One of the greatest things about As I Lay Dying is how much in the gray area the novel is with humor. Is it a tragic parable meant to be taken dead seriously? Is it a humorous story designed to be laughed at? Guess what, it's up to you! Franco's approach certainly seemed to be closer to that of the former though. From what little we saw in class on Wednesday (and yes, I'm basing my whole post on just that much but I hope to watch it in its entirety later on), Franco paints the book in a much darker, creepier, more serious tone, and I'm not too sure how much I liked it.
I appreciated what he was going for with the split screens and I thought it was interesting how much the movie was tailored very specifically to those who had already read the book. I just wish he would have included a bit more humor in some of the scenes we had seen. The book is neither inherently funny nor is it inherently somber. It's a mix, and if I were to create my own movie adaptation of As I Lay Dying I would definitely be sure to bring out the best of both. I feel like the movie could have absolutely worked with having very quick changes in mood, depicting something like the river scene as very amusing then suddenly showing its more serious side.
I understand that not everything in the book is meant to be taken as a joke (Looking at you, poor Dewey Dell), but I think there's merit in the critique of the movie that it's "too artsy" and taking itself a bit seriously. I'd like to see a version where the clash between Jewel and Cash is laughable, where Anse Bundren is more of a Delmar-ish character. As I Lay Dying is a book that became so much better once I could see the lighter side of things, and I feel like a movie would be as well.
I agree that Franco seems to take the concept a little bit too seriously. I think that he could have pull off a movie that could be tailored more to people who had not read the book. The split screen concept ties in closely to this as I don't think I would have understood what that was about if I had not read the book. I don't know if there is enough humor in the book to have a place in the movie. Any humor in the book isn't exactly like jokes, its more subtle and I think that would be a little bit hard to represent in the style that Franco was going for. I think that one could make the movie a little bit simpler and with a lighter tone.
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