The Top 5 Book-To-Movie Reviews of 2022

Credit: Pixabay.com

Happy New Fear everybody! (Of course, I really mean New Year. I’m a horror writer, so what do you expect?) If you read my Facebook post the other night, you can see that 2022 kind of ended  badly for A Far Out Fantastic Site. As I said in the post, our monthly Book-To-Movie reviews have run late into the following month. Well, this is the first time in the series' history, that a Book-To-Movie (BTM) has actually run late into the following year. So, this blog post was originally supposed to be an end-of-year one but the internet in my area went down due to a big New Year's Eve storm. It didn’t go back up until last night. So, consider this post a New Year one even thought we’re going to look back on some BTMs of 2022. 

In a Book-To-Movie, we review a work of prose fiction and its movie adaptation. However, because this year is just starting, and our BTM was supposed to occur on the last Saturday of December at the latest, and I don’t have a movie adaptation of a book to review at this time, let’s look back at the five topmost Book-To-Movie reviews of 2022. 

Book-To-Movie Series is Here to Stay!

Before I narrowed down the search in Google Analytics to the topmost BTM reviews of 2022, I found something really interesting. I first did a general search in Analytics for the year’s topmost Far Out Fantastic Site blog posts in which some of those turned out to be Book-To-Movies. That shows you that you guys really like reading about book-to-movie adaptations! So, one thing to look forward to in 2023 is the assurance that the BTM series won’t be going away! (Not that I had never planned to end it, though.) 

Now for the list of the top five Book-To-Movie reviews of 2022. These were determined in Analytics mostly based on number of views. I’ve listed them in chronological order but included each one’s rank number. For example, January’s BTM is fourth place of the top five and March’s is second place. 

Credit: Pixabay.com

Chronological Listing of the Year's 5 Topmost Book-To-Movie Reviews

Poe's 'The Oblong Box', January 22, Rank No. 4 

Not only did the year start off with a review of a Poe story and its movie adaptation, but with Poe's 213th birthday (which was January 19th). Although the American International Productions (AIP) movie of “Oblong Box”, starring Vincent Price and Christopher Lee, is a good one, it strays way far from the original story almost beyond recognition. Yet, it is good in its own right. At least the original premise of the story was kept, which is directly stated in both the short story and movie's title. 

H.P. Lovecraft's 'The Outsider', March 27, Rank No. 2 

2022 was the year of Lovecraft for the blog. I don’t think we’ve reviewed so many book-to-movie adaptations of Lovecraft stories any other year. "The Outsider" short story is way better than the movie that was retitled "Castle Freak". The movie loses the original story's gothic and cosmic horror elements and suspense.

H.P. Lovecraft's "The Dunwich Horror', May 1, Rank No. 3 

This was one of those reviews that ran into the month following the one it was due in, which was April. Unlike "Castle Freak", this AIP movie captures the cosmic horror really well as well as the "weird fiction" element in the monster. The “weird fiction” element in this case is that the monster has no similarity to any creature on Earth and so is grotesquely alien. Cosmic horror and weird fiction elements are two features of Lovecraft's work that made it so distinguishable in his time. The movie's 70s psychedelia used to portray the creature went so good with the Lovecraftian storyline even though the original story came way before film’s time. Well, they didn't call it weird fiction for nothing now, did they?

E.R. Burroughs' 'The People That Time Forgot', May 29, Rank No. 5 

This BTM reviewed the sequel to the first book of Burroughs' Caspak trilogy, "The Land that Time Forgot", and its movie adaptation. The movie is not as good as the novella. Many scenes from the book were omitted and characters and events were changed. The novella has far better and more intelligent worldbuilding, especially in the evolutionary characteristics which make the story more convincing than the movie. Yet the film still follows the basic plot of the original story and is fun to watch.

Guest Blogger Alex Cavanaugh Reviews 'Relic', August 29, Rank No. 1  

This was the top of the top five! This review was actually done by author/blogger Alex Cavanaugh as a guest post. In turn, I did a Book-To-Movie review of Joe Hill's "The Black Phone" at Alex's blog that same day. (Because mine was not presented here at the Fantastic Site, it's not included in the topmost rankings.) Alex reviewed the Preston and Child novel, "Relic", and its 1997 movie adaptation. The book is a detective horror story. According to Alex, the film was good as a monster movie but it left out the main character of the book which was a major problem especially for those who’ve read it. 

Regardless of its ranking, my favourite Book-To-Movie of 2022 was the one of Lovecraft's "The Dunwich Horror". I both liked discussing the story and movie but I particularly liked going over the 1970s psychedelic influence and comparing it with the weird fiction elements of Lovecraft. Generally speaking, 2022 was a year for good science fiction and fantasy reading and viewing. My favourite book-to-movie adaptation was "The Black Phone”, although it didn't make it into the rankings for the reason I mentioned above. Hopefully 2023 will bring just as good book-to-movie adaptations to review! It may even bring a special addition to the BTM series!  

For the other Book-To-Movie posts of 2022, visit the BTM page! 

What are your favourite Book-To-Movie posts of 2022 listed above or otherwise? What posts in the series would you like to see for 2023? 

Again, Happy New Year!

Until next time . . . which will actually be Wednesday for the year’s first Insecure Writer’s Support Group blog hop!