I can’t believe we’re at the end of 2024, but I suppose that’s neither here nor there. It is the end of 2024, and traditionally, what we do when it’s the end of 2024 is: look back on the year of literary adaptations and think about the ones we liked the most. Over a glass of eggnog, naturally.
We’re living amidst an IP explosion; it’s almost impossible to keep track of all the adaptations, but at Lit Hub, we tried our damnedst. What follows is a list of our favorites from among the overwhelming profusion of adaptations we’ve encountered this past year.
We’ve broken down this list into two categories, “Film” and “TV,” to keep things extra clear, and marked where you can stream them for free (if they’re streaming for free).
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FILM
Nickel Boys
Based on: The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead
RaMell Ross’s deft, impressive adaptation of Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel about a sinister, segregated detention camp for boys in the 1950s, is a bracing and commanding achievement—in its handling of narrative but also through its particularly innovative camera use. It is heavy with subjective shots, in ways that tease intimacy but really hold the audience at a distance until the film’s charged, unforgettable climax and denouement. I can’t remember being so riveted in sickly agony and sheer amazement by a film in such a long time. Truly, I’ve never seen a film like this before. You must see it. You must.
Robot Dreams
Based on: Robot Dreams, by Sara Varon
Pablo Berger’s Robot Dreams is one of the most devastating and beautiful films I’ve seen in a long while, a riveting dialogue-less adaptation of Sara Varon’s graphic novel, made in the same artistic style. Nominated for an Oscar for animated film and suitable for all ages, it is the story of Dog, who leads a lonely life in Manhattan, and so orders a robot companion. The two become devoted friends, but when Dog takes Robot to the beach, they find themselves separated and learn that they won’t be able to reunite for a year or so, each tormented by the length of time, the distance, and the unknowable forces between them.
Conclave
Based on: Conclave by Robert Harris
In Conclave, Ralph Fiennes plays Dean-Cardinal Thomas Lawrence, the Vatican official charged with organizing a papal conclave to elect a new pope, following the death of the previous one. But, once all the cardinals have been sequestered and political schmoozing begins in earnest, Cardinal Lawrence finds himself not only in charge of the proceedings, but also finding out what really happened to the previous pope, whose death seems to have been a bit suspicious.
So, yes, Conclave is a detective story. But Cardinal Lawrence ain’t no Father Brown. This is a tense, staid film… and more than make Lawrence a sleuth, wisely, in all ways, the film makes the WHOLE THING a mystery. I’ll explain. This is a film about a man who, in his vocation to and service of the Church, has lived for a long time accepting the senses of mystery in his life, but who suddenly finds that everything around him is very, very mysterious: the political motivations of his colleagues, the secret ambitions of his friends, and even the Church’s ability to carry out the work of God. In a world of whispers and gossip and secrets and rumors and pleas and deals, Cardinal Lawrence becomes the only man asking questions.
The Wild Robot
Based on: The Wild Robot by Peter Brown
This lovely, lovely film about a robot named Roz stranded on a desert island is, true to its source material, a beautiful reflection on the relationship between technology and nature.
Young Werther
Based on: The Sorrows of Young Werther, by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Yes, that’s right… there is a new adaptation of Goethe’s The Sorrows of Young Werther. And not only that… it’s a romantic comedy. And not only that, it’s set in the modern day. And not only that… it’s good?
The Taste of Things
Based on: The Passionate Epicure: La Vie et la Passion de Dodin-Bouffant, Gourmet, by Marcel Rouff
The Taste of Things is a beautiful movie. It’s not a very vegetarian movie, if that’s a useful thing for you to know, but hey, neither is French cuisine, and that is what this movie is about. Well, it’s about more than simply cuisine, even more than cooking… the film, directed by Tran Anh Hung, takes a thorough, holistic, craft-based approach to the epicurean project, from growing ingredients to harvesting them to preparing them to combining them in dishes and combining dishes in courses and combining courses in menus.
Benoît Magimel plays Dodin Bouffant, a wealthy gourmand in rural 19th-century France. Juliette Binoche plays Eugénie, the gifted cook who works at his manor. The two are constant collaborators in every respect: cooking, work, love. Dodin wants to marry Eugénie, but she wants to keep their relationship the way it is, with their shared art at the center. A beautiful and sensual and tender movie.
Nosferatu
Based on: Dracula by Bram Stoker
Good things come to those who wait, and I have been waiting for Robert Eggers’s Nosferatu adaptation for years. I am very pleased to report that this is a dark, mysterious, and rich adaptation that braids together many different aspects of its cinematic and literary precursors. It comes out on Christmas Day, so lug your crucifixes out of your house and take them to the theater with you!
TV
Shogun (Hulu/FX)
Based on: Shogun by James Clavell
Shogun!! A veritable masterpiece!! If you weren’t watching Shogun when it aired, I’m not sure what your excuse could have been, but it’s all right: you can watch it now! Based on James Clavell’s 1975 novel about 17th-century Japan, it’s the story of Dutch arrival on Japanese shores, and the cataclysmic consequences for all involved. Plus, it features an unreal performance from Hiroyuki Sanada.
Bad Monkey (Apple TV+)
Based on: Carl Hiaasen’s Bad Monkey (2013)
I was pleasantly surprised by Bad Monkey, the groovy new adaptation of Carol Hiaasen’s classic Florida PI story. Vince Vaughn is Andrey Yancy, a down-and-out former detective living in Key West, who becomes embroiled in a mystery after a severed arm is found on a fishing trip. It’s bright and bubbly enough as much as you’d want for a neo-noir, and more than plenty sultry and cheeky. A good alternative for those not headed to the Keys for the winter holidays.
Ripley (Netflix)
Based on: The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith
We didn’t really need another adaptation of The Talented Mr. Ripley, but I’m very glad we got one. Developed, written, and directed by Steven Zaillian, Ripley unfolds as a noir, in punchy, digital black-and-white. The thing about this new series, is that its leading actor, Andrew Scott, is incredibly good. He’s incredibly good in it, and he’s incredibly good in everything. I might even say that he’s the best actor working today.
In the first shot of Scott’s face, his dark eyes look black and cold, like pools of crude oil. In Ripley, Scott has managed to evacuate almost all humanity and feeling from his body; he embodies the sharp contrast of a body which appears to be human but lacks a human’s soul. This mode of characterization makes for a compelling antihero, but also feels rather like an intervention in the Ripley canon.
Anthony Minghella’s The Talented Mr. Ripley is nothing if not emotional; it stars Matt Damon as a young, giddy and thoroughly disturbed interloper who falls in love with a beautiful man and a beautiful lifestyle, and then does whatever he can to preserve whatever he can have of it. It is as heartbreaking as it’s terrifying, a study in explosive pathos and even, maybe, how the pursuit of community only results in greater loneliness. But the novel, written in 1955 by Patricia Highsmith, offers us a slicker, slimier sociopath. We’ve seen an unfeeling Ripley before, but not in a while, and not as well as the one Andrew Scott offers to us, which is an awkward but conniving lizard-man.
