Wonder Boys

So far I like the book a little better than the movie, just because I enjoyed the narrative humor more as well as getting to know each of the characters on a little bit deeper level than the movie has thus far allowed me to get to know the characters. However, this post is about the movie, and there are a few things I'd like to say about it:

First, Tobey Maguire manages to pull off creepy really well. With bags under his eyes, fishbelly-white skin, and a strange intensity of look, Maguire makes me feel a little uncomfortable every time I look into the camera. I feel that's playing the role about how it should be played, though.

Michael Douglas, similarly, does a great pathetic. If I didn't recognize him (and campus) from my life thus far, I would have really mistaken him for somewhat pathetic. He seems a bit more lifelike than the Professor Tripp of the book, slightly less of a charicature.

The dead dog in the trunk and the tuba make a lot more sense when the character interactions are played out on the screen, however, and events that took away from the novel's credibility add to the frenzied humor of the movie.

Robert Downey, Junior plays Crabtree a bit differently than I'd pictured him well reading the novel, but it works.

Any movie will take liberties with a book's plot, and this movie is no exception, but the changes it made all felt necessary; the action and comedy wouldn't have been quite so fast-moving without changes here and there.