All its best lines are from Green's book. The scriptwriters are the same ones who wrote last year's The Spectacular Now (which I have raved about before) and what they have written is a reasonably smart, capable script. Hazel wants know what happened to the other characters after the main character died in her book, and tries to get answers from Van Houten. And interestingly, the author of the fictional novel, Peter Van Houten (Willem Dafoe), turns out to be a troubled alcoholic with an interest in thought experiments and philosophy, as Wallace was.
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The fact that the book stops mid-sentence is one of a series of allusions in TFIOS to Wallace, as well as the themes of many of his writings (including his famous Kenyon commencement speech).
She shares the book with Augustus at the start of their relationship.Īn Imperial Affliction ends mid-sentence, as the late great writer David Foster Wallace's first novel did. The main plot of TFIOS turns on Hazel's favorite book, a cancer book called An Imperial Affliction. Thankfully, even though the characters have been rendered generic, the movie keeps some of this interesting intellectual engagement, probably because the plot completely hinges on this engagement. A number of comparisons have been made between TFIOS and Erich Segal's adapted hit Love Story?Elgort plays Augustus slickly, a little bit like Ryan O'Neal played Oliver Barrett IV.Ī preoccupation with finding meaning in the face of death makes the novel interesting in spite of its central premise. The depth falls by the wayside a bit, but in his appeal to type rather than specificity, he fits with Woodley's performance and they do have chemistry.
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Part of the problem with Elgort in the film is actually one of make-up, not acting?he has glowing skin and he simply looks too healthy. But in addition to being witty, deep and romantic, Gus is also supposed to be a hot and cocky 18-year-old ex-basketball player and the latter is how Elgort plays him. Gus wants to be remembered by millions?he wants things in the world to mean something, he fears oblivion. Several critics have noted Elgort is in over his head in the role of Gus. She was above all not a bland kid dying of cancer, but a very specific one with interesting tastes and turns of phrase. But Hazel in the book was psychologically edgier, wittier and sharper than Woodley's performance suggests. In the film, Woodley has her short hair and her girl-next-door looks.
She was a teenager Green knew who died of thyroid cancer several years ago. But all of Hazel's ragged edges, angles and complexity in the book are replaced by a certain generic Hollywood quality that feels intentional.Īs I learned from CBS Sunday Morning's clip on John Green last Sunday, Woodley has been styled throughout the movie in accord with Green's real-life inspiration Esther Earl. You can't help but like and feel for Woodley's Hazel, of course, because she's an excellent actress giving it her all playing a cancer patient. In the movie, however, Woodley often does play Hazel as a blank slate. And yet, in spite of Hazel's maturity, she is still sometimes a normal teenager who wants her parents to be ok after her death, but says grouchy, even mean things, when pushed. Throughout the book, it is clear how smart, nerdy and interesting she is. Green doesn't pander to his readers or assume they are intellectually unsophisticated. There is nothing vacuous or blank slate-ish about her she is not a grown-up's stereotype of what teenagers are like. It is Hazel's self-aware quirkiness that makes TFIOS (the book) so appealing. As the story begins, Hazel has metastatic thyroid cancer and Gus is cancer-free after a bout with osteosarcoma that claimed one of his legs. Crew models, in spite of the cannula in Hazel's nose throughout the film. For one thing, the two leads have the preppy shine of J.
They promise the movie won't be a generic kids-dying-of-cancer pic.Īlthough what we get is faithful to the plot of the blockbuster book (I'm sure many tweens will love this adaptation), it does not feel like the truth of two particular teen cancer patients in love as the book told it. They promise truth in the descriptions of pain both psychological and physical of dying from cancer and the truth of two complicated psyches. The best thing about John Green's book, in my opinion is its effortless authenticity and unvarnished emotional truths, so the opening lines seem to promise something great to those who like the book. To badly paraphrase, she promises that the story to follow will not be an manufactured romance, but the truth. The lines are a voiceover by Hazel Grace Lancaster (Shailene Woodley), a 16-year-old cancer patient. The most problematic thing about the film adaptation of The Fault in Our Stars is in its opening lines.