in her possession. So all the main characters converge on Tristan and the star, both of whom don’t realize the situation and are simply trying to make their way back to Wall.
I really enjoyed the novel version. All the characters have different motivations that weave together in complex fashion, and the tone of the story is an interesting mix of whimsy, fairy-tale adventure and romance, and surprising moments of brutality, which is in-keeping with fairly tales like the original Brothers Grimm stories. Gaiman is a master storyteller, so he can take familiar fantasy elements and give them a different twist that makes them fresh. [I just listened to the audiobook a year later, and Neil Gaiman narrates it himself. It is always a treat when the author reads their own work, and I have a soft spot for British narrators. Gaiman is an excellent storyteller, and can do a wide range of voices. He is naturally suited to the task, and captures the whimsical spirit of the story. Highly recommended.]
Stardust (Film): The movie came out in 2007, directed by Matthew Vaughn. You wouldn’t expect him to be involved with a whimsical fairytale fantasy if you look at his filmography, as he produced a number of gritty but humorous British gangster films like Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998) and Snatch (2000) with director Guy Ritchie. He later directed Layer Cake (2004), Kick-Ass (2010), and X-Men: First Class (2011). Just goes to show that you have to be pretty versatile in the film industry if you want steady work.
The screenplay, of course, had to make numerous changes to the novel, as even with a fairly short book like Stardust, there is simply too much material to fit into a 2-hour movie. So we see several characters cut from the novel (like the little hairy man Tristan meets when he first enters the land of Faerie), and much of the backstory of his life in Wall is removed. There are many small plot details that are also tweaked to make the film narrative more fluid, and none of these decisions seemed glaringly wrong.
In the end I liked the film more than the novel, but that is due largely to the differences between film and book mediums, and to the excellent casting choices made for the film. I’m a big fan of Michelle Pfeiffer, Robert De Niro, Claire Daines, Mark Strong, and Ricky Jervais, so any time they can all be in a fairytale fantasy movie I’m pretty happy, particularly since the first three tend to do more serious films
Director Vaughn said he was aiming “to do Princess Bride with a Midnight Run overtone,” and to a large extent he succeeded. The visuals and dialogue of the film are more overtly comical than the novel, especially the three witches led by Michelle Pfieffer, who revels in her young and beautiful body (granted by magic), but suffers immediate aging with each use of magic, so that she gradually reverts to her older and uglier self throughout the film. Another standout in the film was the farmboy Bernard, who is first changed into a goat and then a maid, and Billy, a real goat that gets changed into a man. The scenes in the inn with them are hilarious.
One of the best running jokes in the film is the dead sons of the Lord of Stormhold, who appear as ghosts next to the living heirs. They were all vying for control of the kingdom but have killed each other off in the process, and the ghosts show the actual ways in which they were dispatched, including an axe in the head. They all seem pretty rueful about the whole thing, and as each remaining heir gets knocked off, they join the rest of the ghosts in the loser group. This was a really fun addition that works better in film.
Another great character in the film is Captain Shakespeare (played by Robert De Niro), a pirate who captains an airship that hunts lightning in the clouds. This character wasn’t that important in the book, but in the film he gets an expanded role as a flamboyant guy who keeps up a gruff and ruthless character for his crew, but secretly has a wardrobe of frilly ladies’ dresses hidden in his quarters. This character works because infamous gangster and tough-guy De Niro plays against type so well.
Ricky Gervais also plays a short but brilliant cameo as Ferdy the Fence, a fast-talking broker who can’t say anything without being really funny. This role was very reminiscent to the Miracle Max character played by Billy Crystal in The Princess Bride, and I don’t remember the character being in the movie much.
Last but not least, the lead characters of Tristan and Yvaine, played by Charlie Cox and Claire Danes, have a lot of chemistry as they initially dislike each other, and it takes most of the film (and book) for Tristan to realize that the girl he’s trying to impress (Victoria Forrester, the local beauty, played by Sienna Miller) is not interested in him, and that the girl he’s destined to be with is right in front of him. It’s pretty surprising how dense the character of Tristan is, really. As for Claire Danes, she plays up the frustration of Yvaine well, as a star who is upset to be knocked out of the sky without warning, crashes to earth, hurts her leg, and is immediately captured by the love-struck but misguided young Tristan. Having recently watched Claire Danes play an extremely driven and neurotic CIA agent in Homeland, she does stressed-out, unstable characters quite well.
Overall, I think Gaiman was fortunate that his book was successfully adapted to film via a number of well-chosen supporting characters and good visual gags, and while the more serious and magical tone of the novel was sacrificed for more crowd-pleasing humor in the film, I thought this made good use of the inherent strengths of film....more
His Dark Materials: Works on Many Levels, A Modern Fantasy Classic This is a trilogy that is best enjoyed as a single epic tale with three parts, much His Dark Materials: Works on Many Levels, A Modern Fantasy Classic This is a trilogy that is best enjoyed as a single epic tale with three parts, much like The Lord of the Rings. It may have a superficial resemblance to Chronicles of Narnia in that its protagonists are children in a fantasy world, but its explorations of morality, consciousness, and its subversive view of the Catholic Church and religious dogmatism make it an anti-Narnia tale that must have C.S. Lewis turning cartwheels in his grave. It also has a lot more dark elements, especially in the portion set in our world, which reflects the far more conflicted and morally-confused world of today.
I won't describe the plot or characters as that's been done by many others well. Suffice to say that I think the books work equally well as YA fantasy in terms of the plot and adult fantasy in terms of the cosmological and religious and moral themes. The story is absolutely packed with ideas and challenging contents that elevate it far beyond a mere fantasy adventure. It also manages to take many familiar fantasy tropes like magic, witches, talking animals, quests, and a massive war in the heavens for the fate of the world, and somehow make them feel fresh and reinvented, rather than derivative.
I listened to the trilogy on audiobook, and have been watching the BBC miniseries His Dark Materials, which certainly has captured the tone of the books better than the earlier film The Golden Compass. It's a high-quality work of the imagination that has captured modern readers like the Harry Potter series, and is much superior in my opinion....more
I'm sorry, I tried but I just couldn't get further than page 145. In the Hunger Games Katniss Everdeen was a tough, ass-kicking heroine who just led bI'm sorry, I tried but I just couldn't get further than page 145. In the Hunger Games Katniss Everdeen was a tough, ass-kicking heroine who just led by example amid absolutely harrowing conditions and prevailed over the Capitol by thumbing her nose at their cruel media-circus.
But in this she has become a wishy-washy teenage girl (perhaps the target audience?) who is torn for her feelings for Peeta and Gale. This was a small part of The Hunger Games, but now has taken center stage. Even President Snow seems to care who she will choose, whispering to her "I know about the kiss." Oh my, this book has turned into Twilight all of a sudden (and no, I didn't read that series but a little bird told me they're similar).
So I think I'll sign off at this point and return to more adult sf fare, starting with Iain Banks and China Mieville. And fortunately I can still follow the story since Catching Fire will be in theaters this November....more
I never planned on reading this. But my 11-year old daughter is a huge fan of The Hunger Games and Katniss Everdeen. She went through the trilogy likeI never planned on reading this. But my 11-year old daughter is a huge fan of The Hunger Games and Katniss Everdeen. She went through the trilogy like starving tributes gobbling up food scraps, and has been bugging me for an archery set repeatedly (the answer is no, of course, since we live in Tokyo). Most of the kids in her class love it. Then I saw the movie, and I thought, "Wait, this is a pretty cool story with a kick-ass heroine and a believable dystopian scenario." And I noticed that many of my friends on GR, who are pretty serious sf-fantasy readers, gave this high ratings and glowing reviews.
So I gave in and read it over 2 days. Just seeing my daughter enjoying it so much brought back memories of my early reading days. The story is exciting, brutal and pulls no punches, despite being aimed at the YA market. And I think that's why it has met with such success. Frankly, kids these days are pretty savvy about their entertainment (well, there is Twilight but let's just ignore that for now), and they like a gripping survival tale that depicts a dystopian world that is still believable. And with the plethora of reality TV shows (Survivor in particular) and mixed-martial arts bloodfests (MMA), it's not hard to extrapolate to a future like Hunger Games.
Bottom line: A compulsively-readable, tightly-paced story with likable, realistic teen protagonists facing harrowing conditions in a grim dystopian future. ...more
The Graveyard Book: A brilliant full-cast audiobook production Originally posted at Fantasy Literature Neil Gaiman’s 2008 novel The Graveyard Book realThe Graveyard Book: A brilliant full-cast audiobook production Originally posted at Fantasy Literature Neil Gaiman’s 2008 novel The Graveyard Book really racked up the awards, winning the British Carnegie Medal and American Newbery Medal for the best children’s book of the year, and then more surprisingly the 2009 Hugo Award for Best Novel and Locus Award for Best YA Book. For years I have heard Neil Gaiman’s name for various books like Stardust (which was a great film), Neverwhere, Anansi Boys, and American Gods (2002 winner of the Hugo, Nebula, Bram Stoker, BSFA, World Fantasy, British Fantasy awards), not to mention the legendary Sandman series of graphic novels.
I first read it in hardcopy, but it was when I listened to the full-cast production that the magic of story really came to life. Voice actors include Neil Gaiman, Derek Jacobi, Robert Madge, Clare Corbett, Miriam Margolyes, Andrew Scott, Julian Rhind-Tutt, Emilia Fox, Reece Shearsmith, and Lenny Henry. This is definitely one of the best audiobook productions I’ve ever encountered. It’s hard to imagine anyone not liking it. I listened to the entire book during a hike in the mountains.
The story itself is simple. It begins with a sinister man named Jack who enters a London home at night and proceeds to quietly kill every member of the family there, except for a toddler who miraculously manages to escape on his own and wander into the old graveyard on the hill. Though Jack gives pursuit, the ghosts of the graveyard choose, after a hurried debate, to provide aid to the young live boy and successfully hide him from the sinister Jack.
The middle portion is a coming of age tale of Nobody “Bod” Owens, who is raised by the dead folk of the graveyard, and protected by Silas, a mysterious figure who is neither dead nor alive, but is certainly not to be trifled with. Gaiman introduces Bod to a myriad of deceased folk from many different eras of England, many of whom feel protective of Bod as he grows up among them. However, because the killer Jack is still seeking to track down the missing boy, Bod is under strict instructions not to venture outside the graveyard. He develops skills such as Fading, instilling Fear, seeing in the dark, and being able to slip through places that the living normally cannot.
Of course there is the struggle of Bod to reconcile his solitary life among the dead with the urge to explore and be part of the larger world of the living that exists outside the graveyard’s gates. But his one brief foray outside almost results in him being captured by Jack, so he quickly retreats back to the safety of his graveyard home. Later he encounters several supernatural creatures in the graveyard that will eventually help him in his struggle to survive an attack by Jack and his associates, and the ending is surprisingly exciting.
On reflection, the story is as much about parenting and raising a child, no matter what the circumstances, as it is a story of growing up. As a parent of a young teen, I certainly could empathize with the feelings of the graveyard denizens as they watched Bod grow up from an innocent child to a strangely calm and sheltered boy. It was an interesting spin on parenting, and the individual deceased have interesting life stories, and it makes their day to have an audience.
I also thought that Bod’s secluded life with the dead and avoiding the living was a clever metaphor for shy kids who feel more comfortable with books and adults than kids their own age. He is always more comfortable on his own listening to stories of the past - other kids are scary. I can sympathize with that sentiment. So it’s very heartening to see Bod growing up and engaging the world of the living. It’s a good message to be reminded not to let the world pass by just observing it from the shadows....more
The Ocean at the End of the Lane: The horrors and wonders of childhood Originally posted at Fantasy Literature There’s not much I can say about Neil GaiThe Ocean at the End of the Lane: The horrors and wonders of childhood Originally posted at Fantasy Literature There’s not much I can say about Neil Gaiman’s 2013 The Ocean at the End of the Lane that hasn’t already been said far more eloquently by other GR reviewers, particularly Nataliya, Emily, and Algernon. As I read their reviews, I kept nodding at each point, including the precise quotes they included. And with the massive readership that Gaiman has, he hardly needs any further praise. Although I’ve been late to the party, in the last year I’ve read Stardust, The Graveyard Book, and the entire 75-volume SANDMAN series. Initially I was skeptical that he could be as skillful and compelling a writer as the hype would suggest, but I’ve come to the conclusion that this time people are right. This year I also got the audiobooks of all his books, and his readings of Stardust and The Ocean at the End of the Lane are just perfect. He is a natural born storyteller and narrator, and knows his own material better than anyone else possibly could. I thought nothing could top that, but the full-cast production of The Graveyard Book is fantastic. His books are just perfect for audio, with their haunting imagery, relatively uncomplicated plots (I haven’t read American Gods yet, granted), and effortless prose.
So this time I won’t bother to describe the plot of this book. Suffice to say that it explores the terrors and wonders of a lonely childhood in the Sussex countryside, a mysterious trio of women neighbors who will be very familiar to Gaiman fans, and some very strange, frightening, and dream-like events that befell the adult narrator as a 7-year-old. There are numerous insights scattered throughout the story that made me pause for reflection (read the reviews I mentioned above for details), thoughts so distinct and universal that ring true, particularly to those whose childhoods centered more on the imaginary world of books and solitude. This resonated so strongly with me that it was reassuring to see other readers responding similarly. Gaiman clearly tapped his own childhood for inspiration, the only difference being that he can recapture the magic perspective of childhood innocence and certitude that most adults have long become disconnected from.
The book conjures all kinds of thoughts, feelings, and emotions that you may not have experienced since childhood. It’s quite a remarkable achievement for someone like me who feels like our complex, jaded, superficial and predatory world can easily crush any childlike innocence with a flick of its cruel talons. And yet there is hope and terrors to be found in Gaiman’s books that do not rely on flashy action or gore, but rather gentle humor mixed with psychological landscapes much like dreams. The brevity of the book may have caused some readers to feel like the ideas were not fully developed, but like the infinite ocean at the end of the lane, you can discover the whole universe in a duck pond if you just look at it with the right perspective....more
This was one of my earliest introductions to YA fantasy back in 5th grade, and I remember enjoying every book in the series quite a lot. Don't remembeThis was one of my earliest introductions to YA fantasy back in 5th grade, and I remember enjoying every book in the series quite a lot. Don't remember any details now, unfortunately....more
This was the first big book my dad read to me as a child, and I enjoyed it thoroughly. I was glad to have a chance to read it to my daughter as a bedtThis was the first big book my dad read to me as a child, and I enjoyed it thoroughly. I was glad to have a chance to read it to my daughter as a bedtime story and carry on the tradition. A great story!...more
Sometimes you just miss the boat for some books. There is a perfect age to read a given book, and for no particular reason you just never get around tSometimes you just miss the boat for some books. There is a perfect age to read a given book, and for no particular reason you just never get around to it. I remember vividly how much I liked the Rankin/Bass animated movie The Last Unicorn back in 1982, when I was just 8 years old (though it looks painfully lame now having watched a clip on YouTube). I should have read the book right then. I would have absolutely loved it.
Peter Beagle’s prose is truly lyrical and evocative, and I loved that aspect of the book. There are many humorous moments in the story involving the bumbling, incompetent Schmendrick the Magician (well, with a name like that, what do you expect?) and meta-commentary on the nature of fairly tales. The story is very simple, as the last unicorn leaves her enchanted forest on a quest to discover what happened to her kind, falling in with Schmendrick and Molly, and finally encountering the villainous King Haggard and his valiant but clueless son Prince Lir, and the terrifying Red Bull that lies behind the mystery.
Beagle’s focus in the story is actually not on the last unicorn at all, but rather on the human characters around her, who are far more complex and conflicted than typical fairy tales allow. Schmendrick is forever striving and failing to be a competent magician, Molly has wasted many years with a band of dispirited bandits on the road (they’re not very merry), King Haggard is a grim and unhappy man who takes pleasure in only one dark secret, while Prince Lir is the opposite, initially lazy and indolent but later performing an ever-increasing number of valiant feats (slaying dragons, ogres, black knights, etc. all to impress the one he loves), and the Red Bull is a fearsome, elemental beast that is literally larger than life but answers only to King Haggard.
The story abounds with sly anachronisms intended to be clever (like Prince Lir flipping through a magazine to pass the time!), and I loved the fact that the valiant prince can’t understand why he can’t impress his love by dragging home a succession of vanquished dragon heads. The best parts of the book for me were the opening chapters that introduce Mommy Fortuna’s Midnight Carnival and Schmendrick, particularly the fearsome harpy who is the only other real mythical creature, and the final chapters where the protagonists confront the Red Bull and solve the mystery of the missing unicorns. The writing here is truly impressive, and I found myself re-reading passages just to savor the word-play.
I started writing this review with the intent of saying what I didn’t like about the story, and I’ve done the exact opposite. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with the book itself. It is a perfect story to read when you are young and romantic at heart, preferably your early teen years, but less enjoyable when you are a critical and jaded adult and have more trouble appreciating something magical. So I would give it a retroactive 5 stars if I were reading it in junior high, but only 3 stars now since it’s just not really my preferred type of book. ...more
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