THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 26, 2002
BOOKS
THE UNIVERSITYDAILYKANSAN = 5
Catch these books before the movies
By Stephen Shupe
sshupe@kansan.com
Jayplay writer
The Four Feathers is just the first of many renowned page-turners making the leap to the screen in the coming months. It might be too late to read the A.E.W. Mason book on which Feathers is based without picturing Kate Hudson in your head, but such limits to the imagination can still be avoided with other literary characters.
So, before Frodo and Harry Potter battle wicked wizards at a theater near you, check out these six books. Note the release dates of the movies,and,rather than Hollywood's take,picture your own version of things.
October 4
Thomas Harris' first Hannibal Lecter shocker, Red Dragon, comes to the screen for the second time. The book follows a young Jack Crawford, as he tracks a disturbed individual who literally rips apart families with pieces of glass and takes comfort in the arms of a blind woman. The movie puts a familiar face on almost all of the characters (including Anthony Hopkins and Edward Norton), so reading the book beforehand is essential. Also check out Michael Mann's stylish 1986 film adaptation, Manhunter.
October 11
The third Bret Easton Ellis book to get the Hollywood treatment, The Rules of Attraction puts a nihilistic spin on a 1985 college love triangle. A freshman loses her virginity twice at a "Dress to Get Screwed Party," and the extremities never let up from there. Attraction is notable because it features the younger brother of Patrick Bateman, the title character in Ellis' infamous gore-fest, American Psycho.
November 15
The second boy-wizard book is often considered the weakest in the J.K. Rowling series. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets still introduces a half-dozen memorable characters. The best include Hogwarts' new narcissistic Professor of the Dark Arts, Gilderoy Lockhart, and a mysterious Slytherin boy named Tom Riddle.
December 18
Gollum finally catches up with Frodo in The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. Relatively fast-paced and generally the most battle-heavy of the trilogy, the
book finds turncoat wizard Saruman the White facing a tree-like enemy called the Ents and Frodo coping with another neardeath experience, this time in the Land of Mordor. Fans should note that the elfin princess played by Liv Tyler in Peter Jackson's film interpretation is nowhere near as prominent in J.R.R. Tolkien's writing.
December 25
The Gangs of New York: An Informal History of the Underworld restages history, beginning in the 1840s and ending with the blood-splattered Draft Riots in 1863. In the Herbert Asbury book, gangsters permeate nearly every aspect of political life, represented by the two ruling parties of Tammany Hall and the Native Americans. With a lead named Bill "The Butcher" Poole, look for Martin Scorsese's film version to pile on the violence.
A purportedly non-fiction book that reads like a sick joke, Confessions of a Dangerous Mind: An Unauthorized Biography tells the twisted tale of Chuck Barris, the game-show visionary who created The Dating Game and The Gong Show. Barris claims to be a CIA assassin, code-named "Sunny Sixkiller," who uses overseas scouting for game-show vacation prizes as a cover for his more deadly profession.
December 27
The first five books have all been released in paperback editions. Confessions will be published in November.
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