Several Intertubers have declared where they stand on the perennial problem of how seldom the makers of movies capture the magic of the books they often base their movies on. Here are some of those opinions that I’ve recently come across on Facebook:
Found via Facebook post by Benjamin Taylor
FlavorWire recently posted a series of photos and/or videos of ten bookshops depicted in various movies, television shows, and novels.
Don’t overlook, in the description to one of these photos, the link provided to a blogpost at The Yellow Library featuring multiple stills of the enchanting bookshop featured in the Academy Award-winning movie Hugo, based on the Caldecott Medal-winning book The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick.
Selznick’s book, of course, is available at your local public library…as will – eventually – the DVD of Scorses’s movie for those who aren’t lucky enough to see it on The Big Screen, or who want to see the movie again some day.
Found via Shelf Awareness
This year’s Oscar nominees were announced earlier this week, and Shelf Awareness notes that “six of the nine best picture nominations…are based on books.”
Shelf Awareness’ handy rundown of the details are here, for readers who’d like to consult the list and read the books those movies were adapted from.
According to a recent blogpost at The Private Library, every year approximately 30 English-language movies that are based on books are released in the United States.
To keep up with the newest releases – such as several movies that will be premiered in Atlanta theatres later this month – you can consult Bookreporter.com’s Books into Movies.
To check on the bookish origins of older movies – according to the Internet Movie Database, over 28,500 of them – you can check one of the numerous databases listed in the Booklover’s Toolbox under the heading “Movies Based on Books.”
The Central Library (and the Sandy Springs Branch) also own a printed resource that you could check for information on book-based films released between 1928 and 2001: Enser’s Filmed Books and Plays.
You might just find yourself including in your reading for 2010 the book that inspired one of your favorite films. Chances are that your local library will own a copy of it; if it doesn’t, you can ask for it via inter-branch or interlibrary loan.
The movie Julie & Julia opens in theaters this Friday, and is sure to spark renewed interest in Julia Child.
By the time she died (in 2004) at age 91, Child had, through the magic of television, become famous throughout the world.
Your public library system has dozens of books and videos by and about Julia Child. A list of them has been posted to What’s New at AFPLS?
While you’re waiting for the lines at the movie theater to get shorter, you might enjoy these Child-related Internet treats:
Bon appetit!
The film version of another Harry Potter book opens in this week. Like its predecessors, the movie’s debut will spawn another wave of high demand at all public libraries for the books of J.K. Rowling’s that the Potter films are based upon. If you’re one of the millions of adult readers who’ve enjoyed reading one or more Potter books – you might, after seeing the latest movie and re-reading the book – consider examining a very extensive list of Potter “readalikes” compiled last summer. The list is annotated and contains links to similar lists compiled by numerous public libraries.
Or try any of these links to additional annotated lists – many of them specifically tailored to adult (vs. teenage) readers – compiled by librarians at other U.S. libraries:
The books recommended on these lists – as well as all the books in Rowling’s Potter series – are available at the Atlanta-Fulton Public Library. But be warned: unless you act quickly by placing Holds on the titles that interest you, you may have to wait for them until the latest wave of Pottermania has passed.
May 2009 marks the 150th anniversary of the birth of the creator of Sherlock Holmes, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Fans of Doyle’s writings might enjoy browsing (from the comfort of the chair in front of their computer screen) the Toronto Public Library’s virtual exhibit of the items in their Doyle Collection. (Did you know Doyle made four visits to Canada?)
Meanwhile, the City of Westminster Library has posted an online exhibit of information about Doyle’s extensive nonfiction works. (Did you know that Doyle published poetry as well as detective novels, and wrote extensively on – among many other topics – spiritualism?)
The Atlanta-Fulton Public Library System owns many of Doyle’s works (some in audiobook format as well as in print format), and numerous books about him, including the recently published Adventures of Arthur Conan Doyle: A Biography by Russell Miller.
Found at the Librarians’ Internet Index
Postscript: Renewed popular interest in Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories is likely to result from the upcoming release of a new movie this coming Christmas. Robert Downey, Jr. plays Holmes, and Jude Law plays his side-kick Dr. Watson.
Atlanta Booklover's Blog 