Obviously if you haven't seen the movie or read the book but you intend to, don't read this post because spoilers abound.
I didn't see a thread for this movie. We Netflixed this movie last night and watched it - I have read all the books and really liked them, plus I like Alexis Bledel on Gilmore Girls a lot. I had intended to see this movie in the theater but one thing led to another and I didn't. I'm kind of glad because in many ways the movie disappointed me.
I've been trying to think why I thought the movie fell a little flat, and the best I can come up with is that many of the characters go through an inner journey in the book that is so beautifully described in their thoughts or the narration, and it just didn't translate well to the screen.
Lena was one of the most interesting characters in the book, and I honestly had to fast forward through most of her scenes in Greece because I wasn't feeling it. In the commentary the director said how he told Alexis that he really wanted the character of Lena to be acted out nonverbally, in contrast to Rory on Gilmore Girls, but unfortunately so much of her inner struggle and personal growth just felt like it was left out.
Part of it too is that most of the girls' siblings in the book were left out - Lena's little sister, a truly free spirit who was a foil for Lena and also had some crucial conversations with her that illuminated much of her inner thought process, was left out. I understand why that was - too many characters in a movie and it would have been too hard to contend with all the characters in a 90-minute or 2-hour movie, but it really made Lena's character suffer by keeping a lot of her inner thought process from us.
I also didn't like how they made the Lena-Kostos relationship a Romeo and Juliet families-are-feuding relationship, because it was so much more interesting when her grandparents tried to keep pushing him on her because they LOVED him so much and she was having none of it.
It was sort of the same thing with Bridget's character. A lot of her internal process was sort of skimmed over and she just appeared like a shallow, boy-crazy person. Also, the Eric character wasn't quite like I had pictured him, which didn't help. I did think the portrayal of her time at camp was pretty true to the book. Much of the poetry from the book of her descent while pursuing Eric didn't translate, though - she just looked aggressive and annoying.
I thought the Carmen parts were really good and well done - America Ferrera was awesome and I think she portrayed the character to a T. SUCH a great job when she was on the phone with her dad asking why he left her and her mom, was he ashamed of her. I cried.
The show was stolen, though, by Amber Tamblyn. I'd not seen any of her work before and she, to me, WAS Tibby. Tibby wasn't my favorite character in the book but she definitely was in the movie. She emoted so well - whenever Tibby cried, I cried. And the friendship/growth with Bailey was just so well done - for some reason the things I didn't get from Lena's nonverbal expressions I did get from Tibby's.
I'm sure this was not intended by the director or the author, but I couldn't help reading some subtext between Tibby and Bailey in the movie that I didn't get from the book - not I luuuurve you subtext and want to smooch you, but I could definitely see that if Bailey had lived and they had remained friends over the years, that when Bailey reached her early 20's, she and Tibby might have developed their relationship into something more. At first my wife was like "you're crazy, I don't see this" but when the scene with Tibby and Bailey lying on the blanket looking at the stars came up, we both burst into laughter, because how many lesbian couples in TV shows have been in that exact same situation? Xena and Gabrielle, just to mention one couple.
I probably just have that on the brain because I've been reading Written in the Stars by ambercissism so I've been pondering how a relationship between people with a significant age gap might develop over time when one is a child without it being icky.
Anyway, it's definitely a rental and even though I was dissatisfied with the movie, it clearly has given me a lot to think and talk about it so if you're a fan of the book it's worth a rental or Netflix. What did other people think of the movie?
