by Jonathan Maberry
This might be the first time I've ever read a tie-in book (a book based on the film rather than the other way around), and the 'hollywood'ization of the plot is pretty obvious from the start. Things in this book happen in a formulaic way - they have to, because that's the way it happens in big budget films. The novel retains many elements from the 1941 film of the same name, but goes into new territory with Lawrence's history of mental illness and Sir John's role.
The Wolfman (and the Werewolf) is the major villain of the piece, and it suffers in my opinion from a common disease amongst Hollywood monsters, similar to the effects of gamma radiation: the monster is unusually large, impossibly strong, uncontrollable, and invulnerable to conventional attack. All it needed was green fur to complete the look. Maybe I'm being a purist, but the werewolf monster is meant to combine the predatory skills of a wolf (speed, superior sense of smell and hearing, and natural weapons in the form of teeth) with the cunning and intelligence of a man. Making the wolfman 8 foot tall with sharp claws, hyper-senses, and super strength was a departure from the myth, and felt unnecessary. If they'd reigned it in a little, the wolfman would be more about stalking and trapping his victims, and less about violent mayhem, and that's what I was expecting.
Werewolves occupy unique territory for me. The idea of a werewolf is compelling, particularly when it is not realized in the direct terms of wolf and man. I'm thinking of Jekyll and Hyde, or Norman Bates and his mother. A man and a monster occupying the same body. There's a lot of fertile ground there. Once the fur and fangs come in, though, it is easy to descend into the basic werewolf formula: unbeliever is bitten, transforms, becomes a believer, tries to kill a loved one, and dies.
One of the things that surprised me when I read this book was the character descriptions. I haven't seen the movie and don't plan to, so I had no idea that Sir John, described as "tall and imposing", was played by Anthony Hopkins. Sir Anthony is 5'9" - hardly an imposing height. I was picturing someone more along the lines of Ian McKellan, or Peter O'Toole. And likewise to think that the "brutally handsome" Lawrence was portrayed by this man. It's amazing how even in a tie-in novel, the characters can seem vastly different in the reader's head than in the author's.
And may I also say, Maberry missed a real opportunity in that section by not describing Lawrence's hair as perfect.
Maberry has skill with description, setting and dialogue, but I think this particular book was severely hampered by the script he had to use. They hired a good writer to try to make a novel from an unwieldy plot. Consider Chapter 42, where Sir John appears in Lawrence's cell and explains away several questions about what has happened so far. A common tactic in films (I refer to it as "A Visit from the Department of Backstory"), but it comes off as an info dump in a novel. The love interest was forced and hollow - the two characters hardly exchange any dialogue before they inexplicably hook up.
Bottom line, I would have enjoyed seeing this story naturally develop in the hands of a skilled author without having to hold to the expectations of a blockbuster. I suspect it would have turned out much differently.
Argh, Blogger ate my comment. I was saying I wondered if perhaps Maberry wrote this book adaptation before the film was fully cast.
ReplyDeleteI wondered the same thing - Del Toro was attached to the project as early as 2006, and Hopkins confirmed his involvement a year later. Maberry's adaptation was released the same day the film came out, and he said in an interview he wrote it in seven weeks, so I'm guessing he knew the cast. But who knows? Maybe he took creative license.
ReplyDeleteNow, I liked the novelization far more than I did the movie, but I also wondered how the story would've unfolded if Maberry didn't have the script to follow. The potential for an awesome story is there, but it needed to be freed from Hollywood to really develop into something great
ReplyDeleteMaybe Maberry relied more on Sir Anthony just being way imposing to pull off the description, rather than his actual height. From what I remember in the movie, there were a lot of scenes that placed him above Del Toro, like on the stairs, or being over him in his cell in the asylum.
ReplyDeleteIt's funny, when I thought "brutally handsome" I thought of someone that has the kind of look that people either think is totally hot or is way ugly, and I think Del Toro fits that bill. A face that in some instances can look enticing, and in other instances...animalistic (dun dun DUUUNNN!)
I too feel like the book was crippled by the Hollywood script. There were a ton of instances where I stopped and thought... I would have done this differently. Or pondered a "what if the character did this instead?" I love how you call the idea "fertile ground." That's exactly how I saw it. Alas, it was mostly planted with Hollyweeds.
ReplyDeleteMaberry was limited by his ability to change the plot since this book is a novelization of the 2010 film, which is loosely based on the script from the original 1941 film. The film by the way is beautifully shot, brilliantly cast, and pays homage to the Universal films of the past in a way that brought tears to my eyes.
ReplyDeleteAnd, in case there is still confusion, Benicio del Toro is absolutely gorgeous.