Film of the Book: Room

Posted on the 02 October 2016 by Lucybirdbooks @lucybirdbooks

Note: This review contains spoilers for the film and book of Room

I wanted to watch Still Alice when I watched this, but netflix was being stupid so I watched Room on amazon instead, which turned out to be a good choice I think.

I rather enjoyed the book of Room which made me in equal parts excited about the film and anxious because so often films just don’t do the book justice.

It’s been a long time since I read it, so I probably forgot a few finer details, and the film reminded me of some others. Generally though I thought that Room was a good portrayal of the book.

As the book is told in a first person narrative I was unsure how well it would translate to film without having Jack speaking throughout, but actually they did it well. The way the story was still focused as Jack would see it was good, and sometimes Jack would say things ‘in his head’ but not to the point where it seemed pointless for it to be a film.

I found the suicide part of the storyline more hardhitting in the film than I remember it being in the book, maybe because you actually saw the suicide, which I have a feeling you didn’t in the book (feel free to correct me, it has been a long time).

They did miss some bits out though which I think might add something. The most notable thing left out for me was the stillborn baby which had come before Jack. Although I did see a hint towards it in the film it was only through what was seen by the viewer and I don’t think it would have been read that was by someone who didn’t have prior knowledge of the storyline

Buy:

DVD (£4.99)

Streamed film(from £9.99)

Book (£6.29)