{"id":11929,"date":"2020-04-18T03:32:53","date_gmt":"2020-04-18T08:32:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordpress.morningside.edu\/thecr\/?p=11929"},"modified":"2020-04-18T03:32:54","modified_gmt":"2020-04-18T08:32:54","slug":"bright-places-not-so-bright","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.morningside.edu\/thecr\/archives\/11929","title":{"rendered":"‘Bright Places’ not so bright"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

by Mari Pizzini\u2013<\/strong> Movie adaptations of books have\nbeen all the rage, but it\u2019s common knowledge that many of these adaptations\njust don\u2019t cut it. However, the idea that \u201cthe book was better\u201d has yet to stop\nbooks being made into movies. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Netflix\u2019s\nAll the Bright Places <\/em>is a 2020 movie\nadapted from Jennifer Niven\u2019s novel of the same name. The book had been on my\nradar for about a year, but I finally decided to read it when I saw that\nNetflix had released their movie. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Warning:\npotential spoilers ahead. <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nnovel itself was quite captivating, however, it\u2019s writing style seemed a bit\nyoung for me. Granted, it is a young adult novel so Niven was writing to a\nparticular audience that probably wasn\u2019t \u201ccollege senior with an English\nmajor.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\ntwo protagonists, Finch and Violet, meet rather abruptly in the book: on a bell\ntower ledge. It is implied that both are contemplating suicide, a rather dark\ntheme that weaves throughout the novel. Most importantly, the novel implies\nthat Finch and Violet\u2019s peers assume she saved his life, when in reality, Finch\nsaved her\u2019s. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This\nis where the movie started falling short. There is no mention of her assumed\nlife-saving, which changed their friendship dynamic. The plot of the movie also\nmissed relatively important confessions from Finch. The two never journeyed to\na mobile book seller, and Violet\u2019s bike isn\u2019t orange.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finch\u2019s\nfather never makes an appearance, neither does his stepmother or step brother.\nI\u2019m not saying I wish his abusive behaviors were caught on film, but Finch\u2019s\ncharacter never fully developed without them. To cap it off, Finch\u2019s younger\nsister Decca isn\u2019t present, which also means one of the most important scenes\nin the book is cut from the film.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As for the ending, I don\u2019t even want to talk about it. It was so far from the novel that it made me cringe. Netflix made the movie into Violet\u2019s story, when All the Bright Places <\/em>is supposed to be Finch\u2019s story to tell. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I will say that they don\u2019t shy away from the mental health aspects of the novel, and for that I\u2019ll give them kudos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All the Bright Places <\/em>as a movie adaptation receives 2 of 9 planets from me (and yes, I\u2019m counting Pluto). As a novel, I\u2019ll give it a 7 of 9. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Mari Pizzini\u2013 Movie adaptations of books have been all the rage, but it\u2019s common knowledge that many of these adaptations just don\u2019t cut it. However, the idea that \u201cthe book was better\u201d has yet to stop books being made into movies. Netflix\u2019s All the Bright Places is a 2020 movie adapted from Jennifer Niven\u2019s…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":80,"featured_media":11935,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[205],"tags":[53835,46891],"class_list":["post-11929","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts-entertainment","tag-netflix","tag-review"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.morningside.edu\/thecr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11929","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.morningside.edu\/thecr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.morningside.edu\/thecr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.morningside.edu\/thecr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/80"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.morningside.edu\/thecr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11929"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.morningside.edu\/thecr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11929\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11934,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.morningside.edu\/thecr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11929\/revisions\/11934"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.morningside.edu\/thecr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11935"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.morningside.edu\/thecr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11929"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.morningside.edu\/thecr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11929"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.morningside.edu\/thecr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11929"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}