50 best book-to-film adaptations

Michael Hanscom did it, and even Jason Kottke linked to him – so I might as well be a follower. Besides, I’m sure most of my friends will love going through this list: the 50 best film adaptations of all time

Movies I’ve seen are marked with and M, and books I’ve read are marked with a B – just in case you couldn’t figure that out. After going through it you can also go leave a comment on kottke and complain about the lack of love for Tolkien along with all the other geeks 😛

    [B] 1984
    [BM] Alice in Wonderland
    [M] American Psycho
    [M] Breakfast at Tiffany’s
    Brighton Rock
    [BM] Catch 22
    [M] Charlie & the Chocolate Factory
    [M] A Clockwork Orange I read half the book and never finished it
    Close Range (inc Brokeback Mountain)
    The Day of the Triffids
    Devil in a Blue Dress
    [M] Different Seasons (inc The Shawshank Redemption)
    [BM] Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (aka Bladerunner) all you PKD lovers can scream and yell all you like, but I think the movie is far superior
    Doctor Zhivago
    [M] Empire of the Sun
    The English Patient
    [BM] Fight Club
    The French Lieutenant’s Woman
    [M] Get Shorty
    [M] The Godfather
    Goldfinger
    [M] Goodfellas
    [M] Heart of Darkness (aka Apocalypse Now)
    The Hound of the Baskervilles
    [M] Jaws
    [M] The Jungle Book
    A Kestrel for a Knave (aka Kes)
    [M] LA Confidential
    Les Liaisons Dangereuses well, I’ve seen two versions of it, but not the “truest” adaptation
    Lolita
    [BM] Lord of the Flies
    [M] The Maltese Falcon
    Oliver Twist
    [M] One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
    [M] Orlando
    [M] The Outsiders
    Pride and Prejudice
    The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
    The Railway Children
    Rebecca
    The Remains of the Day
    Schindler’s Ark (aka Schindler’s List)
    [M] Sin City I recently started reading the first book – must get back into it
    The Spy Who Came in From the Cold
    [M] The Talented Mr Ripley
    Tess of the D’Urbervilles
    [B] To Kill a Mockingbird
    [BM] Trainspotting
    The Vanishing
    [BM] Watership Down

I’ve both read and seen 7 of them, with another couple in the works – better than I would have expected.

3 thoughts on “50 best book-to-film adaptations”

  1. Just a bit of advice – BM is not a good marking for anything. MB would have even been better. On another note – I can’t believe you’ve never seen a version of Pride and Prejudice. And I’m gonna tell mom you never saw Dr. Zhivago or To Kill a Mockingbird. Another interesting tidbit – do you know Harper Lee only lives an hour away from me. She still hangs out in the town the book is based on.

  2. Yeah, I thought of that, too. But that’s how people were marking them – and it makes sense because the book came first. I do want to at least see the latest version of Pride and Prejudice as I heard that was excellent. And I’ve seen lots of parts of Dr. Z and To Kill a Mockingbird since you guys watched them when I was a kid, but never watched them entirely. I really loved Mockingbird when I read it in school, and am not really sure why I never watched the movie.

  3. Misery and/or Pet Semetary were robbed. one of those should have made the list. (unless maybe i’m the only person alive who feels as though aliens were spying on my brain the entire time i was reading the books and transmitting my imagination to the person[s] responsible for the screenplays.)

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