Similarities Between Books and Movies

Books and movies are different. They are two separate things with a lot of contrasts. However, just because they their differences, that doesn't mean they don't have similarities either.

To start off, both books and movies are mediums, widespread means of communication. As with every other medium, their main task is to spread a message, independent of whatever form it takes. While the methods may differ, one cannot deny that is a singular purpose that both books and movies share.

Another thing they have in common is that they can be used with the same goals in mind. They can both be used to tell a story, to entertain the audience. They can also be used for more practical purposes such as teaching us something. There exist educational books as well educational movies both with the ability to teach us the something. The uses one can find for both books and movies are as varied as they are similar.

Lastly, they can serve as an escape. How many of us, stuck in the monotony of daily life, haven't wished to flee to another reality. That is another thing both books and movies have in common. They have the power to tease our imagination. Simply start reading or watching and everything else ceases to matter. You let yourself get swept away into the adventure of a lifetime and suddenly the world outside of the screen or beyond those pages no longer exists. That is the wonderful power that both books and movies can have over us.

In conclusion, yes, books and movies are remarkably different. But while their means might be like night and day, their purpose, as well as the feeling they can inspire, are pretty much the same.

Preetam Kaushik, "Watching Movies Vs Reading Books: What’s The Right Pick?", (2014, December 28), Business Insider India. Retrieved from: http://www.businessinsider.in/Watching-Movies-Vs-Reading-Books-Whats-The-Right-Pick/articleshow/45665060.cms

How Books and Movies Complement Each Other

We have long been hearing that old argument, "books or movies". There is definitely a rivalry between them for as long as movies have been a thing. However, as is often the case, movies and books depend on each other a lot more than you would think.

Some of the first movies ever made were based on books, a trend that continues to the present time. As a matter of fact, this more true than ever nowadays. Hollywood is always looking for new ideas and sometimes producers and screenwriters either lack the originality or simply cannot keep up with the popular demand from the audiences. As such, they tend to resort to books for ideas. And it works. The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter and The Hunger Games just to name a few. These are some of the most popular movie series ever and they're all based on books.

Of course, movies are not the only ones to benefit. Books too have something to gain from all this. Namely, free publicity. There are a lot of books being published every year, yet most of them tend to fall into obscurity. Even when the book is already popular, a movie can be very helpful at spreading the knowledge of its existence even further. For example, a movie came out this year called "Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children" based on a book of the same name. Now, I have no idea how popular the book was. That's because, until I has heard of the movie, I had no idea this book even existed. Such is the symbiotic relationship between books and movies.

On a less industrial point, movies and books can also complement on a more individual level. When reading a book we often wonder how awesome it would be to actually see it play out. That is a job movies can easily do. On the other hand, books tend to be more detailed than movies so it is advisable if one wants a bigger picture of the whole story.

Basically, us, movies and books are all very fortunate that they both exist because, for all the rivalry between the two, they make each other better and we can all benefit from such a thing.

Dashiell Bennett, The Symbiotic Relationship Between Movies and Books, (2015, January 7), The Atlantic. Retrieved from: http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/01/the-symbiotic-relationship-between-movies-and-books/384254/

Why Are We Reading Less?

In the past everything was easier than today. When comparing three generations it is extremely easy to point out some differences.

Most of our grandparents didn’t go to school, and if they did, they didn’t even finished elementary school. Their works were all manual since there were no machines in their time: women worked in the street selling bread and in the market selling the products they cultivated in their little yards. Men worked in what we call “the tougher jobs”. They even went to war in different countries like India and Africa. Nowadays most of our grandparents don’t know how to use technology like our parents and we know, because there weren’t even sign of it when they were already adults. When technology didn’t existed people’s lives was so much easier, to the point where people could actually sit and enjoy reading a book, since there were not many movies like there are today.

Our parents were born in one era to grow up in another one. They were the ones who saw the evolution of computers and technology. While growing up our parents were attending college and they didn’t used computers or any sort of digital support. Books were the only reliable source. But when getting out of college, computers were starting to appear in everyone’s houses, but not the laptops we can see nowadays. Back then there would be a monitor alone, a huge one compared to the ones we have today, a keyboard, a mouse on the side and then what they called the computer back then that would have all the mechanisms to: turn on the monitor, insert diskettes and many other things. When they had kids (so our generation) there were no laptops yet but the first mobile phones were being created. Nowadays our parents can work with smartphones and laptops because not only they adapted themselves to the new technologies but also because while growing up they had some connection with them.

Our generation I known for “being born with the technologic teeth” meaning it is like we are born knowing how to work on everything that is technological. It is not true though. I remember when I was a kid I had no idea how links to access pages worked so I would simply go through all the links on the list until I found miniclip. Nowadays we are so filled with stress that reading is no longer something that causes us pleasure, but is seen as a punishment. As we carry our smartphones everywhere, we tend to ignore all sorts of other written texts.

Adults are more and more stressed with their lives. Due to work, they don’t have much time to read anymore so they choose seeing a movie wich is way faster than reading. Also books are way more expensive than movies so I do agree with the article when it says that we’re slowly growing more attached to screens. 

David Denby, (2016, February 23), The New Yorker, Retrieved from http://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/books-smell-like-old-people-the-decline-of-teen-reading

Differences Between Movies and Books

When thinking of this topic many questions came to my mind. One of them is about to be developed in this text: "What are the differences between movies and books?”. Perhaps as you think of this question not many ideas come to your mind. I would like to start by comparing both of them.

A book is something that has been present in the life of humans for a very long time. It is nothing new. Books have existed for a very long time and for many purposes: write about theories, historical moments that would help future generations to know what had happened in the past and God if they were books for the church. Nowadays there are books with all sorts of themes: recipes, fairy tales, economy, history, science fiction and many more. Books gained this huge variety as times changed and new writers decided to write about those topics. Also in the past books were censored so there wouldn't exist sources of different ideas to create a "revolution" against the government.

The first movies were based on the famous books like "Ben Hur", "The adventures of Sherlock Holmes", "The Moby Dick" and "Dracula". Nowadays movies are not loyal to books. Harry Potter for example has many differences when putted into movie: Peeves the Poltergeist appears in all books and causes havoc to the students in Hogwarts while in the movies he never appears, Snape is known as "The Half-Blood Prince" but when watching the movie that it is never explained why he is called that while in the book it is explained that is mother was a "pure-blood" and his father is a "mud-blood".

When comparing these two, I do agree with some of the things I saw in a video: while watching a movie we are visually pleasured but of course, they don’t allow our imagination to imagine the characters like we would if we had read the book before. Movies have a larger audience because it is easier to see a movie than reading a book, and also, people don’t have the time to read a book nowadays with their busy lives. Books are usually written by two maximum three people while a movie requires a huge amount of staff to make the “magic” happen, and we see all their names in the end of the movie (that moment when we leave the room because we don’t actually care for a 20 minutes of scrolling names).

I think that both movies and books are essential in people’s lives, each one of us chooses which one to enjoy and spend our precious time with. 

Image: http://www.potentash.com/2015/09/02/the-age-of-machines-literature-vs-movies-and-series/

Difference Between, (2016, December 30), Difference Between Movies and Books - Movies Vs Books. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=orsEYvLG9TY

Are books a dying breed?

Books have a great impact on our lives. They give detailed information about human experiences thus allowing us to connect on basic levels such as desire and emotion to experience the things happening in it.

Since we are living in a more modern era which has television and movies there is a misconception that every problem picture in them and that happens in real life can be solved just as quickly and easier. But books capture the true intricacy of human experience.

Although books are more complex in details, movies are a good alternative to it. They give us a quick way of seeking information, learning from it and even a form of expressing ourselves all with the click of a button. All of this is a consequence of the impact that new technologies have in our life. Convenience is also a good reason because of the shortage of time, movies are just a most simple way to experience either leisurely or to learn since they have two hours of film. Books are another story since they take weeks or even months to read through and that depends on the availability of the reader.

Of course, that when there is a will there is a way so the act of reading books will not vanish because there are always willing people that enjoy that activity and that will find the time to read. So, watching movies will not make books extinct but may, in fact, help to understand a book. If a movie is well made and true to the book, it can give a better insight that we haven’t picked up on the book.

Therefore, we can come to the realisation that they complement each other. They both have their ways of influencing our minds and societies in ways that can be positive and/or negative and they will always be a part of peoples’ life, some arts more than others considering the type of genre that people enjoy.

Ismail, M. Literature is the mirror of society. 2008, February 24. Retrieved January 3^rd from http://gulfnews.com/literature-is-the-mirror-of-society-1.86134

Movies or Books

That is the question: since the existence of both people always dwell and try to give reasons which one is better. There are pros and cons but which one will be better and which one will be bad?

In the article, the author tries to give us both ends of the coin to these two kinds of leisure. Of course, it will always depend on the type of personality that we have because some of us love to create a world of our own through reading and other like to expand theirs through the visual aid the films give.

The author divides the advantages of these arts into five categories: unlimited powers, freedom or escape, pause and proceed and, at last, best “bonding” agents.

In the first, both movies and books have unlimited imaginary powers but what differentiates them is that a book can be a personal experience whilst a film is a social experience because it can be an escape route from the world.

In the second, the book takes us into a world of endless possibilities and mysteries where the minds play a master role in conjuring up images that are beyond our limits. Movies can hinder our power of imagination but there are exceptions of course like if the mind is already creative the film can product countless images in the minds tapping in to our imagination and creating even better images.

In the third, we are able to pause a book and savour scenes that we already read before and travel to which page we want and, when re-reading the whole book, a different journey can be imagined and different interpretations can be made. With a film, it depends on the appetite we have to watch it again or not since we don’t have that freedom to pause and go back or conjure different plot twists each time we see it.

Finally, in the fourth, by having similar tastes in books it means there is also a similar ideology so we are able to bond with other people as long as the interest in the same genre is alike. With movies that can be a little difficult because it means decoding if it is for the story, performance of the actors or the technical part that went into the making of the film according the author. I disagree with the latter because the genre exists as a way to categorise and movies also have these kinds of organization so by knowing it we can also find people who love the same genre as us.

So, it ultimately comes down to how much time we have our hands and how much we want to invest in these activities.

Kaushik, P. Watching Movies Vs Reading Books: What’s The Right Pick?. 2014, December 28. Retrieved December 30^th from http://www.businessinsider.in/Watching-Movies-Vs-Reading-Books-Whats-The-Right-Pick/articleshow/45665060.cms