Of Mice And Men: A Comprehensive Comparison Of Novel And Movie Essay, Research Paper
Of Mice and Men: A Comprehensive Comparison of Novel and Movie
Who doesn & # 8217 ; t cognize of John Steinbeck & # 8217 ; s authoritative novel & # 8220 ; Of Mice and Men & # 8221 ; ? It
is a novel that about everyone educated in the United States has either read it
or pretended to read it. But how many have seen the 1992 movie & # 8220 ; Of Mice and
Men & # 8221 ; ? The comparative obscureness of 1992 screen version of this dateless play does
non intend that it was ill done. Just the contrary is true, it is one of the
best movie versions of a novel that I have seen. The novel and the movie are
really similar. The Steinbeck & # 8217 ; s novel could be though of as the screenplay & # 8217 ; s
foremost bill of exchange. There were some little alterations, but they were instituted for the
good of the movie. I liked the movie better than Steinbeck & # 8217 ; s novel.
& # 8220 ; Of Mice and Men & # 8221 ; is a narrative of people who express their problems
clearly, keeping on to thin dreams as they go about their thankless concern.
The novel, set in the 1930s, is a narrative of friendly relationship of migratory workers George
Milton and Lennie Smalls. The brace travels from spread to ranch, dreaming of
someday doing adequate money so they can purchase their ain secret plan of land and a interest
in their hereafter. George is a father figure and defender of the strong simple-
minded Lennie. Lennie & # 8217 ; s strength is his gift and his expletive. Like the kid he
is mentally, he loves animate beings, but he unwittingly crushes them to decease.
Womans, to him, are instead like animate beings, & # 8212 ; soft, little, and gentle. And there
lies the tenseness that powers this narrative to its tragic decision.
The movie version and the novel are really similar. There is minimum
description in the novel, plenty to put the scene, and the remainder is duologue.
The movie & # 8217 ; s narrative is really pure and thin as Steinbeck & # 8217 ; s original.
Producer/director Gary Sinise and screenwriter Horton Foote don & # 8217 ; t seek do
anything fancy, they don & # 8217 ; t seek to do it anything other than precisely what it is,
a dateless simple narrative. Sinise and Foote make American Literature instructors
everyplace proud ; they have left the movie & # 8217 ; s narrative unlittered. Everything is
really clear, and makes sense within its context. They remembered & # 8220 ; Of Mice and
Work force is a authoritative for a ground, and if it ain & # 8217 ; t broke, wear & # 8217 ; t repair it.
The screenplay and the novel are non synonymous but they are really near
to being that manner. Sinise and Foote held really true in their version. All of
the alterations made were minor and to nil to take away from the narrative. There
were many more scenes in the movie than the novel. It is credible to believe the
novel was originally a drama and so was adapted into book signifier because there
are merely four different scenes in the full novel. Chapter one is set at the
Salinas River, chapter two and three are in the bunkhouse, chapter four in
Crook & # 8217 ; s room, chapter five is in the barn, and chapter six is at the river once more.
Scenes had to be added to the movie to maintain the audience from acquiring bored.
Dialogue was deleted to assist travel the narrative along. The lone manner we get
background information about George and Lennie in the novel is through their
duologue. There was less duologue in the movie because the audience can larn
the background information from ocular cues from the added scenes. For case,
in the novel, George and Lennie speak of walking 10 stat mis after being forced
off the coach by the driver. But in the movie, we see the driver kick the brace off
of the coach. Similarly, George merely speaks of the problem that Lennie had gotten
them into in the town of Weed. But in the film we are able to see what happens.
Curley & # 8217 ; s married woman, played by Sherilyn Fenn, plays a larger function in this movie
than in the novel. This character steadily develops as beds are peeled back
like an onion. The married woman in this version is far more marauding and unsafe
than in Steinbeck & # 8217 ; s novel. Initially she acts rather blowsy, but she
finally shows to be naif, lonely, and trapped in an opprobrious matrimony. She
Acts of the Apostless as a feminist voice that Steinbeck likely ne’er intended.
The movie version is different because downplays the novel & # 8217 ; s political
subtext, a call for humane socialism where people take attention of one another.
Alternatively, the movie version focuses on the human status on the single degree
merely. We are given characters, a scene, and events. The play of this narrative
comes from two work forces who have formed a friendly relationship that works & # 8211 ; they have a bond in
which each takes harmonizing to his demands and gives harmonizing to his abilities.
The two chief characters genuinely need each other. When George is non at that place, Lennie
would acquire into problem and when Lennie is non at that place, George would believe of
throwing away his dreams.
I liked the movie better than the novel for several grounds. The novel gave
good descriptions of the characters but I learned more about them and the narrative
organize the movie because I was watching and listening to them, instead than merely
reading about them. John Malkovich & # 8217 ; s ( Lennie ) , Gary Sinise & # 8217 ; s ( George ) , and Ray
Walton & # 8217 ; s ( Candy ) public presentations made the movie really worthwhile. Malkovich and
Sinise are touching and enjoyable to watch together. Malkovich uses his
phalacrosis with bulky costumes to go convincingly big and stupid. He takes
the clip to demo us that the wheels are turning really easy and
uncomprehendingly beneath his wide brow. Many histrions would hold easy
overacted playing Lennie. They & # 8217 ; d stop up looking cartoonish, but Malkovich does
good because he exercises singular restraint. Sinise does a batch for this movie
by making less. He lets Malkovich & # 8217 ; s character be the attending getter, while he
does good in the quieter caretaking function. Sherilyn Fenn impressed me in
showing a new return on Curley & # 8217 ; s married woman. But Ray Walston as Candy may hold
turned in the movie & # 8217 ; s best public presentation. All Candy had in life was his old smelly
Canis familiaris, but one of the spread custodies shot him because & # 8220 ; he was of no usage any longer & # 8221 ; .
Walston delivers the best lines of the film when he says, & # 8220 ; I wish person would
shoot me when I & # 8217 ; m of no usage any longer. But they won & # 8217 ; t, they & # 8217 ; ll merely direct me
away. & # 8221 ;
The movie is a success because it was good photographed. The movie
captured some of California & # 8217 ; s picturesque aureate wheat Fieldss. The full movie
was really reasonably but it possibly excessively reasonably. I had pictured Candy and Slim to be
more soiled and grizzled work forces. I thought Ray Walston looked a small excessively lame
to play Candy but his playing made up for any defects he had in his
visual aspect. Slim looked a small excessively immature and fine-looking to be the character I
had envisioned. Overall, the casting and picture taking was first-class.
Another ground why I liked the movie better was because of its dramatic
decision. At the terminal of the novel we know what that George has Carlson & # 8217 ; s gun
and so we know what is traveling to go on. At the terminal of the movie, we don & # 8217 ; Ts know
George has the gun and we can & # 8217 ; t see that he is keeping the gun to the dorsum of
Lennie & # 8217 ; s caput. This makes for a really dramatic stoping. Because I read the novel,
I knew what was traveling to go on, but I still was really drawn into the action.
The movie was a really good version of a great book. It is a fantastic
narrative of friendly relationship, solitariness, and hurting. This was an first-class movie because it
was dramatic but it ne’er went excessively far and became cockamamie and overdone. This movie
is great because the Godheads realized how of import the original text was in
doing this movie. They did non gull around with it ; the narrative says all they
privation to state.
