Hearts in Atlantis
Nov. 9th, 2002 02:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
thistlechaserI'm a Stephen King fangirl, I've never tried to hide that. One of my favorite things that he wrote was a short story, Hearts in Atlantis. (Well, it wasn't all that short. About a quarter of a normal book by him, so maybe 300 pages or so.) Amazing tale, especially if you had read his other books and knew the Dark Tower meta-plot which runs through most of his books.
When it came out in the theaters last winter, I was determined to see it. It was the first movie I really, really wanted to see in a long time. Of course I couldn't make myself take time off to see it, and eventually the theaters stopped showing it. So, when I saw a used DVD for sale, I grabbed it. Luckily my PS2 played it easily and perfectly.
Of course, the movie was very little like the story. It was good, but the book had been amazing. Unfortunately they changed the best part, the ending. In the book, the Low Men were beings from another... world. Sort of. (It's kind of complex, they're not aliens but they're not humans.) They finally catch up with Ted (the adult main character), and he and Bobby (young boy, other main character) are captured. Bobby begs for Ted's release. The Low Men shows their real faces, and offer to take Bobby back to their world in Ted's place.
In most books, most characters would do the "noble" thing and go in his place, to assure his friend freedom and all that. Bobby chooses his own freedom and lets these monster-things take Ted, the man he loves like a father and a best friend, away. A real life person would make that choice, but how many characters? And it's not that Bobby was a bad kid, he was just being *human*.
In the movie Ted was captured without Bobby being around, so Bobby never had to make the choice. A poor, poor decision on the director's/writer's/whoever's part, if you ask me.
When it came out in the theaters last winter, I was determined to see it. It was the first movie I really, really wanted to see in a long time. Of course I couldn't make myself take time off to see it, and eventually the theaters stopped showing it. So, when I saw a used DVD for sale, I grabbed it. Luckily my PS2 played it easily and perfectly.
Of course, the movie was very little like the story. It was good, but the book had been amazing. Unfortunately they changed the best part, the ending. In the book, the Low Men were beings from another... world. Sort of. (It's kind of complex, they're not aliens but they're not humans.) They finally catch up with Ted (the adult main character), and he and Bobby (young boy, other main character) are captured. Bobby begs for Ted's release. The Low Men shows their real faces, and offer to take Bobby back to their world in Ted's place.
In most books, most characters would do the "noble" thing and go in his place, to assure his friend freedom and all that. Bobby chooses his own freedom and lets these monster-things take Ted, the man he loves like a father and a best friend, away. A real life person would make that choice, but how many characters? And it's not that Bobby was a bad kid, he was just being *human*.
In the movie Ted was captured without Bobby being around, so Bobby never had to make the choice. A poor, poor decision on the director's/writer's/whoever's part, if you ask me.
