Adaptation

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In 1902 Georges Méliès wrote and directed what would become the very first science fiction film, the 15 minute A Trip to the Moon. The film is loosely based on two popular novels of the time. The First Men in the Moon by H.G. Wells and From the Earth to the Moon by Jules Verne. This is one of the earliest if not the very first occasion in which the work of established authors directly informed this new emerging art form. For the journey of the filmmaker from a mere curiosity to that of an artist, he would have to transcend both his own technical ability and the expectations of his audience. The novelty of watching countless photographs bring a galloping horse to life would soon wear off, and developing a structured narrative became an ambition of the serious director.

Drawing inspiration from literary works was not at all surprising. In retrospect it actually reveals itself as not only an inevitable occurrence but an essential one. Running through our entire history is a rich vein of storytelling that sustains the idea of who we are and how we live. It’s hard to imagine how cinema could have survived if it had continued with simple photographic illusions, ignoring our fine tradition of poetry and metaphor. Homer’s The Iliad and The Odyssey together form the backbone of western literature. But the themes and ideas that form these epic poems were told many times before by wandering poets and transient storytellers. How fitting then that the most popular narrative art form of our age, film, should tip it’s hat to all that has came before it in a manner befitting even Homer.

It’s not all one way traffic though, an awareness of cinema has long since began to impart it’s influence on authors. Vernon God Little, the Booker prize winning novel by Peter Warren Finlay, writing under the pseudonym DBC Pierre, is a perfect example of how cinema, and including television, has being repaying it’s debt to literature. The story, set in small-town Texas, follows fifteen year old Vernon Little and the suspicion he finds himself under when his only friend, Jesus Navarro, murders sixteen schoolmates before committing suicide. Finlay, born in Australia, raised in England and Mexico before eventually moving to Ireland is unlikely to ever fully characterise the misadventures of a Texan schoolboy. But his use of stereotypical characters and apparent social conventions draw us into a world we recognise for all the wrong reasons. The fast-food trailer park culture we too often associate with America is duly represented here. Satirical enough for us to be in on the joke, but never overstated as to make itself unbelievable, Vernon God Little uses our experiences of America through cinema and television to construct a town full of people who’s sole purpose in life is to meet our low expectations, bring our true fears to life about the the most powerful nation on earth and fascinate us all the same. We believe in these characters because we recognise them from a lifetime of media portrayals. Despite the obvious talent of the author, I believe for this novel to fully succeed you must be either in on the joke, or fall victim by way of your own credulity. From the fried-chicken obsessed neighbours to the punchy Texan vernacular, this is a book to be experienced through our cinematic and tele-visual mindset.

Where Vernon God Little is unique is in the way the author uses his experience of cinema and television to develop his characters, and allows his readers similar experiences to add depth to their interpretation and understanding of the novel. Cinema is a universal language and here the author uses it with and against us, allowing us to see what he sees and simultaneously exposing our prejudices. With this the passage of influence comes full circle. There are also other examples where cinema has influenced the feel of certain books or the style of a particular author, the work of Irvine Welsh being a case in point, whose novel Trainspotting is a continuation of the group nihilism and sensory excess seen in A Clockwork Orange, not merely the Anthony Burgess novel, but Stanley Kubrick’s vision of what the novel could be represent.

The eventual impact of cinema on popular culture has been so colossal that it’s hard to escape its presence. We often recognise or associate certain places, ideas or people, by their mere relation to the films we admire. For example, when I hear the music of Beethoven I don't think of the genius composer or his strength of character, I think of A Clockwork Orange in which his music features. I associate the brilliance of a classical composer that even deafness could not diminish, with a film that in it’s early stages glorifies sexual violence. To have something so beautiful and poignant recall an image of complete malevolence is the work of a talented and understanding artist. Likewise, the city of San Francisco will forever remind people of the gay rights movement, the prejudice and persecution inflicted upon those that lived through it, and the resilience of those same few who eventually helped change hearts, minds and legislation. Despite this, the image of a 1968 Ford Mustang is all the great American city will ever remind me of with any conviction, courtesy of Steve McQueen’s Bullitt, the epitome of 70’s celluloid cool.

It can be difficult to even read a book without having your mental image of the protagonist or a particular scene being influenced by your experience of films. With Dostoyevsky it strikes me most. The mental image I develop when reading Crime and Punishment has many aesthetic similarities with the film noir genre so prevalent in the 40’s and 50’s. Just before starting the Russian novelist’s dark masterwork I had watched British director Carol Reed’s 1949 classic The Third Man. The plot of The Third Man is similarly dark in theme and involves the type of double dealing and shady morality Dostoyevsky revels in. But it is the distinct look of the film that imposes itself on my reading of Crime and Punishment. Set in a Vienna of long imposing shadows, dark streets, wet cobblestone and a strong military presence, it can’t help but resemble Dostoyevsky’s St Petersburg. This may be a trivial and unintended occurrence, but it is characteristic of a very real tendency to dress our imaginations with cinematic qualities. Ironically film noir claims not Dostoyevsky as a literary inspiration, but a series of hard-nosed crime novels of the 1940’s. I’m not quite sure what the great novelist would think of being compared to trashy pulp fiction, but he could take comfort in the new life being breathed into his work from the most unlikely of sources. Dostoyevsky’s dark, psychological storytelling has no doubt inspired a multitude of filmmakers throughout the past century. So it could be in kind repayment that cinema allows us to recognise our world of images in his age of words.