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Amanda’s Adaptations: To Kill a Mockingbird – Book Vs Film

to kill a mockingbird

Reading To Kill a Mockingbird as a teenager had a massive impact on me. The powerful story with messages about tolerance, understanding and trying to see life from another’s perspective really opened my eyes to the everyday injustices of the world.

Harper Lee’s book is written from two perspectives in a way – a woman looking back at her childhood and that same child looking out into the world and asking questions adults didn’t dare ask. As a central character, Scout is miraculous. She is inquisitive and naughty but ultimately good. She tries to do her best, it’s just that her best frequently rubs people up the wrong way. Whether it’s the neighbours telling her off for dressing like a boy or her teacher telling her off for knowing how to read, the only person Scout seems to be able to be herself with is her father Atticus.

tkam bookIt is the relationship Scout has with her father that really forms the centre of this story. He is a quiet man who avoids fighting, doesn’t rise to threats and tries to be a good example for Scout and her brother Jem. Yet, as the reader soon learns as the trial of Tom Robinson progresses, he is one of the most courageous characters ever created.

Though the racial prejudice which surrounds the trial is the major event which takes place throughout the story, it is the elusive Boo Radley – the neighbourhood shut-in – who is constantly hiding in the shadows, with the children on a mission to get him to come out of his house.

The adaptation of TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD is one of the strongest adaptations in cinema history. Items are cut for the feature – poor Aunt Alexandra is excluded entirely – but overall the feel of the story and the really important moments remain. Tom Robinson’s fate is altered to really reinforce the point of the racial prejudice which, in the book, isn’t needed simply because there has been sufficient time to explore it already. Without a doubt, however, the greatest thing about the film is Gregory Peck, who so perfectly encapsulates the real Atticus Finch it’s hard to believe anyone else could ever play the role quite like him.

The film keeps the innocence of youth, the injustice of prejudice and the bonds of friendship and family, while not shying away from the horror of the story. Nothing needs to be explicit in either book or film because it’s experienced through the eyes of a child who doesn’t fully appreciate what’s taking place around her. Yet, because of this perspective, both versions of this story are somehow even more powerful, even more shocking and even more compelling.

Book [usr=5]
Film [usr=5]

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