Read The Book / Don't Read The Book...

Rating: 5/10 (13 November 2008)

I first saw The Beach maybe six years ago, and at the time thought it was a good enough film. It still is. However, I agree with most of the people who've posted comments about the movie that have also read the novel by Alex Garland.
After telling my friend about the movie, he said he'd read the novel a couple of years before, and he couldn't stop banging on about the severely altered and missing parts.
Now, let me say, I am quite accepting of movie versions of novels making one or two minor changes to the novel and leaving lesser incidents out, but this film took it to a whole new level.
Lead character Richard's nationality has been swapped from British to American and vice versa for Sal, the commune's leader-of-sorts. There is no inclusion at all in the movie of, for me, one of the novel's defining characters: Jed. Also, in the novel, Richard has no sexual relations with either Francoise or Sal(except for in his head). These are only a couple of the issues I had.
My final gripe is the alteration of the ending. There is no reason to change the finale of the novel. Sure it's depiction is rather graphic but if film classification boards allow films like Goodfellas and Fight Club (which is also based on a novel) to be released, then there is no valid reason at all to dramatically alter a superb ending in favour of a mundane, happy one that we've all seen a million times.
If you particularly love the film, I'd say don't read the book. You'd probably end up with an opinion similar to mine. If you love the book, you'll probably have seen the film, and will have many of the same issues that I do.
The novel is screaming out for a faithful adaptation.