Horrifying! Shocking! Tales of works from print to screen

book-cover-now-a-terrifyingIt’s been a good long while since I blew through a book as quickly as I did James F. Broderick‘s Now A Terrifying Motion Picture! Twenty Five Classic Works of Horror Adapted from Book to Film. Out now from McFarland & Company, Broderick’s book is an enjoyable read.

As I said, I breezed right through it, but that’s not to say that Now A Terrifying Motion Picture! is a lightweight piece of writing. Broderick does a fine job of analyzing both literature and film in a well put-together piece of analysis. Each work gets the same treatment: analysis of short story/play/book, then analysis of the film, then a bit of comparison and contrast between the two.

Those topics are all contained in each 7-8 page chapter, but it’s not as if Broderick follows a pattern. Each work gets its own flavor of treatment. “The Masque of the Red Death” allows for a brief summation of other Poe collaborations between Vincent Price and Roger Corman, while works like The Fly and The Thing From Another World let the author look at multiple adaptations over the years.

The reader could possibly quibble that there’s no grand thread running through the book. Aside from the introduction, there’s no real effort made to try to bring everything together in one grand theory. Actually, that works to Broderick’s advantage. Covering so many works and so many films, with both print and screen titles covering centuries and formats, it would be nigh-impossible to find a commonality between all twenty-five pieces covered within the pages of Now A Terrifying Motion Picture!

Plays, short stories, novels, novellas, movies both silent and talkie, to say nothing of a couple made-for-TV films … the mind boggles at the effort of trying to tie all of this up neatly. Broderick does a wonderful job of keeping each chapter succinct and focused, while not skimping on any pertinent details. This is a must for fans of both literature and film.

You order the book directly from McFarland using the link above or by calling their order line at 1-800-253-2187.