A Prayer for Owen Meany

anarky · Post by **anarky** » Thu Dec 28, 2006 7:26 pm

This is a damned good book. I'm not too big on Irving's other books, but this is that "one phenomenal book" that otherwise fair-to-middling authors are remembered for a century later. (Name another book by Harriet Beecher Stowe. Anyone? Anyone?)

Essentially, there's a tiny kid--not exactly a dwarf or a midget--who has a messianic complex to save the world. That's a gross oversimplification, though, so read the damned book and see for yourself.

Oh, and Negative Boy, this has never been made into a movie. Well, technically not. It was filmed, but the result was so horrifically bad--and so far removed from the novel--that Irving not only insisted his name be removed, but he insisted the title of the movie be changed. Simon Birch is as bad a film as this book is good. (And with that and Daredevil under the director's belt, is it any wonder I have no hopes at all for Ghost Rider?)

Sadly, were anyone to make a good, faithful adaptation now, all the idiots like Negative Boy would say, "This is a total bite-off of Simon Birch."

Negative Boy · Post by **Negative Boy** » Fri Dec 29, 2006 12:14 am

I never saw Owen Meany in the theatres, but I'm surprised this Stowe character never got mentioned in a libel suit from the producers of Simon Birch. It had pretty much the same plot, except Jim Carrey was in it and I think the kid from Jurrasic Park. The one who died of a heroin overdose. And I think the other kid from Ally McBeal, but not the dancing baby. It's an odd coincidence that you mention Daredevil and Simon Birch in the same sentence because Mark David Chapman directed both of those films. I think there should have been a sequel to Simon Birch where Communists and Muslims team up to terrorize the United States and Mack Bolan and Phoenix Force go in and stop them.

jjreason · Post by **jjreason** » Sun Jan 14, 2007 6:50 pm

Why not Able Team?

Negative Boy · Post by **Negative Boy** » Mon Jan 15, 2007 8:56 pm

jjreason wrote:Why not Able Team?

Able Team was Mad ass! I'm sure that little prick was up to no good and Jim Carrey as a kid poured drain cleaner in his Cheerios and saved the world. I don't think Jim Carrey would make a very good Mack Bolan in the movie though. Maybe Thomas Jane. You know what another movie with kids in it that sucked was? Newsies. I don't think I read the book, but it seems to me that kids selling newspapers for pennies just to stay alive wouldn't have the time to take singing and dancing lessons.