I read Emily Bronte’s 1847 novel Wuthering Heights for the first time about ten years ago.  I recall the Yorkshire moors landscape I envisioned as I was reading the book and the friendship between Catherine and Heathcliff…well, there was love and revenge and obsession. And sadness.  Fast forward to 2026: Wuthering Heights, the movie. If you have read the novel and seen the iteration of it in this current film you may have wondered as you were watching it, as I did, “I don’t recall that happening in the novel.”  If you have read the novel but have not seen this current re-telling of it, you will get no spoilers here. Suffice it to say, something got lost in the translation.

Watching movies on the big screen has always been a thrill for me. I enjoy seeing the visual interpretation of the book. The actors and their characters, the landscape and cinematography, the sets and the gorgeous costumes. Like Audrey Hepburn’s couture in Breakfast at Tiffany’s.

In the case of Breakfast at Tiffany’s – which is one of my all time favorite movies – the script is flipped. I had seen the movie possibly ten times before I read the book for the first time two years ago. I did not know there was a book before there was a movie immediately. I bought the book by Truman Capote at a used book library fundraiser. It sat on my shelf for a few months. Then I read it.

I was a little interested but mostly disappointed. There were a couple of things I did not know. I knew she was a call girl; that was evident from the inference of $50 for the powder room in the movie. What I did not realize was how old the story was and when it was set. The story takes place in 1943 not the early 1960’s! A few of the major story lines are the same as are some of the characters. The epilogue to this is that I donated the book back to the library. The movie was better.

There have been other books whose translation to film did not have the same effect that the book did. Books such as ‘Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire ‘when Hermione was advocating for the elves. Or ‘The DaVince Code’ based on Dan Brown’s book of the same name. I felt the film lacked the page turning, heart thumping reaction I had when I read the book. And there’s ‘Where the Crawdads Sing’. Brilliant novel and the movie did try to fit everything in but it just wasn’t the same.

Conversely, ‘A Discovery of Witches’ trilogy which was made into a television series worked. Perhaps because it was made into a series of eight episodes per season. That is nearly eight hours. So, I think it must have to do mostly with time; trying to fit a book into two or two and a half hours is quite a feat. What story do you tell and what do you leave out?

All of that aside, I love to read books when the author can portray something that I can visualize: a scene, a story and a character. Just as much as I love sitting in a movie theater or streaming a mini-series or movie. Like ‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s ‘ that I recently saw on the big screen for its sixty-fifth anniversary! When Audrey Hepburn sings ‘Moon River’ it tugs at my heart stings to this day. ( ‘Moon River’ won Breakfast at Tiffany’s an Oscar. )