![]() ![]() ![]() That series ultimately found its footing as well as its own identity, largely by sacrificing any notion of strict fidelity to the staggering narrative density of the books. Rowling was as fiercely protective of her material as P.L. The tedious first two films in the Harry Potter franchise, as directed by Chris Columbus, treated their source texts as gospel watching them, you’d have thought J.K. (We’ll know more when “The Desolation of Smaug” hits theaters next month.) ![]() ![]() Peter Jackson struck just the right balance in his magnificent “Lord of the Rings” trilogy, although lately he seems to have committed to his material with a fidelity that Tolkien himself might have found excessive, if the epic bloat of “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” is any indication. The answer, of course, is (c) to make a killing at the box office, an outcome generally arrived at by finding some happy middle ground between options (a) and (b), between undue reverence and wholesale reinvention. More than once over the past several years, during the steady diet of teenage wizards and emo vampires that we have come to call moviegoing, I’ve felt compelled to ask: What is the purpose of adapting popular fantasy fiction for the screen? Is it (a) to faithfully reproduce the author’s sacred text in every last particular for the benefit of hardcore fanboys and fangirls? Or is it (b) to refashion the material as an entirely new experience, trimmed down and in some cases completely overhauled? (SPOILER ALERT: This piece reveals key plot details from “ The Hunger Games: Catching Fire.”) ![]()
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