Stardust
We rented the movie Stardust a little while ago. It is a very entertaining film, based on a book I’d never heard of. This week I got the book from the local library.
Stardust the film owes a lot to The Princess Bride, which remains one of my favorite films. Stardust has the same light hearted, fairy tale themes as The Princess Bride, perhaps with a bit more slapstick and more camp.
Stardust the book is entertaining in it’s own right, but it’s kind of disappointing compared to the movie. It’s just too serious; compared to the film, it seems almost pretentious. The story is mostly the same, except that they added stuff for the movie to make it more dramatic, entertaining and fun. You would think converting a 230 page book into a 2 hour film would involve lots of cutting and glossing over. But not in this case. Sure, there are a few details in the book that are left out, or not well explained in the movie. But what they added more than makes up for what was removed. Many of the most entertaining scenes in the movie are absent from the book. Many of the most entertaining characters in the movie are boring and one dimensional in the book.
Read the book. It’s a good book. Then watch the movie and see how they made it better. More entertaining. Sillier.
