Unfortunately, There Are Books That Will Never Be Made into Movies…

Posting earlier about the film version of Kerouac‘s “On The Road” at Cannes got me thinking about the novels I’ve gotten attached to in my life that will never be made into movies. Some of them should be, but, due to author preferences or interpretive difficulty or some other reason, won’t.

The one that comes to mind first is “Catcher in the Rye.” Having been disappointed at the way one of his early short stories was committed to film, Salinger vowed it would never happen again and kept all his remaining work from becoming “properties.” The number of young actors who would have killed to play Holden Caulfield goes beyond counting… and there are certainly directors who would have been willing to commit immense amounts of time to such a project. Can you imagine a Mike Nichols directed “Catcher?”

Thinking of Salinger, it is also a shame that Seymour and Buddy and the rest of the Glass family will never appear on film. No “Franny and Zooey.” No “Seymour, an Introduction” (although that would have been a very eccentric film.)

The novels of Thomas Pynchon, especially “V.” and “Gravity’s Rainbow,” although extremely complex and time-line-twisted, would be interesting to film. I would have liked to see John Belushi play Benny Profane. Not gonna happen.

I’m sure you can think of more, of books you would have liked to have seen filmed but that were withheld from the process.

Let me know which ones come to mind.