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Directed by: Mike Nichols Starring: Alan Arkin, Martin Balsam, Art Garfunkel, Jon Voight Walking out of The Hitchhikers' Guide to the Galaxy, I couldn't help but feel let down considering what a great book it had stemmed from. However, I did feel that I had gotten a good amount of enjoyment from the movie itself. For this film adaptation of Joseph Heller's classic satire, not even that could be said. The main plot is still the same: Yossarian the bombadier gets fed up with fighting in WWII after a traumatic experience, but is repeatedly unable to leave due to the famous title catch that prevents both sane and insane men from being relieved. The film chronicles his constant visits to Rome, talks with other soldiers, and the ineptitude of his higher-ups. And yet it still fails. To start off, Catch-22 is not a short or simple book. Many, many complex characters and subplots are radically changed or removed. Some of this is understandable and forgivable, but others are not; what's the point of reducing the plot of the chaplain, one of the more important characters in the book, to put in one gag scene with Major Major and never show him again? Why keep the ultimate fate of McWatt if the scene is transformed from a tragedy into a comedy? Why stick in a 5-minute dance scene that adds little to the plot? Why unveil the surprise traumatic experience of Yossarian gradually, repeating footage and basically spoiling it halfway through the film, instead of just alluding to it and waiting until the end? Several characters also end up as something different. Aarfy, a living symbol of uselessness and cluelessness in the book, seems to just be another normal guy until his last scene, which should seem only horrifying and not out of character. Doc Daneeka is no longer such a hardass who barks about his suffering. Yossarian himself goes from a fairly levelheaded man to an unbalanced maniac, going into yelling fits every 3 scenes and with a nonexistant temper. Catch-22 is definitely a hard book to translate to film, but it's still surprising how much this adaptation flounders. Even if the book is a favorite, it's best to stay away from this so it doesn't taint your opinion. RATING: 2.5 PROS: Some of the casting is all right; nice on-location filming CONS: Narrative is completely screwed up and comes out disjointed; some scenes and characters are changed for the worst ADDITIONAL INFORMATION: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0065528/
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Sep 8, 2005 21:02
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| # ? Apr 25, 2024 18:49 |
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Adapting Catch-22 to film is incredibly hard, due to how character driven the book was. Shrinking it down to 2 hours (at least I think it was 2 hours) will obviously leave a lot out, and I thought it was handled pretty well. A lot of things, most of them being ones you mentioned, could have been prevented and changed to make the movie better but I think that the movie did a pretty good with two hours. A lot of the characters were really dehumanized and just turned into regular characters, and I really didn't like that. I'll give it a 3.5 for a solid effort, but much could have been improved.
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Sep 10, 2005 05:16
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Again, a low score for overall effect, a medium score for effort. The nature of the book would mean that you would need either a 10 hour long film or a serialised version on tv. Each episode being a chapter in the book. But that would mean that only fans of the book would watch it. Personally, I wouldn't have made the film at all. 1.5 from me
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Sep 11, 2005 02:11
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I've given it a 4, just for the scene with the bomber landing/crashing in the background, and for Orson Welles.
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Sep 13, 2005 03:13
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Soild 4. Maybe higher. If you try to compare it too much to the book, it becomes worthless. It is it's own film that borrowed heavily from the book. To say it fails because it's not "the book on screen" is really holding a lot of bias as you watch this. I thought it was a great film, and I love the book. One may be better than the other, but on it's own, the movie is pretty drat good! If you like the book, or haven't read it, it doesn't matter. This is a funny, intelligent film. Go see it. Pros - Funny, good acting, basic plot resembles the book, which is cool if you like the book. Cons - If you want to be a strict interpretist, then I guess this movie isn't that good. Then again, a large large amount of movies we watch these days are based on books, and very few reproduce what is in the book. Not every film adaptation can be Lord of the Rings 4-4.5
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Sep 20, 2005 00:58
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While it's by no means a great movie, Alan Arkin and Jon Voight put in memorable performances as Yossarian and Milo Minderbinder respectively. Tallmantz Aviation pulled out all the stops for the flying scenes in this one, finding and restoring 16 airworthy B-25 Mitchell bombers and flying them all at once in one of the most complicated scenes ever filmed. If you're an aviation buff it's worth seeing for this alone. 3/5
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Jul 19, 2010 17:58
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| # ? Apr 25, 2024 18:49 |
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The main problem with the Catch-22 movie is that it isn't funny. Most of the humor in the novel stems from the juxtaposition of the absurd events of the plot and the matter-of-fact style of the narrative. Since the movie doesn't have that narration, the humor is lost. Scenes that are hilarious in the book fall completely flat in the movie, even when the dialogue is taken straight off of the page. The film has its moments, but is pretty disappointing considering the quality of the source material. There's also the standard book-to-movie complaint about things being cut out or changed. I'm not universally against this - if you're filming the next Twilight movie, fine. But you don't gently caress with a book like Catch-22. It's a masterpiece. The parts can't be mixed around, deleted, and transformed on a whim. It's like trying to touch-up the paint on the Mona Lisa so that you can take a better picture of it. 2/5
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Jul 20, 2010 03:07
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