So I noticed one of the main characters (in the book) is sort of represented in the movie through others - I'm just wondering, is it just old Hollywood racism or they really didn't consider Lee a relevant enough character? Because I thought he was a very important part of the story, and I don't see why he wouldn't be in the movie.
shareWell the whole movie only covers about half the book so right away a lot of changes had to be made. And Lee, if memory serves, largely raised those boys, I think the idea for the movie was more that they, Cal especially, is really alone in everything until Abra comes into the picture.
shareThe movie only covers the last 1/4 of the book and did not do that very well in my opinion.
Myself I missed both Lee the Chinese cook and Sam Hamilton.
For those readers here that did not read the book Lee was a very intelligent fellow who spoke in heavily accented English. When he was among close friends and those he trusted he spoke in normal non-accented English.
I can't even begin to describe Sam Hamilton in a short paragraph. It'd take a book.
I fully realize that it is not possible to entirely convert a book into a movie. I simply did not like how they did it with East of Eden. They turned Adam into a bible thumping religious bigot. They gave his whore wife a pass and gave her some good qualities. In the book she was a predatory sociopath who lacked the capacity to feel love, sorrow, or guilt. The only emotion she felt was happiness when she made a young man who had fallen in love with her commit suicide. In the book she killed her parents, got by with it, and was proud of it. She even killed the kind hearted whore who owned the whorehouse and took over her business. The movie gave you the impression that she left Adam because of his religiousness. In the book she commits suicide when Aron found out exactly who she was. She actually did harbor a secret admiration for him simply because he looked like her. She also knew that there were people wise to the fact she had killed the kind hearted whore and did not want to go to jail.
As I stated previously there is no way you can accurately make a movie out of a book but in this case I simply did not like how they did it in this case.
There HAS been a few times I enjoyed a movie more than the book it was based on. A good director can make a great movie out of a poorly written book.
What amazes me is that John Stienbeck actually liked this movie.