A Wrinkle in Time

[osprey_archer]

I finally saw A Wrinkle in Time! And... eh, I felt a bit meh about it. I've always felt a bit meh about the book too (I know, I should just hand in my geek girl card like, yesterday), so possibly this is just not my story in any form.

Surprisingly, most of the things that worried me from the trailers weren't problems in the movies: I was afraid Meg's father would get too much prominence, that the vibe for Mrs Whatsit, Who, and Which was off, and that there wasn't enough Charles Wallace, but actually all that was fine. Meg's father is suitably secondary. The Mrs's (how on earth do you pluralize that?) don't look like bag ladies, the way they do in the book, but their weird sparkle aesthetic is suitably otherworldly. And there's certainly plenty of Charles Wallace.

There may in fact be a bit too much Charles Wallace, but that's straight from the book so I can't lay that at the movie's feet. And I actually thought the climactic scene, where Meg saves Charles Wallace through the Power of Love, was wonderfully well done and actually sold me on a scene that I really didn't quite buy in the book, which is possibly proof that I have no soul.

(I've always felt vaguely guilty about not liking the book more. A Ring of Endless Light was always my L'Engle book: does that get me my geek girl card back?)

In any case. The movie really nailed the ending, but I didn't feel swept away by the rest of it and for fantasy movies in particular I want to be swept away into a different world and I just... wasn't... quite.

Comments

[asakiyume]

I don't think you should feel guilty at all. (A Ring of Endless Light is beautiful).

I'm glad the movie made the ending work!

[osprey_archer]

The movie also turned the Happy Medium into a man, and I don't quite understand why. I liked in the book that all these tremendously powerful supernatural forces were women!

[sovay]

(I've always felt vaguely guilty about not liking the book more. A Ring of Endless Light was always my L'Engle book: does that get me my geek girl card back?)

Mine is A Wind in the Door (1973). (Years-later fancasting here, although my cousins thought the Mr. Jenkins in DuVernay's movie would be great.) I don't think cards come into it.

[landofnowhere]

Huh. I found the Mr Jenkins in DuVernay's movie to be far more sympathetic than I'd imagined him; but I can't tell how much of that comes from the ways in which my perspective has changed since I was 12.

[sovay]

I found the Mr Jenkins in DuVernay's movie to be far more sympathetic than I'd imagined him; but I can't tell how much of that comes from the ways in which my perspective has changed since I was 12.

If DuVernay is hoping to make A Wind in the Door, it might be setup.

[landofnowhere]

I suppose? I felt like the point of that bit in The Wind in the Door was that Mr Jenkins was someone who was hard to like but still worth seeing and appreciating the humanity of, and this just feels too easy to do for movie Mr. Jenkins?

It's the difference between this guy in the graphic novel (that exchange is missing from the movie), and this guy from the movie. The presentations of movie Mr. Jenkins makes me want to believe he wouldn't put up with Charles Wallace being bullied -- which, like, he very well might not in a hypothetical DuVernay sequel; attitudes about bullying have changed.

[sovay]

Mr Jenkins was someone who was hard to like but still worth seeing and appreciating the humanity of

I agree with that, which is why my mental fancasting is William "obnoxious and disliked" Daniels. I just can't think of another reason to make the character sympathetic, unless he's serving an entirely different purpose in the film than in the book.

[landofnowhere]

It's true -- they might do something completely different with him in a movie sequel. I'm perfectly happy with movie Jenkins as a character in his own right, he's just a different guy from book Jenkins. Which is well, how I feel about most of the movie characters.

[asakiyume]

I loved A Wind in the Door too.

[thisbluespirit]

A Ring of Endless Light was always my L'Engle book:

Aww. I never read so much L'Engle anyway (she's over here, but not anything like such a big thing), but that would be true of me too. I loved A Ring of Endless Light.

[osprey_archer]

There was a made-for-TV movie when I was in high school and it was terrible (I can no longer remember why, only that it was terrible and that scarred my soul). I think they cut down on the musings about death, not understanding that the book is ABOUT the musings about death, and also dolphins.

[thisbluespirit]

I think they cut down on the musings about death, not understanding that the book is ABOUT the musings about death, and also dolphins.

LOL, oh dear! Because, yes, that is what it's about.

[landofnowhere]

The movie ending didn't quite click for me, which made me concerned for my own soul: but then what I really remember from the book is the part about resisting IT by reciting Shakespeare and the Declaration of Independence and the Periodic Table...

[osprey_archer]

Yes, that's a bit earlier in the book, and it's probably the biggest scene that the movie cut out: there's just the one big climactic Meg-vs.-IT scene instead of multiple resisting IT scenes.

The movie also made the Happy Medium into a man, which I don't quite understand.