'...I have never had a strong relationship with the people who make films ... They want pretty pictures; they don't want a story ... people don't want novels. They want movies.' Stephen King

Words into pictures, exposition into action, mind into matter -- there has long been a tradition of turning books into movies. But how do you transfer an unique and personal vision into mass-market celluloid? Surely it can't be done -- a redundant idea doomed to failure. Like Take That doing Beethoven's 5th. Who would have the nerve? All together now: 'Hollywood, oh Hollywood...'

In today's best-seller environment, it's an unfortunate fact that more people are likely to encounter a film of a book than a book of a film. This, of course, applies to all writers: the successful world of TV and TV movies has meant a boon for many commercial authors. Jackie Collins, Lynda La Plante, Colin Dexter and Agatha Christie have all enjoyed wide scale recognition as result of that most easily accessed of mediums: the television set. Some, like John Grisham, are even guaranteed lucrative film rights before they write one word of their new novel.

As for horror, everyone knows the famous ones: Stoker's Dracula, Stevenson's Jekyll And Hyde, Shelly's Frankenstein and Leroux's Phantom of the Opera. And if you're any sort of fan, you'll no doubt have encountered the many adaptations of Poe and Dennis Wheatley too.

For today's sophisticated audience, the humble book or story is merely the source for a number of profitable spin-offs: the tie-in novelisation (often based not on the original novel but on the movie it produces), the book-about-the-film, the computer game, the CD-i version, the graphic novel, the audio book ... not forgetting the movie itself.

A vast number of novels have been adapted to date and it would be impossible to cover the numerous black & white as well as colour adaptations in a piece as brief as this. Instead let us concentrate on those movies adapted for the 70s, 80s and 90s. And there are plenty of those...

For example, the Stephen King films. The famous writer who once said '...TV is this magic medium which seems to turn almost everything it touches into shit...' has had most of his longer works and many of his short stories translated into celluloid -- meaning that more people become familiar with the author's name via the movie than via the novel or short story it was based on.

Indeed one of King's lesser novels, Carrie actually works better as a film. The book's structure -- newspaper clippings and excerpts from books -- makes for a pretty dry chronicle of events; the film, on the other hand, opts for a personal perspective -- we see these characters close up and actually feel the cruel taunts Carrie suffers. Her plight is in our face. And the overall effect is aided considerably by the black comedy that Brian De Palma injects into his highly visual film.

Another successful adaptation is Salem's Lot. Why? Because it is faithful to the novel and has a small cast of excellent actors (including James Mason) who provide an element of realism; a feeling that someone is taking this stuff seriously. Tobe Hooper directs the TV movie with great skill, creating creepy set pieces -- a floating kid, Mark Petrie's escape from the Marsden house -- which seem to indicate a healthy respect for the book on which it's based.

This is also true of the TV adaptation of It which though not entirely successful did include much that made King's mammoth novel so interesting. Mainly the likeable characters, the scary set-pieces and the black humour.

But even the best King adaptations are vastly inferior to the novels. Such cinematic abominations as The Tommyknockers and The Mangler just go to prove that certain stories should get left on the page.

Often they fail because the director has little or no interest in horror as a genre and so is likely to base his movie on successful films from the past -- even if these, in turn, are copied another hack director! You can almost hear the director's thoughts: 'The Tommyknockers? Ah, nice long book -- will make a good TV series. Give 'em a few shocks, some sex, some violence and the horror fans will love it.' Never mind that some of the more absurd moments in the aforementioned -- a killer coke machine, for instance!- make for ridiculous viewing when humourlessly adapted for the screen. Ditto The Mangler.

We all think we know what constitutes a good adaptation. But can we say why? Maybe it's when the characters are portrayed on screen fairly closely to how we imagined them in the book. Or perhaps the screenwriter's choice of what to leave in is personally appealing. On the other hand it may be because -- as in the case of Misery -- the intensity of the novel, its darkness and unrelenting tension, is successfully transferred to film; whether by means of good acting, a good screenplay or a talented director.

Naturally this begs the question of why a writer -- especially a successful writer -- should agree to have his treasured literary effort slaughtered by clueless execs or even worse, hack directors. In King's case, money, fame and the wish to see a half decent adaptation all spring to mind. A combination of all three is, however, almost unheard of.

So are there any advantages to offering (sacrificing?) your novel? Well, suppose the author of the bastardised film is a relative unknown. The resultant movie -- especially if it's any good -- can, on occasion, kick-start a literary career: a good film/TV serial will help sell books and in some cases incite interest in earlier, previously out of print works; the old adage that any review, even a bad one, is beneficial to one's career can be applied here. And don't forget, the below-par adaptations of the works of King or Lovecraft don't appear to have unduly damaged their reputations... They may even have encouraged fans to check out their books.

Treatments vary. Roger Corman's low budget, loosely adapted Poe films of the 50s and 60s honour the gothic conventions that made such stories as The Masque of the Red Death, Ligeia and The Fall of the House of Usher acknowledged classics. But the recent versions (who can forget the appalling 1988 version, The House of Usher starring Oliver Reed?) simply update the setting to modern day or add more gore ... with inevitably poor results.

Plenty of modern authors have submitted to horror-hungry Hollywood. Ira Levin (The Stepford Wives, A Kiss Before Dying), Bernard Taylor (Mother's Boys, The Godsend), John Farris (The Fury) and William Peter Blatty (The Excorcist), to name but a few.

But how many are actually any good? Clive Barker is one of the lucky ones; personal control (often directorial) over the source text has resulted in the excellent Hellraiser (novel: The Hellbound Heart), Candyman (short story: 'The Forbidden') and Nightbreed (novel: Cabal). But surely few of his imagined literary nightmares can match those occasioned by films like Underworld and Rawhead Rex!

Thomas Harris, often cast as a writer of psychological terror, achieved his deserved success with the films of his books, Manhunter (novel: Red Dragon) and The Silence Of The Lambs (from the novel of the same name); it helped too that they were well made. Gary Brandner can be happy with The Howling, but probably bridles at the mention of the sequels. And Jack Finney's novel Invasion of the Body Snatchers has been creepily filmed three times to date, proving that paranoia can be bloodcurdlingly realised and silence effectively manipulated in the hands of a fine director.

These are the lucky ones. In the cut-throat movie business which gives little consideration to the artist and his vision, if you can watch the film of your book without being reduced to tears, then you've probably been well served. Which is more than can be said of the following...

James Herbert's The Rats, for example, received an appalling treatment at the hands of hack director Robert Clouse. The substandard The Survivor -- another Herbert adaptation -- is, in comparison, a masterpiece. Dean Koontz too has cause to be disgruntled, what with The Servants Of Twilight and Watchers to explain away at conventions. However, these are as nothing when you consider what Shaun Hutson and Graham Masterton have suffered.

If you only know the latter through the irredeemably incompetent The Manitou (from the novel of the name) then be prepared for something a lot more satisfying from his novels. As for Hutson, the horror novel-turned-into-an-even-more-horrible-movie Slugs has to be seen to be believed...

There has to be a reason why the transition from page to reel is such a disparate business. Maybe it's the difficulty of adapting 400 single-spaced pages to approximately 120 double-spaced ones; a process that inevitably involves the loss of several peripheral (and often principal) characters from a novel. On the other hand, a successful adaptation can be the result of scenes being added to a screenplay that weren't in the original novel. In the case of Benchley's Jaws, for instance, the classic 'Indianapolis' scene wherein Robert Shaw relates his experience of having to survive the shark-infested waters after his ship is sunk was not in the original novel but was expressly written for the movie by John Milius. Adding considerably to the eerie atmosphere of the fishing vessel adrift at night, it also acted as a dramatic pause in the narrative. Similarly, the novel sees the three Great White hunters, Brody, Quint and Hooper, making several trips to sea in search of the shark; the film, on the other hand, sharpens its focus by sending the three on a one-off hunting expedition ... from which they may never return...

One horror novel actively improved by the film process is Bram Stoker's Dracula. Here is a much praised and influential vampire text which in fact is overwritten and melodramatic, with poor characterisation and irrelevant exposition throughout. This is where the humble movie can really go to work, replacing unnecessary dialogue, eliminating much of a character's musings and giving more thought to the novel's moodiest settings (the graveyard where the undead Lucy is found/the arrival of Harker at the Count's castle). The many adaptations to date have, with varying degrees of success, turned an intriguing premise into a memorable visual feast; even the recent Francis Ford Coppola version, despite its obvious miscasting, has much to recommend it in the way it diluted Stoker's erotic subtext into an engaging love story without resorting to the sensationalism of the novel.

Sometimes an original variation on a non-horror novel or short story can result in some memorably surreal images. Animation is an excellent medium for such experimentation. For instance, Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures In Wonderland was turned into an unsettling animated feature called Alice. In this the Mad Hatter's tea-party is anything but fun; and the White Rabbit, late as he is for an important date, has to keep making stops to stuff his insides back in! They never screened this on Watch With Mother!

The fairy tale character Tom Thumb was also given a disturbing (Grimm?!) treatment in Dave Borthwick's animated film The Secret Adventures of Tom Thumb. After being separated from his parents -- 'beings' who, by the process of full-motion animation, are bestowed with an unreal, odd-time quality -- Tom visits a land of strange creatures and has some very odd adventures making the film less children's story than adult nightmare...

Some horror novels cry out to be adapted. George R. Martin's gloriously evocative vampire novel Fevre Dream, if made, would certainly give Interview With A Vampire a run for its money. In the right hands, Brian Lumley's highly visual Necroscope books would make a great series of films; and S.P Somtow's werewolf history Moon Dance, again, under the guidance of a good director, would be a considerable improvement over the likes of Wolf and Full Moon.

At least we can look forward to some intriguing movies in the future. TM Wright's bizarre A Manhattan Ghost Story sounds interesting (1999 update: Julia Roberts is supposed to be starring in the film which is currently in the hands of Disney/Touchstone pictures); Koontz's Mr. Murder and Hideaway can only improve on the dire versions of his books we've had to date; and you can bet that King's novella The Mist will make for fine pulp cinema with Frank Darabont, director of the superb The Shawshank Redemption, at the helm.

Like it or not, movies, animated features and television are important to authors. Not only do they sometimes turn a low-profile name into a highly sought after property, but a film adaptation can open up whole new avenues for the lucky writer -- screenwriting, novelisations, television appearances and, in some cases, even acting (yes, we're talking about King again). On the downside, the process of transforming words into pictures almost inevitably means the loss of any deeper meaning originally intended by the author. High budget effects are no substitute for expansive concepts and strong characterisation. And let's not forget that, in this topsy-turvy world, a bad film (who mentioned The Keep?!) is frequently all that's needed to discourage a potential reader from trying the book on which it's based.

Of course, it works the other way too. A really good adaptation, such as the aforementioned Interview With The Vampire, can tempt a cinema-goer to check out the original novel if only to compare it to the movie; as a direct result of Interview's success, Anne Rice's books were repackaged, sales increased and rights to the sequel The Vampire Lestat optioned by Hollywood. Not bad for a book originally published back in 1976!

So how does one judge whether a director has done a good job on a favourite novel? There is, of course, only one way: Ask yourself, does the film stand on its own merits as strong cinema irrespective of how faithful it is to the book? If the answer is yes, then it's a good adaptation. As simple as that.

Whatever your views concerning a movie-massacre of a novel or short story, consider this: the technological age has meant an increase in hours of work and a reduction in the time to set aside for reading; it is the age of the 'quick fix', the superficial gain, fast-fiction fulfilment. An age where computer games are as likely to be adapted as literature; where in the not too distant future movies might be considered as static as the written page; where virtual reality becomes the norm and to sit inert through even two hours of entertainment is considered too uninvolving. And through it all, many novelists will sacrifice artistic vision for commercial gain, writing novels for profit not pleasure. Adapt or die will be the catchword.

Hey, somebody should make a film about it!

Originally appeared in Samahin magazine, issue 56, May/June 1996.