Film Adaptations From Celebrated Children’s Books
Lots of beloved kids films were to start with much-loved children’s books. Numerous kids books that have been around for a very long time have been made into films at different times in the past. Most of the movies can stand on their own and nearly all of the books were previously classics. How narrowly do the movies storylines follow the books?
A fairly recent movie that was adapted from a series of books is “The Spiderwick Chronicles” from 2008. The film was adapted from the series of books by the same name written by Holly Black and Tony DiTerlizzi. There has only been one picture so far but there are really 5 books in the series at this point. The books and the movie follows the venture of a family unit of kids who move into a new residence where they find a out of the ordinary book that leads them into a land filled with goblins and trolls, elves and dwarves and other creatures.
The much-loved kids book “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” by Roald Dahl was in the beginning in print in 1964. It has been adapted into 2 popular movies, “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory” in 1971, starring Gene Wilder as Willy Wonka and from 2005 “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” starring Johnny Depp as Willy Wonka.
In 1952, the writer, E.B. White brought us one of the most adored family tales of all times with “Charlotte’s Web”. The book has stayed in print continuously since its first publication. An cartoon motion picture of “Charlotte’s Web” was released in 1973. In December 2006, a live action film version was released. Both movies followed the original story faithfully.
One of the most favorite family writers of all time is Dr. Seuss. More and more of his wonderful books are now being made into movies. In 2008 with Jim Carrey as the voice of the main character, “Horton Hears A Who” came out. This movie was an cartoon feature motion picture that very specifically followed the storyline of the book.
“The Grinch Who Stole Christmas”, another Seuss classic was made into an animated version that showed on Television every holiday season. That adaptation followed the book. But in the year 2000 a big budget film of “The Grinch” came out with Jim Carrey as the Grinch and there were many different scenes and events. “The Cat In The Hat”, also from Seuss was released in 2003 and it too, had supplementary scenes and events.
The 2nd maximum grossing film series in times gone by was from the kids sequence of books about “Harry Potter” by J.K. Rowling. Six of the 7 books of the series have now been completed into movies with a proposal for two movies to be tailored from the seventh book for a total of eight films in total.
Children’s writing often makes great movies that the entire family unit can enjoy. Reading the books all together and viewing the movies together make for wonderful family amusement and great reminiscences.
