I bought the book after I watched the movie, read the book and then rewatched the movie. Although I can't testify to the authenticity of the liberal arts college setting nor relate to the travails of being an English writing professor, this story was thought provoking all the same. I found myself speculating on how my life would be like when I get to Grady Tripp's age in a quarter of a century's time. His inability to take control of his life or even spend some effort thinking about his problems is very typical of the inertia that has a chokehold on a majority of the world's population. However, his mid-life conundrum is a little more self consuming compared to the problems of the average Joe because he had once been a wonder boy, someone who had scaled the heights of success - a precariously high place for anyone to stand confusedly on. And as a teacher of young people, he has more than his own expectations to live up to.
Coming back to the movie, I found that the pen of Steve Kloves, the screenplay writer, was better at psychoanalytical summarisation than that of the author, Michael Chabon's. Over the 350 pages of the novel, the author rambled on about the motivations of his central characters without actually giving the reader an exact spot to pin down. The movie's largest departure from the book were the parts where Kloves allowed the characters to make up their minds conclusively about what they intended to do next. This does not mean that Chabon's writing is ineffective, it's just that a Hollywood movie doesn't have the luxury of leaving its characters with any lingering sense of self doubt. Hollywood wants the paying audience to walk out of the theater feeling that there was closure. Having said that, I do like Steve Klove's tweaking of the narrative, it chases down the characters' meandering thought processes for the viewer.
The first major Kloves addition to the narrative were the scenes immediately after Tripp and James Leer had broken into Emily Tripp's family home. As Tripp sat among his wife's belongings, it dawned on him that he wanted to belong to another woman and so, he called Sara Gaskell. This episode never occurred in the novel. Meanwhile, James Leer was downstairs helping himself to some bourbon. I treated these Leer scenes merely as comic escapades of the young man on the first viewing. The second time around, I realised that they held more portent than comedy. As James Leer poured himself bourbon, the TV character in the background was exhorting him to yield to temptation and longing so that there would be no regrets later on in life. This was followed by a Judy Garland movie coming on TV where we have James singing along to her, a dead give away with regard to the inclination of his sexual desires.
These scenes shaped the reason behind James' subsequent willingness to succumb to Terry Crabtree's seduction. Over the course of the weekend, after having drunk and drugged himself into a stupor, James proclaimed that he was enjoying himself. For a person who previously had only been able to express himself through his writing, this was a psychological breakthrough, a spiritual release of sorts and so, when he decided to go along with Crabtree, it was clearly a conscious choice he made for himself. Some conservative reviewers have decried what they saw as neglect on the part of an educator to protect his student, a sexual innocent, from outright exploitation. The argument to that is, come on, the kid made up his own mind he was going to do it and as a college junior, he's old enough.
The second Kloves contribution was, of course, the scene where Hannah Green pointed out that Tripp made no choices where his writing was concerned, he threw down on paper everything that came his way. The dialogue in that scene neatly summarised Grady Tripp's entire problem, his paralysing indecision and fear of dealing with his messed up life. In the book, Tripp saw his life as a series of disasters happening as well as waiting to happen, knowing full well that this came about only because he never took the trouble to lob off the peeking heads of would be monsters that were waiting to rear up to their full sizes. The "choices" speech was the best summing up of the whole story although it came rather late to have been able to inspire Tripp to take his foot away from the accelerator, do an about turn and change into a whole different person by Monday morning.
Last, the "improvise" dialogue between Tripp and Crabtree where the professor soberly decided, in one fell swoop, how to dispose of Marilyn's jacket, what he was going to do with himself and how James' plight should be dealt with. It was way too hurried a wrapping up of the Tripp dilemma, extremely jarring given the pace of Tripp's procrastination in the whole movie up to that point. My personal opinion of a better ending would be one where Sara pulls Tripp back from the edge and he convinces her that he would take care of the baby together with her. He then demonstrates his sincerity by confronting Sara's husband, gets beaten up and asked to resign on the spot. He and Sara can follow through by walking out together. No need of fading to a warm autumnal scene complete with Sara and Baby in tow.
Kloves' screenplay and Curtis Hanson's direction tried to strengthen the resolution of the characters' fates and clarify the subtleties in the book's narrative but the result was left wanting in places. The editing by Dede Allen did the best it could, there were no wasted scenes, every moment tried to propel the story to its next development. The product, though quirky and heartwarming, reeked too much of Hollywood's grovelling to audiences with short attention spans.
Coming back to the movie, I found that the pen of Steve Kloves, the screenplay writer, was better at psychoanalytical summarisation than that of the author, Michael Chabon's. Over the 350 pages of the novel, the author rambled on about the motivations of his central characters without actually giving the reader an exact spot to pin down. The movie's largest departure from the book were the parts where Kloves allowed the characters to make up their minds conclusively about what they intended to do next. This does not mean that Chabon's writing is ineffective, it's just that a Hollywood movie doesn't have the luxury of leaving its characters with any lingering sense of self doubt. Hollywood wants the paying audience to walk out of the theater feeling that there was closure. Having said that, I do like Steve Klove's tweaking of the narrative, it chases down the characters' meandering thought processes for the viewer.
The first major Kloves addition to the narrative were the scenes immediately after Tripp and James Leer had broken into Emily Tripp's family home. As Tripp sat among his wife's belongings, it dawned on him that he wanted to belong to another woman and so, he called Sara Gaskell. This episode never occurred in the novel. Meanwhile, James Leer was downstairs helping himself to some bourbon. I treated these Leer scenes merely as comic escapades of the young man on the first viewing. The second time around, I realised that they held more portent than comedy. As James Leer poured himself bourbon, the TV character in the background was exhorting him to yield to temptation and longing so that there would be no regrets later on in life. This was followed by a Judy Garland movie coming on TV where we have James singing along to her, a dead give away with regard to the inclination of his sexual desires.
These scenes shaped the reason behind James' subsequent willingness to succumb to Terry Crabtree's seduction. Over the course of the weekend, after having drunk and drugged himself into a stupor, James proclaimed that he was enjoying himself. For a person who previously had only been able to express himself through his writing, this was a psychological breakthrough, a spiritual release of sorts and so, when he decided to go along with Crabtree, it was clearly a conscious choice he made for himself. Some conservative reviewers have decried what they saw as neglect on the part of an educator to protect his student, a sexual innocent, from outright exploitation. The argument to that is, come on, the kid made up his own mind he was going to do it and as a college junior, he's old enough.
The second Kloves contribution was, of course, the scene where Hannah Green pointed out that Tripp made no choices where his writing was concerned, he threw down on paper everything that came his way. The dialogue in that scene neatly summarised Grady Tripp's entire problem, his paralysing indecision and fear of dealing with his messed up life. In the book, Tripp saw his life as a series of disasters happening as well as waiting to happen, knowing full well that this came about only because he never took the trouble to lob off the peeking heads of would be monsters that were waiting to rear up to their full sizes. The "choices" speech was the best summing up of the whole story although it came rather late to have been able to inspire Tripp to take his foot away from the accelerator, do an about turn and change into a whole different person by Monday morning.
Last, the "improvise" dialogue between Tripp and Crabtree where the professor soberly decided, in one fell swoop, how to dispose of Marilyn's jacket, what he was going to do with himself and how James' plight should be dealt with. It was way too hurried a wrapping up of the Tripp dilemma, extremely jarring given the pace of Tripp's procrastination in the whole movie up to that point. My personal opinion of a better ending would be one where Sara pulls Tripp back from the edge and he convinces her that he would take care of the baby together with her. He then demonstrates his sincerity by confronting Sara's husband, gets beaten up and asked to resign on the spot. He and Sara can follow through by walking out together. No need of fading to a warm autumnal scene complete with Sara and Baby in tow.
Kloves' screenplay and Curtis Hanson's direction tried to strengthen the resolution of the characters' fates and clarify the subtleties in the book's narrative but the result was left wanting in places. The editing by Dede Allen did the best it could, there were no wasted scenes, every moment tried to propel the story to its next development. The product, though quirky and heartwarming, reeked too much of Hollywood's grovelling to audiences with short attention spans.
Tell Your Friends