The Adaptation Complaints #2: Let's Talk About Red Dragon

Stupid name for the blog cause I thought that having a question as the title was getting too old and it would seem like I was never going to answer the questions I was asking anyways, so slap together a dumb title that kind of goes into the concept behind the original and we've got something that's the same thing. But at least I can add subtitles to the posts so I could think of specifically what I want to talk about. With the adaptations post today, the idea came to me to talk about the Thomas Harris novel Red Dragon and its adaptations after watching it's first appearance to the big screen as the 1986 Michael Mann film, Manhunter. This is a movie I really do like, since it's two leads are almost cast perfectly, with William Petersen as Will Graham and Tom Noonan as Francis Dollarhyde, AKA "The Tooth Fairy," and the whole tone of the movie is really dark and grimy, especially when Will is trying to get into the mindset of the man he is trying to capture, almost making it seem as if he is just barely on the right side of the line separating him from becoming just like the people he chases after. This was also the introduction of the character of Hannibal Lecter to the film scene, being played in this movie by Brian Cox. Unlike his appearances in other movies, mainly the films that feature Anthony Hopkins in the role, his role in the movie is kept rather short, only appearing in three scenes total yet he manages to make a solid impression on the audience.

I'll get into more depth later with Manhunter later, as I compare it to the remake of the film in 2002 which does bear the original title of the book unlike its predecessor. Now, with the title difference, there is an explanation to it which is kind of stupid as is was because the producer of the '86 film, Dino De Laurentiis, changed the title after one of his films from the year before, Year of the Dragon, bombed, although it was also said that it was due to the amount of kung fu movies that featured the word dragon in their title. Ridiculous, I know, but let's go into the remake. The second film was directed by Brett Ratner and was mainly put into production due to the success the two previous films in the series, Silence of the Lambs and Hannibal, that it would be good to capitalize on the audience and Anthony Hopkins still being able to play Lecter one more time. It is hard to say whether this version follows the book more closely, as I have not read it, but putting the films back to back, aside from the visual differences, parts of the story also appear to change from one to the other.

In Red Dragon, the role of Will Graham is now played by Edward Norton, who for the most part does a good enough job despite sometimes seeming as if he is kind of a little too aloof, barely showing any signs of inner turmoil from the requirements of his job and having to communicate with Lecter again, who had almost killed him a few years prior after he managed to figure out he was the Chesapeake Ripper. But this does give away one of the more baffling inclusions in the "remake": the beginning of the movie which follows how Graham was able to apprehend him. Now for the most part, this story was alluded to in spoken work in the original movie and from research this might have the case in the book as well, but there was a much larger difference from the source in this version. That being that Hannibal had been working with the FBI and Will for quite a while on the same case where he is the culprit. In the book and the original movie, it was stated that the moment where Graham caught Lecter and nearly got killed in the process was the first time they met, having found a random book that had highlighted a specific page which featured wounds that were similar to the victims of the case. Part of the reason why that scene doesn't work is that seeing it on screen makes it look rather silly, along with the fact that it doesn't really make much sense for Hannibal to be involved with the FBI and somehow not being able to hide the evidence that ended up leading to his capture, or maybe it's worse for Graham that he didn't notice beforehand.

But that is kind of one of the things that doesn't work in the '02 film, and yet for the most part, it is a solid movie that does do some things better than it's predecessor. While the leads in the remake, mainly Norton since I do think Ralph Fiennes as Dollarhyde does a really good job in his role while only being held back by his overexposure this time, are not as good in this movie, the side characters do work a lot better. This can mostly be attributed to two characters who are fleshed out this time around, the aforementioned Hannibal Lecter (although this could be due to Hopkins having done the role twice already and it was easy to get the character this time) and Reba McClaine, the blind woman that Francis falls in love with during the events of the story. In the original, Joan Allen played Reba and while I do see some advantage to her lack of an appearance in the original film as it does make the scene where Dollarhyde catches her with a co-worker and mistakes it for her being unfaithful to him interesting in his sense as it does fit into the character that he doesn't have that much luck in relationships and they haven't been together long, so misreading that scenario and going on the final killing spree because of it works, the character was very underused anyway and her character really suffers because of it. Emily Watson, who is one of those actresses I really enjoy in movies, is given a lot more to work with, as Red Dragon fleshes out her relationship with Francis a lot more which does make her final scenes work, as their love for each other does seem genuine and the end result of Francis' (spoilers but I kind of assume that people who are reading this have seen the movies already on this post) fake suicide does allow us to sympathize with the two of them, although is it a good thing to sympathize with a serial killer too much?

Now for the most part, I do think that both films are worth watching and they do take the source material in their own directions, both showing the good and bad in how that is done. And while I do like Manhunter slightly more, there are some things that it does wrong, such as the the climax of the movie feeling rushed. I do not really know why it was done that way, as I wouldn't have minded another 10-15 minutes that did have the book's climax, like Red Dragon did. Now what I'm talking about is that in the end of Manhunter, Will and the rest of the FBi have managed to find Francis' home and then manage to kill him before he can kill Reba. Now for Red Dragon, it does continue after the fake suicide where Francis goes after Will and his family, which is more closer to the book, and as a climax works a lot better.

But now it's time to focus on anther way that Red Dragon has technically been adapted onto the screen: taking some of the back story of Will Graham and Hannibal Lecter and turning that into the series Hannibal. The show itself is somewhat of a re-imagining of the source material, as it does rewrite some of the situations and such, taking place before the events of Red Dragon yet is also taken into a more modern setting and also taking a cue from the opening of the second film. It was brought into development by Bryan Fuller, a showrunner whose series, while being critical darlings or cult hits, rarely ever got past more than two seasons such as Dead Like Me and Pushing Daisies. As for myself, I have only watched the first season of the show so far, yet from the first minute or so of it, I was instantly hooked. The acting among the leads does the best thing I could imagine, especially Mads Mikkelsen's portrayal of Lecter; and the description he gave for what he was trying to do with the character makes sense when watching it and in a way, makes it something that fits him perfectly. He wanted Lecter to be seen similar to Satan, someone who enjoyed watching humanity and the way it works yet feels alien and detached. The rest of the lead cast does a great job, with Hugh Dancy doing a great interpretation of Will, having him be more of a neurotic and showing how much of a toll the work he's doing is taking on his psyche, which I guess is more of an expansion of Petersen's take on the role. As for the story itself, it is easy to tell from the first few episodes on that the show was more or less going to go into its own direction with the source material, since many people already know what the destination is, and for the most part I really want to see where it goes from here. I also caught a few allusions and references to the source material yes I can imagine that there are many more I have yet to catch. One I liked a lot was when Lecter asks Will about the aftershave he uses, remarking how it smells as if the label on the bottle was a ship, with Will saying that it was a Christmas present.

I am unsure how much more in depth I can get into this as my knowledge in the subject is not as great as many others who have talked about it before me and will in the future, so I guess this is where I shall leave my two bits of discussion with for the time being. Maybe I'll do a retrospective on Mads Mikkelsen since Hannibal was the first time I really saw him in anything and he did such a wonderful job that I really want to see some of his other work. So until then, hopefully I can get more work done on this blog in the near future.

Like What You Like.... Just Don't Try And Think You're Superior

This topic came to my mind when I was at work and I was thinking about a movie trio that I'd rather watch than a single episode of any reality show, the first thing I could think of being a movie marathon of A Serbian Film, Salo, and Men Behind The Sun. I'm sure I could come up with a lot more disturbing trio of movies that go together nicely (maybe I'd put Gross Out in there) but all it meant was that I would rather watch some of the worst movies that are only meant to gross out and disturb people beyond comprehension before I watch a reality show willingly. I was also trying to make a joke about it as Penn Jillette was one of the people in the show I was really complaining about (Celebrity Wife Swap...... just why?) and one of the quotes he made in the beginning of the show was that he only lets his kids do things that are intellectually stimulating and my quip was that "And when they misbehave, we do stuff like being on Celebrity Wife Swap. Works better than any other form of punishment," I also came up with a ridiculous idea of a found footage parody influenced by the John Travolta film Phenomenon but that's for another time. Yet I kept thinking about the topic about my disdain for reality shows for quite a long time, even during my blood donation but at least it subsided until I got home after and finally gave the Nostalgia Critic's Top 11 Trailers video. I enjoyed his list, and his reasoning behind his choices was well thought out, yet I was kind of pissed off on how he mentioned watchmojo.com and it's top 10 trailers list, as I do not really like the site all that much, since their lists usually contain the usual suspects and the reasoning behind the choice seemed really half-assed at times, even when the picks are some I agree with mainly due to the reasons and their placement on the list.

So back to the Nostalgia Critic, since I was watching the video on YouTube, I read some of the comments and saw that someone mentioned that watchmojo put Gravity Falls in the top 10 most hated Disney cartoons, which is perhaps one of the most surprising things I had heard and I thought it was a joke until I actually watch the video and saw that it was on there (at number 7, which did kind of diminish the blow but still). It was so pissed off at this choice that I didn't bother finishing the video because I don't understand why Gravity Falls is even a choice in that, as in my opinion and probably many others, it is easily one of the best kid's shows that is on television now and maybe the best Disney animated show. This also was an example of half assed reasoning as well, since they only gave a sentence to explain what they thought was wrong with it and those were that the show was dark, stereotypical, and inappropriate for kids. Now I can understand why people can dislike the show, as it probably isn't for everyone but that reasoning is perhaps one of the worst reasons for hating something I have heard in quite a while. A easy contraction I could make for the argument of that the show is too dark is paraphrasing Don Bluth, as part of his philosophy with his movies was it doesn't matter how dark a story is; if it has a happy ending, kids will be able to take it. And since I'm sure a lot of people have seen at least one of his movies, mainly the ones in the '80s like Secret of NIMH and Land Before Time, they could attest to that Bluth was kind of correct in his assumptions, although it could also depend on the maturity level of the children and how they are able to process some of the more dark moments.

Now here comes part of the my topic and why I am kind of a hypocrite in regards to this, and even though I dislike most of the opinions on the site and there are other people's opinions I disagree with (the whole reality show argument this started with), I can't really force someone not to like a show they want to watch no matter how much I dislike it myself. Some goes with movies and the like, as there are always going to be people that are in the minority regarding opinions, such as when someone says they really did not enjoy the movie that got all of this praise and accolades and vice versa. The easiest example I could give is my enjoyment of Friday the 13th Part 5, as a lot of people do see the movie as being one of the worst in the franchise, yet I enjoy it. Although not really so much for the horror aspect of it, as more of the fact that the movie is really unintentionally hilarious, where is plays kind of like the least self aware parody of itself, almost the opposite of Part 6 which in itself is rather self aware and makes fun of itself on many occasions. Part 5 is almost the equivalent of The Room in where it's humor comes from, yet it never reaches that Tommy Wiseau level of incompetence, yet how many movies actually do? If I had to pick some of the more hilarious moments from the movie, it has to come from the hick mother and son combo of Ethel and Junior and those performances are kind of something else, where it almost feels like they were meant to be in a comedy or something.

Yet before I forget about it, part of the issue with the system of Watch Mojo I have a problem with is that a lot of the top 10 content looks user generated, and the lists come from user suggestions, which while it does at least mean that some of the more lesser known things could get mentioned, the way it works doesn't always make it that way, as those kinds of suggestions could always be made towards the end of the voting process, meaning that they never had a chance to go against the mainstream picks. And yet, it also does show how the majority thinks for the time which I guess is fine and if the top 10 lists feel as if they are perfect choice, then I can disagree all I want but also know that my opinion isn't the same as everyone else's. It feels as if I never really talked all that much about the headline of this post, but to be honest it should really be a given. Part of the problem is that we often just expose ourselves to things that we know we'll like and sometimes, just act all snobby about it whenever we are introduced to something out of our comfort zone and hate it almost immediately without giving it a chance. Expectations also play a big part in it as well, as we can hold things in such high regard that it is difficult to watch something without holding it to that standard as well. Now some movies seem to just pander to a specific audience and those are the movies and shows that are kind of hard to pinpoint as to why one may like or dislike it, yet others are much easier such as mainstream blockbusters for example. I can respect one's opinion regarding their dislike for a movie or show I love if the reasons behind that disdain seem legitimate as it makes it easier to understand how someone's own views on genres compared to your own. So I guess all I can say is that have your own opinion and just follow your own thoughts and not anyone else's just because it is the mainstream thing, but also take in those other opinions to see not only how they differ but also try and tune your own so that you can understand your own views better.