A Separate Peace

First I must confess that A Separate Peace is my favorite book. So of course, I have some bias against any attempt at adapting it for a feature film or television movie. But as I began to watch this film, I was more than willing to give it the benefit of the doubt. The original version from the early 1970s, though shot at Phillips Exeter Academy where the book's author attended school, and though it stayed as faithful as it could to the book, lacked any real depth of feeling and failed to capture the essence of the characters. The original seemed to simply go through the motions. Reading the trivia about the movie, you discover that it was cast mostly with non-actors. Thus, the original has an amateurish feel to it and it ultimately fails.

This new version, though I will grant that it captures the look of the period better than the original, seems to have thrown the book out all together. Scenes are rearranged, characters imposed where they don't belong, characters created that were not in the book, and no attempt was made to delve into the deeper conflicts that make the book so compelling. And the cardinal sin of all: the tree is not treated as the vital, almost central character it is in the book. This is an inexcusable oversight on the part of the film makers. How could they downplay the role of the tree? Why was it not introduced immediately? Why the Dead Poet-esque beginning? And what in God's name was up with Gene's accent? This film is, to be blunt, garbage. A Separate Peace should not be a difficult book to adapt for the stage or screen. John Knowles wrote it in a perfectly fine, linear style. The film makers should have trusted the story as it was already written; make changes, sure; embellish here and there, sure; take some mild dramatic license, sure. But destroy one of the pearls of American literature in the process? What were they thinking? In their corruption of the story line, they cut any possibility of suspense or drama. The whole movie falls flat and fails miserably.

If you are a high school or college student assigned to read this book and you are thinking of skimping and just watching the movie...don't even think about it. This film will be of no help to you.

Alas, we shall have to wait even longer before a version of this story comes to the screen that truly does it justice.

Some books seem natural for high school study. They need to be simple to read, but contain enough ambiguity and analogy to show students that real literature is more than a plot. If the book is set in high school, so much the better. I think the existence of this market niche is why this book has survived. There can be no other reason.

I mention the ambiguity, because that is why the book works; you never really know for sure what happened on that tree.

Alas, but TeeVee movies do not like ambiguity because they find their own market niche. So the only potentially valuable bit from the book is scrubbed out.

Still....

It did resonate with me. Its an odd thing when you encounter a story that has accidental settings and events that mirror important events in your life. I went to an elite boarding school, a military school in fact. The dynamics among boys in such an environment can have no analog anywhere else in the world. There were a characters like these (in the movie). There was at the time an expectation that many of us would go to the then current war in Viet Nam. There was anxious enthusiasm about roles that could in our imagination be achieved and a black market for swapping dreams of which of these roles were claimed first.

All this you see on the screen is true.

Ted's Evaluation -- 1 of 3: You can find something better to do with this part of your life.

to the 1972 version (which I have not seen). But I can't agree that there is no suggestion of a homosexual love interest in this movie. The director didn't beat you over the head with it, but the signs were pretty obviously there--or at least it was obvious to me.

Not being familiar with the novel it's based on, I can't say how well this film stuck to that story. There did seem to be quite a lot of loose ends that were never satisfactorily tied up (or even loosely laid back into place). But I found no faults with the location or the actors. A good piece of work, though not stellar by any stretch of the imagination.

ASP is my favorite book or at least in my top 3 or 4. I remember watching the 1972 film near where I went to college. I was blown away by that film with Parker Stevenson playing Gene and John Heyl as Finney. In my mind, sometimes I intertwine the pair of remakes, and while I preferred the original version, I didn't think this one was that bad the second time I viewed it. It's just a different take but the substance of the book is true enough. I recommend watching both films and just decide for yourself which one you prefer - no sin in liking both of them. As a rule I hate remakes since I am all for original ideas more than rehashing stuff that has already been done.

I read ASP for English this year (my sophomore year) and personally loved it. I fell in love with the characters (particularly Finny) and re-read the book three times (naturally I aced my exam) and I'd been wanting to see the movie for a long time. After calling every rental store in my town I finally came across it and happily rented it and just finished viewing it.

As with all book-to-film movies, this naturally wasn't a play-by-play. Scenes were added, scenes were cut, details were left out. But this was a generally good film, and goes hand-in-hand with the book, granted that you read the original first.

The acting was superb; to my delight, Finny was exactly as I wanted him to be, and I was pleasantly surprised with Brinker and Leper, who I hadn't thought too much of at first. Gene was very good too, could've been better (but the cute accent was a nice touch!) All in all it was great.

As I said, this could've been a better adaptation, mostly because Gene's descriptive narrations aren't heard in the movie. Read the book, then watch the movie. It's a good pair, despite the differences. 8 out of 10.

--Robin-chan