Snips & Specs & the Multiplex

In which Sam rants about single books being split into two movies, raves about Divergent, and throws in some photos of the new Divergent movie for your viewing pleasure :)

Inspired by next week's Top Ten Tuesday feature on YA film adaptations (check out the original feature here), let's talk about an upcoming film adaptation I'm pretty excited about: Veronica Roth's Divergent. Starring Shailene Woodley of The Secret Life of the American Teenager, this should be a fast-paced thriller, following protagonist Tris as she navigates her dystopian world, comes of age, and joins the Dauntless faction, known for their bravery and fighting prowess.

... vaguely familiar.

Something looks ...

It was a quick, exciting read, and I devoured it overnight. My dad and I both read it, actually, and like everyone else, compared it to Suzanne Collins' Hunger Games trilogy. (We both have a soft spot for dystopian fiction, like The Giver - although can a preference for reading about those hard, unforgiving worlds really be called 'soft'?!?)

Probably not.

Though in Divergent there aren't "games," per se, Tris does face several "trials" in her quest to become Dauntless - one such trial left my dad wincing and me skipping the page and trying not to faint, so it will be interesting to see how some of those violent scenes translate on-screen. 

"I'll just punch this punching bag instead"

It's been interesting to watch mega-violent YA novels attempt to become PG-13 friendly movies, since the standards seem quite different. I've always felt books can get away with more than movies, which is why I thought The Mortal Instruments, with its central romance taking a turn toward the taboo in the second novel (though it all turns out not-taboo in the end?), would never make it to screen. (Obviously, I was wrong.)

But movies also get away with splitting books into two (yeah...as if The Hobbit wasn't bad enough, did you hear they're splitting up Mockingjay into two films?) I have a lot of feelings about this. Perhaps I will reserve them for Tuesday.

For now, I will leave you with this: Shailene Woodley will also apparently be starring in the film adaptation of The Fault in Our Stars. Because every YA movie in the next five years will star Shailene Woodley. And also be in two parts.

What film adaptations are you excited about? Will you go see Divergent? What about both Mockingjays?

-Sam