Warm Bodies: A "Staggering" Success? The Book vs the Movie

I've made it no secret here that I'm insanely in love with Isaac Marion's book Warm Bodies. I've reviewed it, mentioned it in several other posts, and given away a couple of copies. I just can't get over it. So, needless to say, I was pumped for the movie adaptation. I reread the book in preparation and went to the first showing I could, which was at 10:15 pm last night. Now I'd like to give y'all a little comparison/movie review, hopefully to aid you in your decision to read the book and/or see the movie. Please ignore the serious part if you'd like, and scroll down to the fun part. :)

First, my general opinion of the movie:

Warm Bodies as a film has a clear demographic it's appealing to. I think it's easy to see through the trailers they desperately want the same girls that froth at the mouth over a new Twilight book and hope that the book's slightly higher literary roots will appeal to everyone else. I'm perfectly fine with this. Making a movie completely faithful to the book would be next to impossible.

With all of that in consideration, as a general movie-goer, I thought the movie was pretty great. They use humor to get the audience to accept a very tough idea to swallow: a human and a zombie falling in love and somehow changing the world. This was never a problem for me, and I don't think it will be a problem for the audience. R comes across as almost painfully endearing; one can't help but love and root for him. My roommate--who has no experience with the book--sat next to me and spazzed the whole time. She loved it.

As a deep lover of the book, I was a little less satisfied. Because the movie has to appeal to a much more varied audience than the book does, it loses some of its grit and its poignancy. This was expected, and I caught a glimpse of what I had so loved a couple of minutes in, but seeing the movie is not the same raw experience as I thought reading the book was.

Now, I'm going to be a bit less serious:

You should head on over to see Warm Bodies if:

You think this kid is SEXY. (And, really, who doesn't?)

You think zombies deserve a little bit o' lovin' too!

Your best friend says the darndest things (For reals, just you wait.)

You think John Malkovich is awesome. And who doesn't? Look at that face!

And just this. Really, I needed no other reasons.

There you have it! This is why you should see Warm Bodies. I think it's a great movie and that you'll come out of the theater a happier person for it. And please let me know what you think of this! I'd love to do more movie based on book reviews. It gives me the excuse to go see them... Hehehe. Have a happy Friday!