#MicroblogMondays: Page to screen

"The Blue Castle" -- one of my favourite L.M. Montgomery novels (and one of my all-time favourite books, period) -- is coming to the screen. 

I am of two minds on this: 

• (1) YAY!!/IT'S ABOUT TIME!! I've always thought this would make a great movie (in the right hands). 
• (2) (To that point...)  I am TERRIFIED they are going to screw this one up.  (Like, Americanize the story to appeal to a U.S. audience, or set it in modern times... ugh. Or inject modern sensibilities into a story written in 1926.)  

I had similar feelings when I recently learned that Alexandra Potter's "Confessions of a Forty-Something F***-Up" (reviewed here) is being turned into an ABC-TV series called "Not Dead Yet."  None of the actors cast seems to be British, so I can only assume it's been transposed to a U.S. setting. I'll reserve judgment until I see it, but I have a hard time envisioning this one without British accents and humour. (Likewise, I am praying that the film version of "The Thursday Murder Club" -- Steven Spielberg has bought the rights -- keeps the story in England, cast with British actors.) 

Granted -- some movie/TV adaptations turn out to be pretty good. I adored the 1980s TV adaptation of "Anne of Green Gables" with Megan Follows as an absolutely perfect Anne and Colleen Dewhurst as Marilla. (The sequels, not so much...!) I enjoyed "Road to Avonlea" (which used several Montgomery novels and short stories for inspiration), to a point -- it took a lot of liberties with Montgomery's material and kind of wore out its welcome by the time it ended. Likewise, "Emily of New Moon."  

Off the top of my head, in terms of well-done film versions of other books I've enjoyed: 

• "Normal People" (I loved the TV version possibly even more than the book! -- reviewed here and here). 
• "The Fault in Our Stars" (movie review here). 
• The 1994 version of "Little Women" with Winona Ryder as Jo. (The most recent version, with Saiorse Ronan as Jo, was pretty good too, but the 1994 one remains my favourite.)  
• "The Outsiders" was one of my favourite books, growing up, and the movie version turned out to be pretty good (can't beat that cast!), although by the time they got around to making it, I was in my 20s, so it didn't enthrall me quite as much as it might have a few years earlier. 
• The TV versions of Winston Graham's "Poldark" novels -- both 1970s and more recent -- were both pretty faithful to the books and well done, with the exception of the final/most recent season, which was entirely made up by the scriptwriters. 
• "Gone With the Wind," both book & movie, are pretty dated/politically incorrect, but both were touchstones of my growing-up years, and the movie was a pretty amazing feat of filmmaking and storytelling for its time (also some great casting -- Clark Gable as the perfect Rhett Butler!!) 

I know there are a lot more I'm forgetting, but those are a few that spring to mind at the moment. 

Disappointments: (As I often complained here while it was being aired, lol) Dan Brown's "The Lost Symbol" started off all right, but it diverged in some significant ways from the book, including being padded with characters and subplots that weren't in the original (presumably to stretch things out to 10 episodes). It all got rather ridiculous toward the end. 

What do you think? What movie/TV adaptations do you think were well done? Which ones weren't? 

My reviews of "The Blue Castle" (the book), here and here. 

(On a related note:  Following the conclusion of our recent discussion of "The Story Girl," the LMM Readathon group on Facebook I've been part of for the past two years is on hiatus. The organizers promised to keep the group going as long as the pandemic lasted... I don't think they ever imagined it going into Year #3 (we've covered seven Montgomery books to date)..! One of the organizers is stepping back due to other commitments, and if the group is to continue, volunteers will be needed. Decisions/future plans will be announced soon...) 

You can find more of this week's #MicroblogMondays posts here.