Okay, I have studied film adaptation, and I understand that a film does not need to represent a novel with the same title. But if I ever had a reason to complain about an adaptation, I found it when I watched Slaughterhouse-Five. I must admit that I was really anticipating viewing the film, and I was curious about how such a novel could be adapted…I did, however, attempt to remain open about what I was about to view.
Are there novels that should not be adapted into film? I do not believe so. Slaughterhouse-Five may be among one of the more difficult novels to adapt, merely because of the structure of the novel…but it could have been accomplished, and well. I mean, there was an attempted adaptation, but there was not a grain of depth that was inspired from the novel. Sure there were characters with the same names and sometimes they performed similar acts, but it is a necessity for an adaptation to create the same or very similar effect as its original model.
Why did the film adaptation of Vonnegut’s work make me hate Billy Pilgrim or despise him? And why did Montana Wildhack have to be so hideously annoying? I know I would have hated to spend even five minutes with that Montana, but should I not have seen her as an amazing prospect for Billy? What about the question of what was really happening to Billy? I did not even bother to ask that during the film. I only wondered why Billy had been presented as such a low-life scum. How could I ever step into his shoes or relate to his situation when I could not even understand why he would take his wife and children to see a porn film at the drive-in theater?
Even if there had not been a novel, the film would still be awful. It does not make me feel. It does not make me think. It only makes me wonder why.
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