A Comparitive Analysis on the Film Adaptation of Life of Pi

As Pi reaches the second level of the hierarchy of needs, he finds himself on the level of safety he needs to figure out how to stay safe while on the life boat. While Pi was on the boat he was so scared of Richard Parker that he had jumped off the boat to go in the water, but then realizes that there are predators just as scary as Richard parker or maybe even worse that he has to avoid to staying safe. “I noticed the presence of sharks around the life boat…The sharks were makos-swift, point-snouted predators with long murderous teeth that protruded noticeable from their mouths” (Martel 179). Once Pi tries to overcome his fears and tames Richard like a zookeeper would do and once he does, he ends up having a companion that helps Pi get through the struggle to survive. Pi finds an island where he is safe and is able to regain his strength but as he finds a tooth in the algae, Pi

Pi is an eager, outgoing, and excitable child, dependent on his family for comfort and support. In school, his few main concerns were to prevent his schoolmates from mispronouncing his name and learning as much and as fast as he can about religion and zoology. But when the ship went down Pi is torn from his family and left alone on a lifeboat with wild animals which would make anyone believe that they weren’t going to even make it through the night. The disaster gives him a reality check which makes him realize that he has to become self-sufficient. He mourns the loss of his family and fears for his life, which any normal sane person would do but he realizes that he has to take this challenge and make the best of what he can. He finds a survival guide and emergency provisions. He had to force himself to question his on values and decides that his vegetarianism is a luxury, and he wouldn’t make it a week without teaching himself how to fish. He manages to protect himself from Richard Parker the bangle tiger that has managed to get stuck on this boat with him and take on a parental relationship with the tiger, providing him with food and keeping him in line, to protect himself as well as keeping Richard Parker alive. The devastating shipwreck turns Pi into an adult, able to fend for himself out in the world alone. Which gives him good morals, and

This setting is the cause of Pi’s development of primitive instincts because it is associated with chaos and a battle with the environment. The lifeboat is floating in a barren body of water that has a lonely atmosphere, which helps portray Pi’s need to be independent. To tame the survival instincts inside of him, Pi needs to rely on his own decisions and logic. Because Richard Parker’s territory is within the lifeboat, the lifeboat represents the origin of Pi’s savagery; therefore, it’s atmosphere is tense and overpowering. The action of the passage occurs in the lifeboat because Pi needs to tame his inner tiger in the same setting where it was born. Pi discusses that he spends more time in the lifeboat after his confrontation with his brute behaviour. The raft allowed Pi to hide from his developing instincts, but now that he has tamed his savagery, he can live along side it in the

Desperation forced him to try and move towards the safety box that was near Richard Parker who has the ability to easily attack him. Once Pi is near the safety box he illustrates the feeling of satisfaction by saying, “oh, the delight of the manufactured good, the man-made device, the created thing! That moment of material revelation brought an intensity of pleasure -- a heady mix of hope, surprise, disbelief, thrill gratitude, all crushed into one … I was positively giddy with happiness." (Martel 141). He finds water in the box as he hoped for and this has brought him a confidence boost. Even though Pi completed the first of many stages in the hierarchy, he is still stranded in the ocean. He acknowledges the fact that animals or very territorial and in turn marks his own territory within the boat. Pi insists that, “I had to fix in his mind that the top of the tarpaulin and the bow of the boat, bordered by the neutral territory of the middle bench, was my territory and utterly forbidden to him” (Martel 168). He urinated on the parts of the boat that he claims as his part of the boat and does it in a way that Richard Parker who is an animal would understand.

Finally, when the lifeboat reached the island of Mexico, the “savage Pi” is gone forever with Richard. Richard Parker’s savagery influenced Pi for his guilty acts, however, he was the motive and spirit that encouraged Pi to stay alive before being rescued.

On its surface, Martel’s Life of Pi proceeds as a far-fetched yet not completely unbelievable tale about a young Indian boy named Pi who survives after two hundred twenty-seven days on a lifeboat with a Bengal tiger named Richard Parker. It is an uplifting and entertaining story, with a few themes about companionship and survival sprinkled throughout. The ending, however, reveals a second story – a more realistic and dark account replacing the animals from the beginning with crude human counterparts. Suddenly, Life of Pi becomes more than an inspiring tale and transforms into a point to be made about rationality, faith, and how storytelling correlates the two. The point of the book is not for the reader to decide which

While most of us love watching films, those of us who have read the book in which a film was developed from, will most likely feel uneasy when the film does not match exactly what we read. In most cases, we feel disappointed to not see our own interpretation of the book on the screen. A film made from a book or inspired by a book is called adaptation. Many people who have read Cornell Woolrich's short story "It Had to Be Murder" and then watched Alfred Hitchcock’s film, “Rear Window,” were disappointed that the adaptation did not reflect exactly the

Having considered the opposing side’s perspective, individuals should also recognize not only a filmmaker’s necessity to express their creative freedom but the factors which contribute to the limitations of adapting a book into a movie. Members of an audience often scrutinize an adapted film because of their initial bias and previous knowledge of the original work, without taking into consideration the possible factors which play a part in alterations of the original works. Prior to the adaptation of a film, there is a lengthy process a film must go through before its production. In these facets of adaptation the creator of a film must attempt to transform an author’s work into a physical and tangible vision for his audience. In screenwriter and script adviser Linda Seger’s book The Art of Adaptation, she explains the vital factors which film producers are subjected to when adapting literature. In her introduction and “Why literature Resists Film” chapters, Seger deals with recurring issues in adaptation such as timing constraints, commerciality of a film, plot clarification, and the elimination of key plot points and characters (1-13). Having an audience be aware of the limitations and factors which filmmakers face, makes them less liable to scrutinize a film or at least makes them aware of the existent hardships of adaptation and the reason behind potential alterations to the original work. As a result, of both genres’ unique process and struggles, some supporters of the film industry propose that both genres should be seen as independent from one another, and that criticism be set aside to respect each other's effort to create something of value. Researcher James M. Welsh, cinematography writer and author of the book, The Literature/Film Reader: Issues of Adaptation, agrees. However, in his book he also acknowledges that those opposed to a film’s creative freedom will

Left without any companionship and the consequences of his deed, Pi spent the rest of his time creating the better story. He weaved a web between the story of Richard Parker and the events on the ship, to disassociate from the events of the other survivors. The death of personified animals stings much less than witnessing the death of Pi’s mother and the sailor. It also made it easier to live life connecting Richard Parker to the hyena’s death. This also explains the disappearance of Richard Parker after climbing into the boat, and his reappearance to kill the hyena in the second story.

The story would have changed had the sole surviving animal had been the zebra, orangutan, or a hyena because Pi would not have survived. Having Richard Parker as his boat mate forced Pi to stay alert at all times. If Pi had been too distracted, Richard Parker could have pounced and attacked during times of inattentiveness. Piscine also had to be a caregiver for Richard Parker inadvertently keeping him focused on something other than loneliness. Also, if an animal like the zebra or orangutan, that is relatively harmless, would have been the sole survivor, Pi would have been tempted to kill and eat them as his provided food supply dwindled away, taking away his source of entertainment.

Richard Parker is the tiger on board the lifeboat he makes his first public appearance by devouring the hyena. Having a tiger on board doesn't really make your chances of surviving very high especially if that tiger is hungry. When Pi first realizes that Richard Parker is on board he builds a make-shift raft so that he is not in the presence of Richard Parker. But as the days go on Pi realizes that first his raft is extremely uncomfortable, second, he needs to go get food from the lifeboat and third, he needs to take care of Richard Parker. Because of Pi’s knowledge of zoology. Pi knows how to take care of Richard Parker. So for the next few days Pi gets Richard Parker food and water and soon Richard Parker becomes his friend but Pi still stays on alert and Pi always goes back to his raft to sleep. Soon Pi realizes that he needs to exert his dominance over Richard Parker so he sets out to show Richard Parker who is number 1. Pi realized that “it was rights I needed, the sort of rights that come with might. It was time to impose myself and carve out my territory” (Martel 202). Richard Parker kept Pi busy for all of Pi’s 200 day ordeal. Richard Parker was the other main reason that Pi survived. Richard Parker kept Pi busy and occupied. If it wasn't for Richard Parker Pi probably wouldn't have survived for so

Where he soon finds himself alone with a zebra, an orangutan, and a hyena, all seemingly in shock. His family is gone. The hyena kills the zebra and the orangutan, and then Richard Parker shows himself. Soon the tiger kills the hyena, and Pi and Richard Parker are alone together at sea. Pi lives on canned water and filtered seawater, emergency rations, and freshly caught fish. He also provides for the tiger, whom he masters and trains. When the blind man attacks Pi, intending to eat him, Richard Parker kills him. Not long after, the boat pulls up to a strange island of trees that grow directly out of vegetation, without any soil. Pi and Richard Parker stay here for a time, sleeping in their boat and exploring the island during the day. Pi discovers a huge colony of meerkats who sleep in the trees and freshwater ponds. One day, Pi finds human teeth in a tree’s fruit and comes to the conclusion that the island eats people. He and Richard Parker head back out to sea, finally washing ashore on a Mexican beach. Richard Parker runs off, and villagers take Pi to a hospital.

In Life of Pi, Yann Martel weaving a wondrous tale of God, a shipwreck, and the nature of storytelling, but the film version, marvelously made by Ang Lee, contains several significant inconsistencies with the book. Although the general structure of the story is the same in both versions, the limitations of film-making and the realities of what makes a film entertaining create the few changes between the two versions.

The feeling flooded my chest. ‘Truly I do. I love you, Richard Parker. If I didn't have you now, I don't know what I would do. I don't think I would make it. No, I wouldn't. I would die of hopelessness. Don't give up, Richard Parker, don't give up. I'll get you to land, I promise, I promise!’’’ (Martel 236). Finally, at the end of the pairs’ merciless endeavour, Richard Parker moves on into the jungle of unknown as he is no longer needed to aid Pi, “Then Richard Parker, companion of my torment, awful, fierce thing that kept me alive, moved forward and disappeared forever from my life.” (Martel 285). Richard Parker has a strong influence on Pi, as in his opposing story that was told to the reporters, Richard Parker is Pi, “‘So the Taiwanese sailor is the zebra, his mother is the orangutan, the cook is… the hyena---which means he's the tiger!’” (Martel 311). In conclusion Richard Parker is powerful, magnificent, terrifying, and hopeful, all of which help Pi to survive his

Literary adaptation to film is a long established tradition in cinema starting with early cinema adaptations of The Bible. Adaptations have been a common phenomenon in the world of cinema from the early years of its origin. Literature provides a wide range of possibilities for the film. Adaptation has been defined as the act of producing a work of art by adapting elements from another work of art. Film adaptation is the transfer of a written work to a feature film.