Boots, cowboy hat, and a horse… what more do you need?

When I think of westerns, I picture a cowboy on his horse, looking out toward the horizon as the obligatory tumbleweed blows by. This image seemed to dominate the covers of my father’s large collection of Louis L’Amour and Zane Grey paperbacks. My dad wasn’t the only member of the family who appreciated a good Old West story–Saturday and Sunday afternoons would often find my sister and I checking the TV listings for a good western movie, hopefully starring John Wayne or Gene Autry.

My appreciation of Western movies hasn’t diminished with time. The first movie I saw in 2011 was the Coen brothers’ amazing True Grit, starring Hailee Steinfeld and Jeff Bridges. Based on the 1968 book by Charles Portis, it tells the story of a tough U.S. Marshal who helps a stubborn young woman track down her father’s murderer. My second outing to the cinema was to see the animated western Rango. Starring the voice of Johnny Depp as the titular Rango, a pet chameleon accidentally stranded in the Old West town of Dirt after his terrarium falls from his owner’s car.

Recent years have seen an increasing number of good quality western movie releases. Some of my past favourites include: 3:10 to Yuma; Appaloosa;  and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Frost. Starring Brad Pitt and Casey Affleck, based on Ron Hansen’s 1983 novel of the same name, this movie was shot in both Alberta and Winnipeg. I’d be remiss if I didn’t sing the praises of the made-in-Canada Gunless, starring Paul Gross as the Montana Kid, an American gunslinger holed up in the Canadian town of Barclay’s Bush. This summer we’ll be in for a treat with the release of Cowboys & Aliens, starring Daniel Craig, Harrison Ford and Olivia Wilde. Curious about the concept? Hurry and get your name down for Cowboys and Aliens, the 2006 graphic novel that serves as the inspiration for the film.

Check out WPL’s catalogue for more great western movie listings. Get your boots and cowboy hat, pretend your recliner is a horse,  and visit the Old West for a few hours. What more do you need?

-Barbara

Read a movie, see a book

Books and films have had a symbiotic relationship ever since movies were invented. They feed off of each other at low- and high-brow levels, from comic books to prize-winning literary fiction.

Conventional wisdom says that the best movie adaptations take liberties with the original source, and it’s not hard to find examples of this. Christopher Priest’s The Prestige is a twisty, complicated tale of double identities and family vendettas lasting up to the present day; the movie version wisely concentrates on a single thread of the story. P.D. James’ very English dystopian Children of Men is hardly recognizable on film, and not just because the setting is grittier — many of the characters are brand new or completely different. And while those of us who are fervent fantasy readers debated all the changes to the Lord of the Rings trilogy, it’s hard to argue that director Peter Jackson’s condensation of the story wasn’t part of the reason for his movies’ huge mainstream success.

Of course, life stories are a natural source for movie adaptations — think of the bestselling memoir Eat, Pray, Love. Stacy Schiff’s recent biography Cleopatra: a Life has already been optioned for filming, with Angelina Jolie rumoured to play the Egyptian Queen. And the subject doesn’t even have to be human: racehorse Seabiscuit’s story is thrilling in both formats.

But other kinds of non-fiction can also be adapted into movies, and not just documentaries. A trend in recent years has seen pop culture non-fiction turned into fictional narratives. Yes Man, Danny Wallace’s story of the year he agreed to everything he was asked to do, became a movie starring Jim Carrey, and the relationship guide He’s Just Not That Into You morphed into a romantic comedy.

"Really?" "I know, it didn't seem plausible to me either."

And I haven’t even gotten to the never-ending stream of movies from classic literature! Jane Austen’s books alone have seen every kind of treatment from respectful multi-part BBC miniseries to modern teenage comedies (that’s before you add zombies to the mix).

My favourite kind of literary movie introduces me to a book I’ve never heard of before.  Forgotten older titles like the charming Miss Pettigrew Lives For a Day and I Capture the Castle have been discovered by new generations of readers after movie versions were released. And the Swedish horror film Let the Right One In (also in Hollywood remake form) led me to the creepy original novel by John Ajvide Lindqvist.

How about you: what’s your favourite kind of literary movie? Do you prefer a script that sticks close to the book’s road map, or goes wildly off-course?

-Danielle