Do you plan to read any of the books this season's movies are based on?

I'll answer the question first. I might, though I probably shouldn't say that I might. For each year I make an internal plan to read all of the books on which upcoming films are based. Guess how many I usually get through? But given that I'd never trade F Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby" for any film version that might ever exist, I should probably try and read source material quicker once I know it's going to be a movie. I weep proactively, for example, for anyone who sees August: Osage County first as a movie (if it's not good) without having previously known the brilliance of the play. With this year's "Adapted" crowd, I have actually had read/experienced at least five of them... plus all the superhero stuff, 'natch.

intimate knowledge *before* seeing the movies, 2013 edition

This topic is on the mind since I've posted my predictions in the Original and Adapted Screenplay Oscar categories.

What's the difference between ADAPTED and ORIGINAL these days? Well, like the Acting Categories, sometimes screenplays play fast and loose with definitions. The landmark year for "Original" vs "Adapted" shenanigans was 2002 in which both Gangs of New York and My Big Fat Greek Wedding, which had presented themselves as adaptations of a novel and play respectively for months on end as they made their way into the public consciousness, suddenly decided they were originals when that category proved conveniently easier to nab nominations in. Oh sure, they had their excuses ("only inspired by" "I wrote a version of this for the screen before I wrote it as a play") but it still smelled like Category Fraud.  

I bring this up because it's possible that some of the films will be classified differently than I've classified them. The most confusing case is probably Foxcatcher since books have been written about the bizarre true story but the film doesn't seem to be based on those books but on an unpublished autobiography (?) by one of its secondary characters (played by Channing Tatum). I'm guessing Adapted for now but that could easily change.

But back to books. Have any of you read any of these pictured? Do you want to?
Which of these ten should I read and write about before the film version?

poll by twiigs.com

WHICHEVER BOOK WINS THIS POLL I PROMISE TO READ / BLOG.

I'll try for two but I will do one. I will,  I will. 

May Flowers? Mrs Dalloway Buys Them Herself!

How soon into a movie or book or anything do you know you'll love it? When I first read The Hours, Michael Cunningham's transcendent riff on Virginia Woolf's "Mrs Dalloway" I knew as soon as Clarissa had entered the flower shop. With the film version I knew even sooner, perhaps having been prepped for the movie by the book but also because of the unfussy simplicity of the kick-off to this glorious triptych. (The Hours isn't always unfussy, of course, but note how the music drops out completely in this absolutely key moment when Virginia finds her first sentence.)

All we're left with is three women, three eras, three great actresses, and three separate temperaments. 

Virginia: Mrs Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself.
Laura: Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself.
Clarissa: Sally, I think I'll buy the flowers myself. 

How utterly perfect and succinct - Art, uttered first in the imagination, is then received and contemplated, and finally lived-in and through, having made its mark. (It's a subtle thing but how beautiful that Stephen Daldry's camera pulls out a bit with each repetition, making more room in the world for the words)

"Mrs Dalloway", Virginia Woolf's masterpiece -- or one of them at least (I can't live without "Orlando") --  was first published 88 years ago on this very day!. The concept, a woman's whole life in a single day. And as the later book and film helpfully extrapolates and reminds us ... and in that day her whole life. 

I love the cut to Allison Janney's blunt exclamation, that pulls us out of this first sentence reverie before it gets to precious.

[to Clarissa] WHAT? What flowers?
[to Self] Shit.

Which  books do you wish would inspire not straight adaptations but spun off works of art that stand beautifully on their own? How soon did you love The Hours?

Previously in The Hours
Nathaniel talks to Nicole Kidman about her Oscar win
Joe & Nick discuss The Hours its kisses, hands, actresses and tics at length 

Review: "The Great Gatsby"

This review originally appeared in my column at Towleroad

"Gatsby. What Gatsby?"

Daisy asks with a rush of girlish 'it can't be!' alarm, her nerves far overpowering the tiny glimmer of hope you think you hear in her voice. Which is as sensible a reaction as anyone could have when hearing about the arrival of another Jay Gatsby in movie theaters. You don't mean THE GREAT GATSBY, do you?

The F Scott Fitzgerald classic is a tough book to crack for filmmakers, its power so tied to its gorgeous (slim) prose, its subtle and cynical evocations and condemnations of American wealth and unspoken caste system. Further complicating adaptations is that the story is subjectively narrated. It's all told by Nick Carraway and his is, despite blood ties to the wealthy, an outsider's point of view. It's an easy book to love but a difficult one to adapt. But Hollywood keeps trying once every thirty years or so. 

The story, if you are unfamiliar (though you won't want to admit that out loud) follows the attempts of the elusive mysterious extremely wealthy Jay Gatsby (Leonardo DiCaprio) to win back his lost love Daisy (Carey Mulligan) who he abandoned many years earlier while penniless to seek his fortune. More...

Click to read more ...

Contest: "On the Road" Autographed by Walter Salles

Here's another contest for you for reader appreciation month... I have three books to give away.

"Enter to win a copy of Jack Kerouac's ON THE ROAD autographed by the film's director, Walter Salles! IFC Films and Sundance Selects Presents ON THE ROAD A film by Walter Salles Based on Jack Kerouac's classic novel Starring Sam Riley, Garrett Hedlund and Kristen Stewart

Check your local listings!"

It's okay if you're a little (okay, a lot) surprised that the movie has finally been released. In fact, just last night at a screening I was telling a friend it had come out and they were like "nope, it came out in December". But no... t'was a one week Oscar qualifier, that. So it opened Friday and will be expanding to more markets in April. Better late than never I suppose but hiding Kristen Stewart's only performance that can hold a candle to her Joan Jett work and keeping Garrett Hedlund's explosive sexiness from the world is a shame. It'll prove the turning point of his career if the right people (i.e. auteurs and casting directors) see it. Oscar traction was always going to be hard to come by since the Academy doesn't at all value youth and sexuality in men the same way they obsess over those qualities in actresses.

If you haven't read "On the Road" it's worth a read. Good for cultural literacy given it's iconic place in history.

I think of Dean Moriarty..."

To enter the contest - I have three autographed books to give away - shoot me an email with name, addy, and a sentence on the longest road trip you ever took... where'd you go?  

Introducing... The Desiring Image

We interrupt our regularly scheduled programming to shill for someone else's. I am thrilled to point you in the direction of "The Desiring Image," a new book on contemporary queer cinema which is available to pre-order now. The author is my great friend / podcast mate Nick Davis and he's been working on this book for nearly as long as I've known him. In addition to covergirl Maxwell Demon (Jonathan Rhys-Meyers) from Todd Haynes' hallucinatory eye candy abundance (better known as Velvet Goldmine), Nick discusses Beau Travail, The Watermelon Woman, Shortbus, and Brother to Brother. I'm dying to imbibe the queer readings of David Cronenberg's Dead Ringers and Naked Lunch. I haven't yet read the book but Nick writes beautifully and his sense of humor is rare in academic writing. I am ordering my copy right now.

[Moments Later...] Done!