Are you an expert on which short stories became movies?
You should be as hundreds of them do become films and payoff for their writers. A SHORT story is the right size for a film, believe it or not. Film is a very TINY SCRIPT mounted on a big screen. NOVELS are way way too big for film screens unless you're David Selznick. (Gone with the Wind.) I loved the novel PILLARS OF THE EARTH by ken Follett. What a turkey of a mini - series! You don't have to write prose that is so beautiful it can be mounted as JEWELRY when you do a short story. Scott Fitzgerald did and every time they do Gatsby, the greatest American novel, the film turns out to need cranberry sauce.A few of the short stories that became films you'll know are:
1. “Bad Time at Honda” became “Bad Day at Black Rock” Spencer Tracy MGM film
2. “The Body” turned into “Stand By Me”
3. “A Change of Plan” became “The Heartbreak Kid”
4. “The Day of Atonement” turned into “The Jazz Singer”
5. “Flowers for Algernon” became “Charly” about a retarded adult.
6. “The Greatest Gift” turned into “It's a Wonderful Life”.. James Stewart Xmas classic
7. “The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown” became “Guys and Dolls” by Damon Runyon
8. several of the “Kensington Stories” turned into “Meet Me in St. Louis” Judy Garland Musical
9. “Night Bus” became “It Happened One Night” Gable/ Colbert
10. “The Real Bad Friend” by Bloch turned into “Psycho”;
11. “Rope Burns: Stories from the Corner” led to “Million Dollar Baby” Clint Eastwood starrer
12. “The Sentinel” became “2001: A Space Odyssey”
13. “A Situation of Gravity” turned into “The Absent-Minded Professor”
14. “Spurs” begat “Freaks”
15. “The Tin Star” turned into “High Noon” Gary Cooper, Grace Kelly
16. “Your Arkansas Traveler” became “A Face in the Crowd.”
17. Maurice Sendak wrote WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE, very short story for children
18. Anita Loos "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes" Esquire story.
19. Stephen King wrote Shawshank, Long Green Mile and many other short stories.
OTHERS:
http://voices.yahoo.com/adaptations-collection-short-stories-became-2817.htmlANOTHER text mentions MORE titles I hope it's still online when you click on this
They 'go' you know.
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/183947.Adaptationshttp://www.librarything.com/topic/55836
Stephen King http://www.rollingstone.com/blogs/traverstake/2008/03/dvd-tuesday-stephen-king-horro.php
Another site invited readers to come up with many other story to film titles. Check out:
http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/1724904?sort=review&view=reviewsThe CBS TV SERIES "UNFORGETTABLE" was once a short story!
Kurt Vonnegut tell us how to write a short story -- the 8 RULES.
Use the time of a total stranger, (your reader,) in such a way that he<==BACK TO THE WRITERS' INDEX PAGE
or she will not feel the time was wasted.2. Give the reader at least one character that he or she can root for.
3. Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.
4. Every sentence must do one of two things: reveal character or advance
the action.5. Start as close to the end as possible.
6. Be a Sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading
characters, make awful things happen to them in order that the reader
may see what they are made of.7. Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love
to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.8. Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as
possible. To hell with suspense. Readers should have such complete
understanding of what is going on, where and why, that they could finish
the story themselves, should cockroaches eat the last few pages.
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