Beowulf: Comparing The Book And The Movie

The PBS article on film adaptation discusses the challenges of adopting a novel into a film and the changes film makers must make. Most of these novels that are being read in schools are being made into movies. In these movies though, the narrator disappears in the movies which is a main factor of a book because they would show many characteristics about a character. The great thing about movies is that instead of a narrator, everybody can see the emotions on the characters faces and explains what the character goes through. For example, in the film “The Pedestrian” instead of having a narrator the creator of the film added another character in to show their feeling and emotions and others(Bollinger). Film is limited in many aspects as in

Imagine a slimy swamp like place where only the most horrid monsters with the most disgusting features live, this is the fen. Now imagine A wonderful bright beautiful hall that’s almost castle like, these are the two elements of the story Beowulf a New Telling.

Normally, when a movie is made about a story in a book the two stories are not exactly the same. The movie is adjusted by adding small details or leaving out some parts in order to make the story more

The plot is where the book and the movie totally differ, they have almost nothing in common. A big plot twist in the movie is when Beowulf goes to kill Grendel’s mother; first of all he did not end up killing her and lies about it. Also in the movie, it shows that Grendel’s mother is just angry about Beowulf killing her son, so she makes him stay and give her a new son by making love to her. Another big plot twist is when Hrothgar kills himself and Beowulf does not return back to his kingdom, and becomes King of Dane Land. But in the book Hrothgar lives and stays king of his land and Wiglaf takes the throne after Beowulf dies; “Take what I leave, Wiglaf, lead my people, help them; my time is

Beowulf: A New Telling by Robert Nye is about a character named Beowulf who has to fight evil by using strength, but by also using cleverness. Beowulf’s name means “bee hunter” and Beowulf loved bees. In the story a hall is built it is called Hall Heorot. “By day it towered above men’s heads like a second sun, so bright were it’s walls and roofs”(p. 5). Once the hall is made, a monster comes and eats people at night.

In the 2007 movie, other than the setting and plot, it was totally different from the original poem, It was very entertaining but didn’t follow the original poem. Grendel’s mother was a beautiful Angelina Jolie while in the book she was very often described as a grimy slimy monster. The similarities were when Beowulf’s heroic characteristics and the severing of Grendel’s arm ; however, the movie mentioned the seductive scene of Grendel’s mother and how the product of this sin is his son the dragon, while in the text this beast is regarded as a rogue monster. As mentioned in the poem, “ Beowulf arose, with his men around him,

The overall theme/message is also different from the book to the movie. For example in the book the book the theme is good vs. evil, Beowulf being good and Grendel being. This however is not the case in the movie, the theme in the movie is more like don’t cheat on your spouse and don’t lie to the people you rule or else it will come back to haunt you. This quite the difference, but I believe the writers of the movie did this to make a point or to send a message to the people watching

The poem Beowulf, written by an unknown Anglo-Saxon poet and the movie script, written by Neil Gaiman and Roger Avary. The story is about a Man named Beowulf, who becomes a hero to his town Heorot, by defeating a monster named Grendel. He is later named King of Geats, because of his braveness and loyalty to his people. After about fifty years of ruling, a dragon threatens the town’s people. Beowulf and his servant, Wiglaf, set off to defeat this dragon. While he did succeed to kill it, sadly Beowulf dies in the process. In the poem versus the movie, Beowulf shows different character traits throughout the story. Heroism, loyalty, and bravery all differ from the poem to the movie. The audience will perceive Beowulf as a completely different person if only looking at one of the two pieces.

In the book as well as the movie Beowulf brings fourteen men to the land of the Danes and defeats Grendel. The first main difference is that in the book Grendel’s mother only kills one Dane, Aeschere. In the movie Grendel’s mother slays all of Beowulf’s men besides Wiglaf. At this time in the book Wiglaf is not present with Beowulf and his men, but only at the final battle against the dragon. In both the book and the movie Beowulf detaches Grendel’s arm and his mother returns to the hall for revenge. In the book Beowulf immediately follows Grendel’s mother to the underwater lair, but contrastingly in the movie Beowulf would have no knowledge of Grendel’s mother unless Hrothgar would not have told him. Beowulf kills Grendel’s mother and returns to Geatland to rule in the book, however in the movie Beowulf lies about killing Grendel’s mother and stays to rule in Denmark. Just as Beowulf brought Grendel’s head back in the book, he also did so in the movie. The book does not mention that Hrothgar was the son of Grendel or that Beowulf was the father of the dragon. In the book as well as the movie Beowulf defeats the dragon and dies as the hero of the epic even though he did it in a different way at a different place. The concluding difference includes Beowulf’s funeral. The book displays his funeral as a burial near the coast of the sea, but conversely in the movie his body is put on a burning ship sent out into the

If we’re going to compare the book to the movie we have to make sure we’ve carefully read the book and watched the movie occasionally stopping your mind to evaluate the movie wondering what is different. I did just that, Beowulf the book compared to the movie has a variety of differences and some similarities. In my opinion the movie was better, let me tell you why.

Beowulf was a book composed during the Anglo-Saxon period of the world. It is a fictional about an epic hero know as Beowulf who kills mighty creatures and saves kingdoms from opposing armies and demons. This hero was from part of a tribe of a tribe known as the Gaets. In this story he comes to the aid of the Danes and their king Hrothgar. He battles multiple creatures for the Danish king and his helpless people during his time in the kingdom. He was seen as a hero their and feared throughout the surrounding kingdoms. In this essay i will compare and contrast the Beowulf movie and the book. I will discuss the differences in the setting, theme, and characters between the two. I will also discuss the differences of the fights he had with the

Whenever books are adapted for film, changes inevitably have to be made. The medium of film offers several advantages and disadvantages over the book: it is not as adept at exploring the inner workings of people - it cannot explore their minds so easily; however, the added visual and audio capabilities of film open whole new areas of the imagination which, in the hands of a competent writer-director, can more than compensate.

The task of creating a film based on a work of literature sends filmmakers on a challenge of sorting through which parts of the book are incorporated into the movie. The creators had to find a way to turn almost over 200 hundred pages of paper into about two hours of time. Consequently, many details of the original writing are left out, shortened, or changed entirely to “fit” into the script. This concept is shown in the movie version of the book, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain, which tells the story of young Huck Finn as he travels down the Mississippi with a slave friend. Differences and similarities are apparent between the two adaptations of the story but both remain true to the original plotline. Even though certain literary elements of a novel, such as use of time, events of the story, and the characters, are altered, the main plotline is unaffected as a literature-based film is produced that meets specific real-life constraints.

The PBS article on film adaption discusses the challenges of adapting a novel into film and the changes film makers may need to make. There are many differences between the two due to their prepositional setups. This can cause key factors of a novel to be lost once transferred into a film. This includes a narrator, personal attachments with the characters, engaging your imagination and possibly even scenes due to the time limitation a film has(PBS). However, when a director takes on this challenge they’re able to alter the novel and fix any faults they see. They also must make many attempts to successfully convey the protagonist’s emotions through other tools with actions or visual aids. This results in the director's

Behind every great movie, comes a storyline that is derived from a book however, most of the books to the movies have a great number of deviations. The screenwriters and other staff members to include the director come up with these deviations to enhance the plot in the attempt to make it a more interesting film to which in turn can make a better profit. The majority of differences that is found in films main objective is to enhance the mind. For example, when a scene has the ability to get a particular feeling out of a viewer, it is imperative to be able to understand the reasons for those feelings. The dialog and the visual effects of a scene sets a tone that differs from that of the book that it was taken from. Also, screen writers and