SHELF TO SILVERSCREEN, VERSE TO VISION.
Ashleshaa Khurana.

‘Don’t judge a book by its movie’ reads a sign at India’s leading bookstore. It never fails to bring a knowing smirk to the lips of book lovers. Movie buffs however, couldn’t disagree more; if a picture speaks a thousand words, a movie, surely speaks millions.

Books trigger one’s imagination, build anticipation, stay with you for days and provide detailed nuances of its characters. Cinema breathes life into those characters, in a short span of time unveils the excitement of the story, giving visual and musical appeal that remains ingrained in our photographic memory forever.

Mario Puzo’s The Godfather, immediately brings to mind Marlon Brando’s best known work. The film gave us Al Pacino, James Caan, Robert Duvall to name a few. While lines of the book,’ leave the gun, take the cannoli’,’Im gonna make him an offer he can’t refuse’ are used worldwide as quotes to live by, it’s the scenes from the film that made viewers feel the chill of this ,Francis Ford Copolla’s’ Godfather of all gangster movies.’ For the dead horse in bed shot, they actually got a dead horse’s head from a dog house!

Other than the millions spent over it, cinema making brings along with it, a whole load of new, unknown challenges that book authors do not have to face. Like for Jaws. Based on the book by Peter Benchley, that Steven Spielberg converted into one of the scariest movies ever made. While Spielberg knew exactly how much to hide and reveal to scare viewers, the shark was never tested in water after being built. The beast with hydraulic innards sank straight to the bottom of the ocean’s floor when put in Martha’s Vineyard and it took a team of divers to get it back!

In spite of the plot already being revealed, it’s the magic of the movies that lures the audience to have a dekko at adaptation, predestined scenes of how the lovers will meet, how the hero will vanquish the villain. It is the brilliance of the script and direction along with talented actors that have watchers rolling in the aisles, laughing out loud and bawling their eyes out in public. On the first day of shoot for Alfred Hitchcock’s ace, Psycho, the entire crew was made to raise their right hand and take an oath of secrecy to not divulge the story and its end was withheld by Hitchcock till they needed to shoot it. The shower scene that went 'stabbity stab stab' was scary enough to make viewers wary of ever taking one alone.

Tom Hanks unbeatable, guffaw worthy sentimental drama in and as Forrest Gump,
Bridget Jones’s battle with her age, weight, job and love life in Helen Fielding’s, Diary can only be imagined and understood with the angst of Renée Zellweger.
What verse would be able to describe the then handsome Mickey Rourke’s sensuous seduction of the voluptuous Kim Bassinger, from 9 1/2 weeks?
Could a reader imagine the magnitude of BenHur and its spectacular chariot race, or how macho Rambo was without Sylvester Stallone’s projection; David Morrell’s books that James Cameron’s First Blood were based on had knives and guns on the cover!

Movies travel countries and speak one language, which books unfortunately cannot, being restricted to the language they are written in and often their soul gets lost in translation. It is Cinema that succeeds in transporting talent from verse to vision.

Writer Abhijat Joshi’s favourite pick is, "Pather Panchali because it’s sheer poetry. " Envisage the delight in the scene where Apu and Durga run through Kaash fields to catch a glimpse of the chugging train, from Satyajit Ray’s film on Bibutibhushan Bandhopadhyay’s Bengali novel, considered one of the greatest films of all times.

Culture of Cinema and literacy co-exists and lives off each other creating art from art. Writer Esther David’s choice is the Spanish film,’Like Water for chocolate ‘,based on Mexican writer Laura Esquivel’s novel its,’ Honest to the book’s story line, since the writer did the screenplay herself as well, the film is a celebration of traditions handed down by a generation of Mexican women. Both the book and the film have a mystical, fairytale like quality. Both compliment each other as the characters come alive on screen and fire your imagination with the use of literature and cinematic magic.’

Nothing can beat the sight of your precious cherubic charmers giggling to visuals of, William Steig’s, Shrek, or see them slurp while watching Willie Wonka’s chocolate factory, based on Roald Dahl’s book or watch their jaws drop on seeing ‘real’ Dinosaurs in Jurassic Park.

While teens are patient enough to page through the amazing J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series with its mystical pronunciations, men muster courage to complete the extensive and fabulous J.R Tolkiens, Lord of the Rings and women would give anything to make the Twilight series last forever, just like its lead characters Edward and Jacob, it’s the celluloid charm that lends life and brilliance to these fantasies that then last in the mind forever. Shut your eyes and you will know.

Who would know how suave and sexy Ian Flemings' Bond is, had not Sean Connery, Roger Moore, Daniel Craig and gang shown us. How we have loved the manipulative Scarlett-Vivien Leigh and roguish Rhett Butler-Clarke Gable from Gone With The Wind.How we have danced with Waheeda Rehman’s ambitions in ,’aaj phir jeene ki tamnna hai”that picturised the essence of Dev Anand’s soulful journey based on R.K.Narayan’s book, The Guide.

Shakespeare’s brilliant plots converted into pictorial presence in our very own laugh a minute riot ,Gulzar’s Angoor,in Vishal Bhardwaj’s rustic Maqbool, Omkara and legendary Akira Kurosawa‘s adaptations of Macbeth and King Lear amongst other greats.

Whether its classics like Wuthering heights or Jane Austen’s Pride and prejudice, or Actor Konkona Sen Sharma’s choice -Stanley Kubrick’s satirical science fiction,’A clockwork Orange’ from Anthony Burgess’s novel by the same name and according to her ‘Superb, both the book and film.”, Movies manage to make books memorable.

Books and Films are the world’s favourite pastime .They make us realize what love and life is when we are moist eyed as we read and watch ‘love means never having to say you’re sorry’ and our minds go 'dola rey dola.'