On reading the book before seeing the movie

“The book is always better” is a decent rule, but I have to make exceptions to it. Like with “The Maltese Falcon” by Dashiell Hammett - the book is great, but the film is AMAZING and my beloved Humphrey Bogart plays the part of the clever (and somewhat brooding) detective beautifully (Bogie forever<3).

The rule I do try to keep is to always read the book before seeing the movie. I wasn’t always such a stickler about this, but then I went on a last minute date to see The Maze Runner and I hadn’t read the book (written by James Dashner) yet and I was panicking a bit inside, but didn’t know how to say that I couldn’t see this film yet because I HADN’T READ THE BOOK. I somehow survived the movie and then waited 2 ½ years to actually read the book, hoping I’d forget everything. That still wasn’t enough time to erase the ending from my mind and I knew what was coming from the first chapter.

Since that terrible experience, I had vowed not to see the film before I read the book. And I’m taking this seriously. Maybe a bit too seriously. My vow has often led to me reading books that I really don’t care that much about just in case I end up seeing the movie.

Take Me Before You by Jojo Moyes for example. Several of my friends went to see it and could not have spoken of it with more acclaim. So I put it on my TBR list and….waited. And waited. And waited. And finally, I told myself that this was getting ridiculous - it wasn’t even a big movie anymore and eventually someone would suggest we watch it (because they’d assume I’d already seen it) and I would have to tell them no. So I read it in a couple days. And it was fine. And now I can see the movie - but I haven’t. Now that I’ve read the book, I’ve lost all interest in seeing the movie. Because it just wasn’t that great in my mind.

The Girl On The Train by Paula Hawkins is my latest TBR book/film that I’ve been putting off. Maybe I’ll actually get around to it one of these days.

If you are one of the heathens who likes to see the movie first, you should probably check out The Little Blog of Horrors for movie reviews and cinema opinions.