(2012) VS (2014)

I was surprised to find out last week that so many of my blogger friends still haven’t read this book or seen the movie.  I thought I was all kinds of deficient in waiting as long as I did to read it.  But I listened to the excellent audio and then watched the movie with my ‘no, that’s just the sun in my eyes and that’s not me wiping tears away with my sleeve’ husband. (hmm, sometimes he actually reads this blog…)  We both had the same assessment.

The Story/Plot    They both told the cancer-ridden story of two teens who fall in love against all odds and they were both spot on in that aspect.  There were differences though.  In the book there was more of an understanding of Hazel than in the movie.  In the book we see her go to college classes, meet a friend at the mall, visit Isaac in the hospital, discover that Augustus had and ex-girlfriend (I will spoil no more about that), have more conversations with her parents.  As for Augustus we missed a lot of his struggle at the end of the book (no more spoilers).  The movie focused primarily on the love story, which it is at it’s heart, but it lacked the nuance and depth of the book. And I missed one of the more lighthearted scenes of the book about the swingset as it was left out of the movie.  Thumbs Up- Book

The Visual  I’ll give the props to the movie on this one.  For one, I loved the visit to Amsterdam and want to visit someday. Also, in the book there was always Hazel with her oxygen tank and it was surprising how by the end of the movie I didn’t even notice it.  It became a permanent part of Hazel and it wasn’t distracting and that illustrated that the beauty within a person shines through even if physical ailments exist.  Thumbs Up- Movie

Characters vs. Actors  I read the book well after the movie came out, so I was already picturing Shailene Woodley as Hazel and Ansel Elgort as Augustus.  I was more familiar with Shailene’s work and she felt right in this role. She was a great Hazel.  I loved the casting of Laura Dern and and Sam Trammell as the parents, I thought they were perfect.  As for Augustus, well Ansel came so close that I won’t hold it against him.  I think Augustus is such a difficult character because he was so everything, so perfect teen girl fantasy, so witty, so smart, so romantic.  That is a hard role to fill.  I think Ansel got about 80% of the way there for me and that’s saying a lot!    Thumbs Up- Book, but barely

The Ending  There were a few differences toward the end of the movie but the one that bothered me most was one I mentioned earlier, we missed some of Augustus and his struggle. I think the movie would have been better for showing it.  Thumbs Up – Book

And the winner is…the book!!!!

Did you realize that John Green hasn’t written a book since? This article is from entertainment Weekly this month.

Other book vs. movie polls you can vote on: (We Have Always Lived in the Castle) (Good Morning, Midnight/ The Midnight Sky) (Before I Go To Sleep) (The Little Prince) (Charlie St. Cloud) (Far From the Madding Crowd) (The Girl on the Train) (Tuck Everlasting)  (Northanger Abbey) (Me Before You) (And Then There Were None) (Still Alice) (The Blind Side) (The Fault in Our Stars) (The Hound of the Baskervilles) (Gone Girl) (Jack Reacher) (Ender’s Game) (Carrie, the original) (Under the Tuscan Sun) (The Secret Life of Bees) (The Shining, the original)