I’m sure by now, many of you have heard of the movie and the book The Fault In Our Stars by John Green. If you have not, allow me to wake you up: Stop living in a cave!
Now that you are awake, time for a short catch up on how The Fault In Our Stars (TFIOS) come about.
Spoilers & a tsunami of words ahead (Read on if you dare)
So basically, TFIOS is a fiction book which depicts a story about this cancer patient, Hazel. She have to use a portable oxygen tank to breathe for her lungs failed to be lungs. Hazel was forced to the cancer support group by her mother and there she met Augustus Waters. Augustus Waters have been cured from cancer causing him to have one humanly leg left. Not that he only have one leg, he have two but one of them is prosthetic. Augustus main purpose there was to support his partially blind friend, Issac.
When the session end, Gus (Augustus) approached Hazel to tell her she resembles Natalie Portman from V for Vendetta and they went back to his place for a movie. They bonded over their stories of life and exchanged books recommendation; Hazel recommended her favorite title of all, An Imperial Affliction while Gus gave Hazel The Price of Dawn, his favorite video game which was made into a book.
After a few days Gus finish reading Hazel’s book and he felt in love with it. Upon discussion of An Imperial Affliction, Issac broke up with his girlfriend before going into surgery. He tried to get over his break up at Gus’s basement, playing The Price of Dawn. When that didn’t work, Issac was given permission to break Gus’s basketball trophies.
Shortly after, Gus and Hazel devised a plan and contacted Peter Van Houten, author of An Imperial Affliction. Van Houten’s assistant reply on behalf of him, inviting them to Amsterdam.
Since, Hazel have used her wish meant for kids with cancer to wish herself to Disneyland when she was a child, Gus gave her his wish and wished them to Van Houten’s place in Amsterdam.
Hazel soon have an episode and ended up in the ICU. Her doctor advised her not to leave the country. However, after some discussion, Hazel’s psychiatrist finally allowed her to travel.
With that, Hazel’s mother, Hazel and Gus flew to Amsterdam. There, Hazel & Gus met Van Houten and his assistant Lidewij. Van Houten was a non-hostile aged man whose actions clearly states that he doesn’t want to talk about his book or want Hazel and Gus to be in his home.
Subsequent to Hazel and Gus storming out of Van Houten’s house, Lidewij chased after them and brought them to Anna’s, the main character of An Imperial Affliction, museum. In the museum, Hazel had her first kiss with Gus and that leads to:
On the last day of the trip, Augustus broke the bad news of his cancer recurring to Hazel. They flew back home.
When they went back, Augustus requested for Hazel and Issac to write a eulogy each for his funeral. He also set up his pre-funeral for himself so that he can listen to their eulogy for him.
Augustus died 8 days later. On the day of his funeral, Van Houten was present. He tried to explain to Hazel what happened to Anna’s family after Anna passed but Hazel just simply ignored him. After some disruption, Hazel learned from Issac that Gus wrote a eulogy for her, sent it to Van Houten for editing and they were sent to Hazel.
With that, the story have concluded with Hazel reading Gus’s last words to her and her being happy with her choice in love.
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So basically, that’s the skeleton of TFIOS. If you want a more detailed version, go read the book / the pdf.
With that idea in your head, time for the movie review:
Overall, as a fan of John Green books’ I felt that this movie does not fully depict what TFIOS is about. Many details regarding the story are missing from the existence of Hazel’s best friend to the elevator scene which every reader longed for.
The reason to why I would fall for TFIOS is because of the details which were depicted in the book. Aside from that, the description of each character’s exact emotion was an added bonus.
I guess the real reason to why people who have read the book were enraged and unhappy when they saw the movie was because:
- Lack of details
Emotions, facial expression and microscopic movements. These were the things that make John Green’s books perfect. These are the things that will help us get in the character’s mind, help us connect with the character and emotionally in tune with them. Without these things we are just staring at a few pounds of meat in motion.
- Missing scene & characters
Although some character seemed like useless unnoticeable background, readers still do remember them for they help shape who the main character is. As they say, your friends do partake in shaping the person you have become now.
Aside from characters, scenes are also important for they too help set the mood and connect the dots. This allow the movie have a regular flow throughout instead of just PLOP, a cut out scene PLOP, another cut out scene, join them together and that makes a movie!
- High expectations
Given the unbelievably high standard which TFIOS the book have set, readers would be expected to be touched to tears when the movie come out. However, when they came to learn that the movie was so rushed through, they are infuriated.
- Cast issues
We all do realized that in life sometimes the handsome couple would not work out. In fact, your perfect match might not be someone which matches your facial features. Thus, in order to evaluate the cast issue, looks have to be put aside. Instead I would like to side track to another one of the most recently released movie, Divergent.
For this movie, the only thing you need to know is the female lead, Beatrice ‘Tris’ Priorplayed by Shailene Woodley and the male lead, Caleb Prior played by Ansel Elgort were siblings in Divergent.
However, in TFIOS, they were casted as lovers. I think this have caused fans of both TFIOS and Divergent to have their mind blended and slightly sick to their stomach at the same time. I mean, who would want to kiss their brother / sister?
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In conclusion, I would say that for TFIOS, it’s book over movie.
