Two Great Works

Two Great Works

Thesis Statement: The morals and themes in both the book and the movie are parallel in

the story of racism and Alabama life in the 1930’s told through a young girl’s eyes (Scout).

I. Introduction

A. Comparing the book to the movie

B. Challenges of director

II. Differences between movie and book

A. Characters

1. Aunt Alexandra

2. Miss Maudie

B. Morals and themes of the book the are same

III. Deletions of situations that appear in book and not in the movie

A. Mrs. Dubose and Jem’s lesson

1. Atticus’s lesson

2. courage

B. Tom Robinson’s trial

1. left hand on the bible

2. cup toss

3. affect on audience

C. Passing of time

1. two years in book

2. one year in movie

IV. Similarities

A. Morals

B. Themes

1. innocence

2. prejudices

V. Conclusion

Garcia 1

Two Great Works

It is funny how when some infinitesimal facts, situations, and characters are changed in the making of a movie from a book, the morals are changed and concepts are not fully understood. This however, is not the case when comparing the book To Kill A Mockingbird to the movie To Kill A Mockingbird. The morals and themes in both the book and the movie are parallel in the story of racism and Alabama life in the 1930’s told through a young girl’s eyes (Scout). A director has many challenges to overcome when making a book into a movie because of the simple fact that the visual pleasure one gets is different from the pleasure of reading that an audience gets. Therefore, deletions, combinations of characters, and changing of scenes is necessary in order to correctly adapt a film to a book.

There are many differences between the movie and the book. While watching a movie, one can not keep track of as many characters as when reading a book. A book takes a lot longer than two and a half hours to read, which is about as long as or longer than most movies. Since there is only a short time to comprehend characters, the shorter the list, the better. In the book there was a character named Aunt Alexandra. Aunt Alexandra is Atticus’s sister and moves in with Atticus, Scout, and Jem in order to help raise the children. In the movie, Miss Maudie helps atticus raise the children and helps teach Scout to become a lady. Though Miss Maudie is also in the book, the movie combines Miss Maudie and Aunt Alexandra into just Miss Maudie. The deletion of Aunt Alexandra had not real negative impact or decline of worth on the movie. It did not change any of the morals or themes that were adapted from the book to the film.

Garcia 2

One of the biggest deletions of the book that was not in the movie was the deletion of the part of the book where Jem is forced to read to Mrs. Dubose as a punishment for destroying her garden. The deletion of this scene takes out the lesson that Atticus teaches Jem and Scout about what real courage is. The children go on throughout the whole movie with out knowledge of real courage. In the book, real courage can be awarded to Boo Radley, because, as explained through Atticus, he lives with the hand he is dealt and does not try to change it. He is perfectly content with knowing his place in life and how it should end. In the book, during Tom Robinson’s trial, Tom is forced to put his left, lifeless, hand on the Bible. When he does this, his left hand keeps falling off of the bible, making it impossible to swear with his left hand. Instead, Atticus tosses Tom Robinson a glass and asks him to catch it with his left hand. Tom can not and instead catches it with his right