Adapting the Past Adapting

Brian McFarlane adapting the past adapting

ISSUE 46 SCREEN EDUCATION 18 Songs of Experience

What film adaptation – and the word should warn us of this – is not and cannot be about is providing us with the same experience as that offered by the adapting the past earlier text.

Brian McFarlane

he most expensive ‘book’ the other two in support of my case that lating it to another semiotic system, one that I have bought in liv- there is no avoiding the phenomenon in of audio-visual moving images will enjoin ing memory is Frank Mill- the cinema, and why would one try? Fur- on the new work all manner of ‘change’, er’s graphic novel, 300.1 ther, each of the four titles draws on a ‘alteration’ and ‘accommodation’. (In the (Now that I’m finished with different kind of anterior text, and each case of Becoming Jane, it is not even a it, I’m open to offers for in its way derives from a kind of ‘history’: matter of adapting a precursor ‘text’ – Tan almost new hardback.). By chance, it that is, from a set of circumstances that unless one counts Austen’s letters as a cost almost the same as the ticket I had had their referents in the ‘real’ worlds text – but of re-imagining a possible in- for the MTC’s production of Alan Ben- of the past, whether of early nineteenth terlude in the life of the great novelist. It nett’s The History Boys. The profound century England or of upcountry Victoria seems widely accepted that Jane Austen point made here is that if you take ad- or an English grammar-school education did engage in at least a mild flirtation aptation seriously, it can be a very ex- in the mid-twentieth century or of a battle with the impecunious young Irishman, pensive business. As this is endemically in the ancient world. Tom Lefroy, but the degree of her emo- practised in contemporary cinema – real- tional involvement has divided commen- ly, in cinema since the olden days – one The ubiquitous nature of cinematic ad- tators.3 There is actually a scholarly book can hardly avoid it, and only be grateful aptation keeps leading one to ask ques- entitled Becoming Jane Austen, but its when, as in the case of Romulus, My Fa- tions about what it means to us as view- author is not credited on the film, though ISSUE 46 SCREEN EDUCATION ther, the original memoir2 could be bor- ers. In the most general sense, the word it details Austen’s supposed feeling for rowed from a library and, in that of Be- ‘adaptation’ implies ‘change’, ‘alteration’, Lefroy.)4 What film adaptation – and the coming Jane, if you’d read the Austen ‘accommodation’; in relation to cinema, it word should warn us of this – is not and oeuvre, you didn’t need to read further. usually refers to the taking of work con- cannot be about is providing us with the ceived in one medium (novel, play, mem- same experience as that offered by the This study is essentially based on how oir, biography, poem, TV series and so earlier text. There may perhaps be some the Miller and Bennett texts have fared on) and reconceptualizing it in terms of overlap in this matter, perhaps even what in transfer to the screen, but I mention cinema. The mere – mere! – act of trans- Gerard Genette would call a ‘palimps- 19 Songs of Experience

est’ effect. In his discussion he coins the 300 is only the most recent adaptation words hypertext and hypotext to char- from this source. Miller’s previous brush acterize the ‘relationship uniting a text B with the screen was on Sin City (2005), (which I shall call the hypertext) to an ear- known in the US (and on DVD) as Frank lier text A (I shall, of course, call it the hy- Miller’s Sin City, which he co-directed potext), upon which it is grafted …’5 The with Robert Rodriguez, and which bears idea of this relationship is for some of us the credit: ‘BASED ON THE SIN CITY endlessly interesting, but – it is almost GRAPHIC NOVELS BY FRANK MILL- wearying to stress – the different media ER’. These bits of information perhaps involved inevitably ensure, at least for the point to Miller’s having the status of attentive reader and viewer, a radical dif- graphic-novel royalty, and on 300 ference in responses to the two or more he is co-executive producer. His versions. are, of course, not the only graphic novels adapted to the screen in the The graphic novel: new last few years, but they are per- challenges in adaptation haps among those most con- cerned to find cinematic paral- So, having braced myself, I bought lels to the visual styles of their and read my first graphic novel, Mill- originals.6 The Wachowski broth- er’s 300, and must say at the outset ers wrote and directed The Matrix that it offers a new challenge, new im- (1999) from their own graphic novel, plications, for students of film adapta- and James McTeigue directed V for tion. It is easy enough to say that, in this Vendetta (2006) from a screenplay by case, it is not just words set out linear- the Wachowskis, ‘Based on the graph- ly on a page that the filmmaker is adapt- ic novel illustrated by David Lloyd’. ing: indeed the words are not set out in The films that bear least visual re- this way but burst out all over the page, semblance to their source works in bubbles and rectangles and ellipses: include Sam Mendes’ Road to as well, though, and more significantly, Perdition (2002), from a graph- the filmmaker now has to contend with ic novel by Max Allan Collins what is already a visualization of the nar- and Richard Piers Rayner, rative action. What, then, is the filmmaker much revised by screen- adapting here? Is he intent on making a writer David Self, and film that will LOOK like the graphic nov- David Cronenberg’s A el? Can he expect the soundtrack to take History of Violence its cue from KUNCH! and KRAK! and the (2005), from like? Will he expect ac- ISSUE 46 SCREEN EDUCATION tors – on film, two-dimensional representa- tions of actual phys- ical presences – to speak in the large simplicities of the top Left to right: The HISTORY BOYS, Panel from graphic novel’s frank Miller’s 300, two scenes from the film 300. characters? 20 middle: Richard griffiths as hector in the history boys It is not just words set out linearly on a page that the filmmaker is adapting: indeed the words are not set out in this way but burst out all over the page, in bubbles and rectangles and ellipses: as well, though, and more significantly, the filmmaker now has to contend with what is already a visualization of the the graphic novel by John Wagner and Vince Locke, and screenplay by John narrative action. Olsen. The cinematographer on Perdition was the great Conrad L. Hall, who won an Oscar for his evocation of Depres- sion-years America, but whose images belong wholly to the screen rather than to Collins and Raynor’s graphics.

I have no idea what aficionados make of the screen versions of their favourite graphic fictions. Adapted films in general tend to get rough handling from gently nurtured critics, and it is no doubt easy to be dismissive if one has grown up with Jane Austen, Henry James, Thomas Hardy and that push. Having, as I said, laid out a large sum of money for 300, I had my first sustained encounter with the mode of the graphic novel, or rather my first since childhood obsessions with the Phantom and Superman ‘com- ics’, as one called them then, even when they were of extended length as distinct from strips in journals and newspapers. What, I seriously wondered, is to be had from such reading? Well, to start with there is some real beauty in the art work, in its line and composition and its muted hues; even, on occasion, a look of paint- ing, a comment which, I realize, reeks of the patronage of finding something to praise in terms of an older, more estab- lished art form. There are also moments of sly modern wit (confronted with a bi- zarre and bejewelled figure borne aloft by slaves, Leonidas ventures: ‘Let me ISSUE 46 SCREEN EDUCATION guess. It’s Xerxes, isn’t it?’) and scep- ticism (‘There’s never been a holy man who lacked the love of gold,’ says Leoni- das, as he seeks out the Ephors in their top left: director Alister Grierson; rock-top aerie). And there is no missing All other photos its wildly emphatic narrational mode. In from Kokoda case you might, key motifs spill over the (photos BY JASIN page in sprawling red letters: PERSIANS! BOLAND) 21 Songs of Experience

or NOW as the occasion demands. VICTORY, the last referring not to the im- is his poetry. The way that he structures mediate outcome of this unequal conflict the prose is as important as the drawings As everyone must by now know, 300 (like but to long-term defeat of oppression by to me. I wanted to think of a way to pre- the old 20th Century-Fox film, The 300 those who stand firm for higher ideals. serve and honor his prose, as well as his Spartans, (André DeToth, 1961) which imagery, in the film.9 in fact inspired Miller), is the story of the When one turns to the film, it is hard doomed defence of the pass of Ther- to resist the idea of the graphic novel’s This suggests a level of attachment to mopylae in 480 B.C. by the eponymous standing in relation to it as a sort of sto- the original that does indeed seem to ac- force of Spartans, later joined by the ryboard. The latter has been defined as cord it the status of storyboard in rela- Athenians (‘philosophers and boy-lovers’ follows: ‘A film storyboard is essentially a tion to the film, though the storyboard is of course a practical tool, not an art form in itself.

300: overblown or a clamorous rendering of myth?

The film has been widely derided, both here and abroad. The very astute and re- sponsible UK reviewer, Philip French, has called it ‘a ridiculous rendering of the ancient world’10, while, in the US, the Village Voice reviewer found it ‘a ponderous, plodding, visually dull picture’,11 and in- dulges himself in facetiousness and sar- casm at the film’s expense. It’s not my in- tention to defend the movie on artistic grounds, but it doesn’t appear to me any more foolish and tiresome than, say, Troy as they are derisively described), against large comic of the film or some section of (also much trashed). I read the graph- the might of the marauding Persian in- the film produced beforehand to help film ic novel after seeing the film and can’t be vaders under their king Xerxes, until they directors, cinematographers and televi- sure how I’d have reacted to the film if are betrayed by a hideous-looking freak sion commercial advertising clients visu- I’d known something about Miller’s work who makes the Elephant Man seem like alize the scenes and find potential prob- in advance. There were certainly times Brad Pitt. The Spartans are distinguished lems before they occur.’7 Or more suc- when it was palpably absurd and I won- by their dress: black jockstraps and cinctly, and more directly to my purpos- dered to whom it was meant to appeal: it cloaks; the Athenians as often as not dis- es, as ‘A means of pre-planning a se- seemed too gory for children and too sil- pense with the jockstraps; and the mim- quence of individual shots for a film by ly for adults. sy Persians, replete with armour, jewels means of a series of drawings, somewhat and cross-gartering, are much more ful- like a comic-strip.’8 Director Zack Snyder Not knowing the novel at the time of ly clothed. There is a lot of high-sound- (who also co-authored the screenplay, viewing, and having to rely on my notes ing talk about ‘the only FREEMEN the with Kurt Johnstad and Michael B. Gor- made during viewing, I’d have to say that world has ever known’ standing up to an don) is on record as saying: I found the tone frantically overblown, army ‘vast beyond imagining… poised to from the moment that the film’s title is devour Greece’, and the whole is divid- The beautiful thing about Frank’s book splashed, blood-red, on the screen. And ed into five chapters with the headings: … is the prose that goes along with his HONOUR, DUTY, GLORY, COMBAT and drawings. It’s not just an illustration; there

above: the history boys

ISSUE 46 SCREEN EDUCATION Right: 300

22 ISSUE 46 SCREEN EDUCATION 23 - similarly doomed enterprize has a com- enterprize has similarly doomed (on a ring. The arrival parably rhetorical - by slaves) of Xerx carried golden throne who appears to be Santoro), es (Rodrigo (baubles, ball fancy-dress a for accoutred - body-pierc bangles and jewels, much fish-net posing ing, and a sort of gold for further such pouch), is the occasion defies him with: ‘The echoes as Leonidas few stood against world will know that the Battle of many’. Think of Agincourt, last stand, as well Britain, and Custer’s Light Brigade: why of the as the Charge com- then does 300 so signally shrivel by how such fa- parison when one recalls mous encounters have so moved hearts it is because and minds? Most probably to the two-di- adherence of Snyder’s and imag- prose mensionality of Miller’s of comes. The battle scenes, as hordes Persian ships fill the puter-generated and air the through rain spears as screen, or no more are bodies hurtle over cliffs, or Al- less ridiculous than those in Troy exander, and they have their moments in the murky colours of visual splendour, contribution Varley’s Lynn that reproduce to the graphic novel. What is all this worth as a film for those - not addicted to graphic novels? Proba is too much stand- bly not much: there are and declaiming; there ing around some very strange accents (oddest of all as David Wenham, is that of Australia’s Dilios, who loses an eye but jokes about is virtually no and there having a spare); scope for acting (though Lena Headey as Ther as and Dominic West Queen Gorgo on do what they can with a few tense ex- manner of changes). The over-emphatic is tipped into a handy pit. Battle is now inev- itable; there is consulta- itable; there tion with the Ephors (hood- ), whose commemoration of a l ed priests in touch with the Ora- If it seems foolishly foolishly If it seems as a film, extravagant as it may appear something different it as if one accepts of a an adaptation graphic novel whose aim is not any kind of a rather, realism but, clamorous posturing, rendering of myth. cle and described disrespectfully as ‘dis- cle and described disrespectfully eased old mystics’) in a visual mimicking temple; the action then moves of Miller’s which the 300 plan to Thermopylae from ‘Into that the invading hordes. to repel says the corridor we marched’, narrow - Tenny moment recalling for a voice-over, six the death/Rode of valley the (‘Into son hundred.’ - As far as ‘plot’ goes, Snyder and his co- writers have followed in slavish fashion ‘A Persian the lines laid down by Miller. messenger awaits’ – an audience, that is, But- with Spartan king, Leonidas (Gerard of his sug- ler) – and following rejection ‘submission to the gestion of Sparta’s turned already will of Xerxes’, an offer down by those Athenian ‘boy-lovers’, he cy!’ – underscore the ditto of the imag- cy!’ – underscore six- improbable es, as Spartans, sporting languid- packs, stand around ly like sulky male models. All this is put before us in the first few minutes, setting the tone for of the the rest film. My point is that, if it seems foolishly extravagant as a film, it may appear as something - if one ac different cepts it as an adaptation of a graphic novel whose aim is not any kind a posturing, clam- but, rather, of realism myth. of rendering orous the language which Snyder was so con- which Snyder was the language cerned over-the-top to ‘honor’ is wildly ‘bap- intones about men as a voice-over - combat’, all of this em of fire tised in the soundtrack phasized by a deafening that is alternately mind- portentous and simplicities of numbing. The comic-book to serve, ‘fired the language – men are no pain or mer to fight, to kill, to show Songs of Experience

everything, whether of battle in full cry or returned to school for a further term to of Gorgo’s haranguing the Council back prepare them to take Oxbridge entrance in Sparta, wearies with its insistence and exams. They are constantly faced with fails to keep at bay what the screen’s questions about history and truth; the mimetic capacity in the matter of real- play and film are also drawing on Ben- ism has led us to expect. Which brings nett’s own personal history, on his own me back to my starting-point: if I had experiences as a grammar-school boy; been a reader of graphic novels, would and the same might be said of Nicholas I have made something more/else of it? Hytner, who directed both play and film All right, a film is a film, and I’ve said this and who gets into the film a crack at his many times myself in repudiating the fol- old school, the academically elite Man- lies of ‘fidelity’ criticism in relation to ad- chester Grammar. At one level, what is aptation. What 300 makes me wonder, being adapted then are aspects of per- though, is whether it has acted out of a sonal history,13 never mind the more con- sense of obligation to its anterior text, ventional notion of a play’s being adapt- that it has wanted to look and sound like ed to film. the latter, and, if I’m not interested in the original, then that is bad luck for me be- However, the latter is the more cause there isn’t much else to compel usual basis for this sort of dis- the attention. On the other hand, fans of cussion and what is unusu- the graphic-novel mode may well be fas- al is being able to see a per- cinated to see how film deals with it: this formance of a play one is a film that wants to look and sound like week and the film version its original, and high-minded adaptation the following, which was scholars like myself can go jump. (We my experience here. In the also ‘jump’ of course at all those end- Melbourne Theatre Compa- lessly literal-minded BBC TV adaptations ny’s excellent production, the of classic novels – and are right to do so, play ran to three hours with- but that is another matter.) out inducing longueurs; the film comes in at a leaner 106 The History Boys: from stage minutes. Even seeing the two so ISSUE 46 SCREEN EDUCATION to screen close togeth- There are so few eye-witness accounts er, I have of what went on at Thermopylae that difficul- it is pointless to be asking about the ty in pin- film’s obligations to historical ‘truth’. ning down Alan Bennett’s The History Boys and the what’s film adapted from it focus on a batch of been omit- 24 grammar-school sixth-formers who have ted from the film, with the exception of a brilliant- of Oxbridge, employs the youthful Irwin ly camped-up acting out of a scene from (Stephen Campbell Moore) to train the the 1946 melodrama, The Seventh Veil. boys like thoroughbreds for the entrance The play, as performed by the MTC at exams. Irwin is slick and knows about any rate, unfolds in a series of short the- tricks for passing exams, even though he atrically contrived scenes, set in a non- looks and is ‘only five minutes older than realist décor of chairs and columns, and we are’ as one boy says, and though, as what seems like smooth transition from it transpires, he’s not the full-package one brief sequence to another in the film Oxford graduate – he’s ‘only’ Bristol and would seem merely disjointed on the an Oxford Dip. Ed. The Headmaster en- stage, where even vestigial changes of thuses that Irwin ‘comes highly recom- furniture, etc, take time in a way that cin- mended’, to which sardonic Dorothy Lin- ematic cutting doesn’t. And whereas tot replies, ‘So did Anne of Cleves’. plays are almost nothing but dialogue, the film can make points mutely (or with Education and truth in The a soundtrack accompaniment) through History Boys camera movement, angle and distance, through adroit cutting, through highlight- Both play and film focus on serious mat- ing this or that aspect of mise en scène. ters related to education and history. In Film’s mobility in space and time will nor- preparation for the all-important entrance mally be more apparent than that of the exams, truth comes to seem like a nec- staged play; the latter will gain in the essary casualty of originality. It’s the lat- matter of direct personal contact of play- ter that Irwin says they need to stress: er and audience, leading, as happened ‘What’s truth got to do with it?’ he asks in the MTC’s production, to bursts of ap- rhetorically, if everyone else is writing the plause at the end of episodes of particu- same unimpeachable but dull respons- lar theatrical effectiveness. es to, say, the Holocaust. The film main- tains the sense of the boys’ being un- At the heart of Bennett’s play, and of the der the pressure, not just of the immi- film, is a conflict for the allegiances of nent exams, but of reacting to the op- the history boys. Hector (Richard Grif- posing approaches of Irwin and Hector. fiths), with his easy charisma, enters into And in the beautifully exact performanc- ISSUE 46 SCREEN EDUCATION and incites the spirit of their camp car- es of Stephen Campbell Moore and Ri- ry-on, inspiring them by his own immer- chard Griffiths in these roles, each is giv- sion in both history and literature (not to en his due. Irwin is attractive enough to mention film and Gracie Fields). His rap- seduce the class’ would-be stud Dakin port with the class is challenged when but is himself a kind of failure in his own the Headmaster (Clive Merrison), a ge- eyes as well as in dealing with his sexual ography graduate from Hull, but desper- ambiguity. On the other hand, Hector, hu- ate for his school to achieve the kudos mane and humanist, is also inadequately 25 Songs of Experience

by each other and by Hector. There is a ests, on character and thematic levels, Film’s mobility in Muslim, a fat boy, a Christian (‘The things and Hytner, acclaimed as he is for his I do for Jesus’, he says as he accepts theatrical career, reveals himself again, space and time will that it’s his turn for Hector’s bike), a Jew- as he did in bringing Bennett’s The Mad- ish gay (‘I’m small, I’m a Jew, I’m homo- ness of King George to the screen, a normally be more sexual, I’m fucked’), a sporting jock, and consummate film director. Whereas the the lubricious Dakin (Dominic Cooper) play is not realistically set, film’s vo- apparent than that who has his eye on the Head’s secretary racious demands for a realist mise en (‘Fiona’s my Western Front. Last night I scène (demands resisted only rarely in of the staged play; thought we were up for the big push.’) such exceptions as Dogville [Lars von before transferring his ambitions to Irwin. Trier, 2003] or in the adapting of Miller’s the latter will gain in Listing them makes them seem too con- graphics in 300) are met with fluid move- sciously cross-sectional, whereas what ment around several schools and col- the matter of direct is just as interesting as their individuality leges and several towns and cities. Ben- is the way they constitute a group, with a nett has said: ‘… the film, like the play, is personal contact of more or less common goal, and the way about the school [as was his Forty Years in which Hector’s laissez-faire approach On, 1968] and the outside world scarce- player and audience. has engendered tolerance among them. ly figures’,15 and the brief excursions Watching the film, one can eas- beyond its bounds offer no more than ily accept Hytner’s remark: glimpses of a wider world that seems ‘I have never known ac- apt for these boys about to emerge from attuned to the reality tors so in sympa- the school cocoon. Nevertheless, Hytner of the boys’ scho- thy with each oth- has not settled for the easy realism that lastic needs, and er, so quick to comes so naturally to film. Not merely tries to grope generate be- does he retain the intense theatricality of the boys to tween each other the boys’ send-ups of scenes from Now whom he gives real thought and Voyager and Brief Encounter (the latter, a lift on his mo- feeling, and to with Jewish gay Posner as Celia Johnson tor-bike (‘more erase the distinc- is oddly touching, as well as very fun- appreciative than tion between the- ny), but in the film’s final sequence, in the investigatory’, he atrical illusion and school hall following the memorial serv- claims). real life.’14 No won- ice for Hector, he has the good traditional der he wanted to retain teacher, Mrs Lintot (Frances De La Tour, The boys themselves – the original National The- brilliantly truthful and acidulous), ques- and one or two of them, un- atre cast for the film, and man- tion the boys about their after-lives. They der the camera’s discerning eye, look a aged to do so, in spite of the dubieties of sit there in their school uniforms and talk bit too old for the classroom – are written potential financiers faced with names not of their older selves as if these are oth- and played with a disparateness that dis- of household celebrity. er people they happen to know. This is tinguishes each from the others, but the as little ‘realistic’ as some of the sophis- disparateness is unobtrusively respected The film takes on all of the play’s inter- ticated dialogue the boys are allowed, ISSUE 46 SCREEN EDUCATION

26 but as Hytner says, ‘you never doubt that who are interested in the art of adapta- Endnotes it’s part of the daily banter of a Sheffield tion will find themselves asking differ- 1 Frank Miller (Story & Art) and Lynn teenager’.16 Hytner also knows how to ent questions of each. How has Snyder Varley (Colours), 300, Dark Horse use a montage sequence as film short- dealt with the images and prose of Mill- Books, Milwaukee, Oregon, 1999. hand for a range of activities associated er’s graphic novel? To what extent has he 2 Raimond Gaita, Romulus, My Fa- with the exam preparation, a cinematic sought to maintain its two-dimensional ther, Text Publishing Company, Mel- device that we’ve long since accepted as impact? Does knowing the film’s source, bourne, 1998. part of the conventions of realism. and Snyder’s stated intentions in regard 3 Le Faye, Deirdre, (ed.) Jane Austen’s to it, make any difference to how one re- Letters, OUP, Oxford, 1995. See let- More important than any of this in the sponds to it? Is there any point in sim- ters to JA’s sister Cassandra on film’s appeal is the sense of character ply saying ‘a film is a film is a film’ what- 9 January and 14 January, 1796, complexity that is so skilfully sustained in ever its antecedents, and judging 300 by pp.1&3, for specific references to Le- the performances of both boys and staff. the same criteria as we might apply to, froy. There are scattered throughout The bringing together of Hector and Ir- well, The History Boys? The latter, film as these letters other oblique references win, with their different priorities, avoids well as play, has required complexity of to him. a cliché confrontation of two ideolo- those involved in it and those watching it; 4 Jon Spence, Becoming Jane Austen, gies by finally suggesting that, despite but does this, of itself, make it any ‘bet- Hambledon, London, 2003. weaknesses in each, they both know ter’ than 300? If we can respond to the 5 Gérard Genette, Palimpsests: Litera- more about boys and education than the film of The History Boys without know- ture in the 2nd Degree (Translated by Headmaster will ever know (‘If this were a ing the play, is 300 just as susceptible to Chana Newman and Claude Doubin- 1940s film, he’d be played by Raymond a virgin viewing? I may seem to be edg- sky), University of Nebraska Press, Huntley’ as someone remarks), and the ing away from my usual position on ad- Lincoln & London, 1982, p.5. last scene with unerring discrimina- aptation,17 but I can’t help feeling that 6 Shari Springer Berman and Robert tion gives everyone his/her due. History the graphic novel phenomenon and its Pulcini’s American Splendor (2003) is may be, as sporting star Rudge (Russell translation to the screen may instigate a another example: it sets out to ape Tovey) says, ‘just one fucking thing after new element in the discourse. As far as I the visual style of the graphic artist another’, but in the weeks preceding the know there is no sustained study of the whose life it is depicting. entrance exams the history boys have graphic novel on screen; all I am flagging 7 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ been encouraged to sort out the truth if it here is a sense of being challenged by an Storyboard can be found, whether in great events or approach to, and a kind of, adaptation I 8 John Walker (ed.), Halliwell’s Who’s in personal matters. When the boys sing hadn’t considered before. Who in the Movies, Fourth Edition, ‘Bye bye blackbird’ at Hector’s memori- Harper Collins Entertainment, Lon- al service they are acknowledging an in- There seems to me no point in ignor- don, 2006, p.578. fluence that made their lives richer and it ing the phenomenon of adaptation and 9 300, Production Notes, p.3. is done without any sentimentality. As to just insisting on the autonomy of film. For 10 Philip French, The Observer, 25 Bennett who has written his own screen- one thing, adaptation has been an inte- March 2007. play, the viewer has the sense of being gral element of the cinema’s history for 11 Nathan Lee, ‘Man on Man Action’, in the presence of a master of charac- most of its hundred-odd years. For an- The Village Voice, 6 March 2007. ter, structure, dialogue and mood; and in other, it is a matter that everyone feels 12 Alfred, Lord Tennyson, The Charge of Hytner he seems to have found the ide- free to hold opinions on. And for yet an- the Light Brigade. al interpreter. ‘The world we had creat- other, and perhaps most persuasive, the 13 In this relation, it could also be ar- ed together [i.e., with the actors] was the way one art form is inspired by and goes gued that all biopics are, in this way world we wanted to film’, wrote Hytner to work on another is of itself a matter and in some degree, ‘adaptations’. about transferring the play to the screen, of endless fascination to many of us. We 14 Nicholas Hytner, ‘Introduction’, The and that doesn’t seem so very far away don’t have to succumb to tedious dis- History Boys: The Film, Faber & Fab- from Snyder’s intentions vis-à-vis Miller’s cussions of fidelity to the precursor text er, London, p.ix. graphics. of whatever kind, and we don’t need to 15 Alan Bennett, ‘Film Diary’, The His- succumb to the irrelevance of finding one tory Boys: The Film, Faber & Faber, The enduring questions version of the text ‘better’ than the other, London, 2006, p.xviii. of adaptation to respond to what has been character- 16 hytner, op. cit. ized as ‘the process of convergence and 17 See Brian McFarlane, Novel to Film: ISSUE 46 SCREEN EDUCATION 300 and The History Boys, both con- exchange’ among the arts.18 If the expe- An Introduction to the Theory of Ad- cerned with history, both made by direc- rience of a work in one medium is made aptation, Clarendon Press, OUP, Ox- tors on record as wanting to adhere as richer for us as a result of our knowing it ford, 1996. closely as possible to the precursor text, in another, that is enough grounds for se- 18 See Keith Cohen, Film and Fiction/ and both adapted from works with their rious study as well as serious pleasure. • The Dynamics of Exchange, Yale Uni- own legions of followers, will no doubt versity Press, New Haven & London, have found their own audiences. Those 1979, p.1. 27