The Pearl

Compare to the all big blockbuster movies, this movie has inner beauty about it. It's pleasant to watch and heart warming. The emotions of the story portrayed very well. It's a really good movie in my opinion.

The Pearl is a horrible movie, without a doubt. The actual pearl glows like a 60-watt light bulb. They said the rain was coming, and the rain clouds moved at 60MPH. Horrible portrayal of the movie. Some minor differences in the book, and the movie. The rain was clearly fake, as only one part of the set was being rained on. My English teacher showed this to me and said we are watching a movie, not a good one. The lighting was so dim in some dark seems that it looked like it was filmed in a dark closet, with no one on camera. The budget for this movie seemed a little lax, maybe in the 2,000-10,000 range. The only good actor is the Doctor, and Juan Tomãs. Don't expect anything good from this movie.

Dear Mr. Zacharias,

Hi! My name is Johnny Sun. I highly respect your work sir, but you put the original, award winning novel The Pearl to shame. The book is known for it's remarkable lessons, and vivid details in which your movie seemed to lack. Your movie had absolutely none of the examples in which he was transforming into an animal. This was one of the most important reasons in the book explaining how greed will lead you to another side of you that awakens when you become selfish and self centered. Another reason that your movie was missing, is the knife he had from the beginning and the one he had encountered on his adventure. In your movie, out of nowhere he gets this long, sharp, and not to mention deadly machete which had taken the place of his working tool. In the book he had a regular knife to open up pearls which was a working tool that signified and complimented Kino's personality and nature. Later on, he upgrades to a machete which signified his inner personality and how the transformation was taking place. Finally, in the end the baby did not die. As much as this pains me to say, the baby should have, no, needed to die. Without the baby's death Kino would not have had a change of heart and an understanding of human nature. Also without the baby's death there would have been absolutely no point in throwing away the pearl. Mr. Zacharias, this movie is not worth 8 million dollars of funding. Many readers of the pearly would agree with me that the movie is terrible, right about now I am beginning to question if you read the book at all or heard a horrible summary from a close friend or family member. Overall this movie was very dissatisfying to readers like me. I hope that this letter has enlightened you and changed your idea about a good movie based on a spectacular book

With Hope,

Johnny Sun

The Pearl, released in 2001, and probably the worst movie of that year. I watched this movie out of curiosity since I had just finished the book, and that was where my dislike began. Where the writers and director changed the story, which they did very frugally. With that aside, I will concentrate on the movie and how it was made.

The actors of any movie are a good place to start, so that is what I will do. Lukas Haas was cast as the lead, Kino, who is described in the book as a large and strong man who has physically worked for everything in his life; I would be surprised if Lukas Haas weighs more than 150 pounds. Physicality can be overcome if the actor believes in his part and is committed, however this is not the case as Lukas Haas would just stand there watching the other actors go, even though they were not even half-decent, trying desperately to remember his lines. Richard Harris, playing the villain of the movie (not of the book), was a slight saving grace, and was able to do the best with the lines he was given. Nevertheless, I still do not understand why this two-time Oscar nominee chose to do this movie.

Even without the actors help, the director can still make a movie a success. Once again, though, this was not the case. Each scene of the movie was extremely poorly crafted, and even laughable to watch. With random characters thrown in to state obvious facts, my favorite being the man with the beard proudly announcing that "they have not yet said a price" during the appraisal scene. The director also had a poor eye for detail with little mistakes throughout, such as Kino's black spandex that he was wearing underneath his loin cloth, which can be scene plainly during the diving scene. And of course the director couldn't resist throwing in a love scene that lies nowhere in the book.

The Pearl was an overall terrible movie, and I found myself laughing aloud at the poor filmmaking and acting. In my immediate memory, I cannot think of a movie which was worse than this. The Pearl has obviously received zero award success.

I give The Pearl a very worthy 2.1/10.

Haas as Kino is what makes this so bad. You wouldn't think Steinbeck could be corny, but this film does just that. Dated music. Peasant women with eyeliner and rouge.