As a huge fan of Philip Reeve's Predator Cities series of books, this movie was both satisfying and a disappointing to me. Satisfying because it is significantly better than it could have turned out (i.e. horribly), disappointing because it had the promise to be much better still. The way the movie turned it, it landed pretty much in six out of ten territory for me.
I don't believe that movies should be exact adaptations of the books they're based on, but this one adapts some segments so directly that it feels weird when it doesn't. Many of the characters in particular are watered down versions of who they were in the novels, with many of their defining characteristics taken away - which ends up affecting the relationships between many of the main and side characters.
The rest holds true for many other parts of the movie. Some sequences feel like they were storyboarded directly based on a scene in the book, while others feel foreign and don't even seem to fit in particularly well with the movies.
Ultimately the movie wastes the promise of the source material, which is rich and fascinating and could make for an awesome adaptation even if not adapted one-to-one. What we're left with is a movie that has very little focus, and as a result was also very difficult to market. It's sad that this will probably be a one-off movie, when in a better alternate universe somewhere, moviegoers are getting to see a series of sequels that perfectly capture the magic of the source material.
Review by freinharVIP 10BlockedParent2019-02-26T07:09:41Z
As a huge fan of Philip Reeve's Predator Cities series of books, this movie was both satisfying and a disappointing to me. Satisfying because it is significantly better than it could have turned out (i.e. horribly), disappointing because it had the promise to be much better still. The way the movie turned it, it landed pretty much in six out of ten territory for me.
I don't believe that movies should be exact adaptations of the books they're based on, but this one adapts some segments so directly that it feels weird when it doesn't. Many of the characters in particular are watered down versions of who they were in the novels, with many of their defining characteristics taken away - which ends up affecting the relationships between many of the main and side characters.
The rest holds true for many other parts of the movie. Some sequences feel like they were storyboarded directly based on a scene in the book, while others feel foreign and don't even seem to fit in particularly well with the movies.
Ultimately the movie wastes the promise of the source material, which is rich and fascinating and could make for an awesome adaptation even if not adapted one-to-one. What we're left with is a movie that has very little focus, and as a result was also very difficult to market. It's sad that this will probably be a one-off movie, when in a better alternate universe somewhere, moviegoers are getting to see a series of sequels that perfectly capture the magic of the source material.
One can dream...