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‘One of our favourite books is Homer’s The Odyssey,’ Ronald Bergan has quoted the Coen brother’s to have said in their biography. ... The opening credits of their 2000 feature film O Brother, Where Art Thou? claims to be ‘based upon “The Odyssey” by Homer.’ The adaptation of literature into film has arguably been a constant since its earliest beginnings, with many having been based upon nineteenth and twentieth century novels, which are renowned within their own literary field. Morris Beja concluded in his book Film and Literature, that ‘…the percentage of American films derived from novels as between 20 and 30 per cent of the total released each year, adding that three-quarters of the best awards at the Academy have gone to adaptations, and that of the top twenty money-earning films of all time reported by Variety in 1977, fourteen were based on novels. ... Nevertheless, are we just in comparing literature to film?, considering ‘…changes are inevitable the moment one abandons the linguistic for the visual medium…[with] the end products of novel and film represent[ing] different aesthetic genera, as different from each other as ballet is from architecture. The film becomes a different thing in the same sense that a historical painting becomes a different thing from the historical event which it illustrates. It is as fruitless to say that film A is better or worse than novel B as it is to pronounce Wright Johnson’s Wax Building better or worse than Tchaikowsky’s Swan Lake…, each is autonomous, and each is characterised by unique and specific properties. ... Consequently, this chapter is to examine the process of adapting literature into film, concentrating upon epic literature and film, and using as examples, both Homer’s Odyssey and the Coen brother’s film O Brother, Where Art Thou? ... Though attributing its continuous popularity to film is highly questionable. ...
“EPIC” FILM
Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey emerged from the mythology of the ancient Greeks. ... The ancient epic in cinema is a term which is widely used when describing a film which has been set in antiquity. ... Consequently, it is plain to see that defining epic in film is a great deal harder than that in literature, perhaps mainly due to the fact that the word epic is almost always identified with those works that are of a literary nature. ... It may [now] well embody concepts such as “monumental”, “large-scale”, “far-reaching”, “inspiring”, “awesome” – it is in these senses that it is most used colloquially…’ (Elley 1984:9) and used in this manner when talking of epic in association with film, reinventing its original meaning. ...
EPIC LITERATRUE EQUALS EPIC FILM?
The relationship between literature and film has arguably always been ‘…overtly compatible, secretly hostile. ... The adaptation of literature into film has always been a popular theme with filmmakers, with often several remakes occurring based upon the same book or play, for example. ... Nevertheless, there are those such as Morris Beja who argue ‘…that written stories (novels) and filmed stories (film/TV) are but two forms of a single art: the art of narrative literature, which he defines as any work which recounts a sequence of events, a story.
Approximate Word count = 2551
Approximate Pages = 10.2
(250 words per page double spaced)
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