MovieChat Forums > The Life Before Her Eyes (2008) Discussion > A good companion to the superior book......

A good companion to the superior book....

posted 14 years ago by whatbecameofhim
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The film isn't a total failure--It's beautifully shot, well acted, and has a gorgeous score. But I feel like the aspects of the book that were downplayed/changed kind of wrecked the potential of the film.
The reason Diana's death is so shocking in the book is because of the plot layout. We spend the book assuming Maureen was killed because we hear Diana say it in the beginning: "Kill her, not me." We then revisit it in the end of the book,and learn that Diana is shot after giving up her friend (Maureen 'volunteers' to be the one killed.)
I think the filmmakers felt Diana needed some kind of redemptive arc, and maybe it's a bit too mean to have her killed after giving up Maureen to the killer. Better to have her have a last minute change of heart and give herself up instead. The truth is, the story would've been tragic no matter who was killed, but it stings since Diana had so much life to give.
Also, the book had an almost supernatural element that I'd have liked seen in the film version. There are ghostly animals and logical hiccups in Adult Diana's life that make you think she's just losing her mind. I'd have like to see Thurman be able to go this route with the character, instead of one simply wracked with guilt. I feel like she got a bit cheated with the screenplay's version of older Diana. I'd like to have seen her go bigger with the character, but most of the events they put her though didn't seem to mean much. (The Emma/spaghetti scene in the book is really unsettling, but in the film, doesn't seem to signify anything).
I just feel like with a little more time, care, and attention to the book, this could've been a knockout. Maybe the book would've been to hard to adapt literally, but the film is a bit too muddled. But still, gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous.

[–] ioandesmj 14 years ago

Really?That's how the book actually was?Thanx!This makes a lot more sense now.I was baffled when the film ended, but yeah, I can understand now.And I agree with what u say about the filmmakers wanting to "soften" Diana

[–] aimless-46 14 years ago

Except what the OP said is not in fact what happens in the book. Diana never says "kill her - not me"; she imagines herself saying that and then imagines what it would be like for her to say that and to live; she concludes that there will be no punishment for her choosing to live except she will have to live with the memory that she told Michael to "kill her - not me". So instead she says "kill me - not her"; and at the same time her 40 year-old imagined-self sacrifices her life to save Emma from a wolf ("And when the wolf sprang in her direction, Diana spread her arms wide to take him in").

There is even a bit of subtext that the sacrifice was her destiny ("the moment she had been born for", "the moment in which she gave herself up", a part of the "goodness" of her life); with the question then being whether she exercised free will (had a choice) over what she would say. Kasischke probably introduced this to ask readers whether disobeying her conscience in a matter this important was even an option for Diana; and how having no option would relate to the Professor's concept of "intentional" evil and "intentional" good (could anything still be considered intentional if there was no option but to do it).

Of course all this is confusing because Kasischke is moving back and forth between and within timelines, and the 3rd person narrative in the rest room scene never specifies which girl is saying what to Michael (a typical line is: "Then one of the girls says in a whisper"). So you have to go to the future story where Michael has assumed the guise of a wolf to figure out what is really happening in the present story, because in the future story she is actually referred as Diana and in the end Emma has become Maureen.