Film/Book Versions of Midnight in Garden of Good & Evil

The transformation of any novel into cinema typically requires the filmmaker to omit people, events or other aspects of the novel to fit the format and time constraints of film. The same is true with respect to Clint EastwoodÆs cinematic version of John BerendtÆs Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. However, despite this need of cinema film also offers opportunities to enrich novels in ways that the printed page cannot achieve. This analysis will compare and contrast the film and book versions of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil to demonstrate the above points.

There are many differences in the movie version that make me like the book version of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil better. Chief among these is that in the book the narrator is not really a major factor in the events that unfold or in his interactions with the locals. In the movie, the narrator is named John Kelso, a writer through whose hands all of the movieÆs action passes. In the book, the locals are full of energy and color and their interactions, like the womenÆs card club, are humorous and revealing. In the movie, we basically only see the characters in relation to Kelso which undermines the richness of the characters in the book. Instead, we get Kelso talking about Savannah or the characters. ôThis place is fantastic; itÆs like Gone With The Wind on mescalineö he tells a peer at his magazine (Eastwood, 1997).

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Approximate Word count = 1007
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page)