Popular Fiction and Film Adaptations

From Words to Images: On Adapting Life Of Pi

Hema M

2nd semester MA English

Zamorin’s Guruvayurappan College Calicut

Literature is a vast area which incorporates different genres and cultures within itself.

Novels, short stories, and biographies portray characters and events through words. When a

film is made from a book it is called an adaptation. From the beginning, film-makers

have made films based on novels, short stories, biographies and plays; of the sources of these

adaptations,  novels have always been the most popular choice. Adaptations are everywhere

today on the television and movie screen, on the musical and dramatic stage, on novels and

comic books. Movies adapted from novels are not just a matter of pulling dialogues from the

novel. When adapting a novel, the film maker has to leave out a number of things for the very

simple reason of time constraint and because the medium is different. While reading a novel,

what is involved is the decoding of language to visual imagery by imagination within a

private space, whereas films are visual and aural and it could be watched in a collective

environment. The major difference between films and books is that visual images stimulate

our perceptions directly, while written words do this indirectly. A novel is fully controlled by

the author, but in a movie it’s a collaboration of many hands. Adaptation has to tell and re-tell

a story, hence recreation is done while adapting to different genre and medium. Like a

translator, the filmmaker who adapts is bent on a double task:   some sort of “fidelity” to the

original work and creation of a new work of art in a different medium. An adaptation is

always an interpretation, involving somebody’s personal views of the book and choices of

elements to retain, reproduce, change or leave out. 

Adaptations were seen by most critics as inferior to the adapted texts, as “minor”,

“subsidiary”, “derivative” or “secondary” products, lacking the symbolic richness of the

books and missing their “spirit. It is a fact that each act of visualization narrows the open-

ended characters, objects or landscapes created by the book and reconstructed in the reader’s

imagination into concrete and definite images. The verbally transmitted characters are created

by the imagination of the reader; there is no interference of the author. It is the freedom of the

author to give detailed description or not. The individual author deals with the whole book,

but when considering the visual medium there are a number of hands behind it. A good

adapted film has to come to terms with what is considered as the “spirit” of the book and to

take into account all layers of the book’s complexity. George Bluestone, the first to study

about film adaptations believes “the filmmaker is an independent artist, not a translator for an

established author, but a new author in his own right”

A screenplay for a standard feature film is about one hundred pages and a novel runs to

more than two hundred pages. In books the writer uses narrative, description, and dialogue,

interior monologues, expression of thoughts and figurative language (images, metaphors.) In

films, the film-makers use pictures, images, ways of shooting, camera angles, camera

movement, camera distance, scale, lighting, colours, contrasts and in a scene setting, props,

costumes, and make up.                        

One third of all films ever made have been adapted from novels, and, including other

literary forms, such as drama or short stories, that estimate might well be 65 percent or more.

For example there are more than two hundred versions of Sherlock Homes and fifty film

versions of Romeo and Juliet. Novels and dramas have also been adapted to movies.

Shakespearean themes were adapted and new stories were made up in different languages

according to their culture. Jane Austen’s Emma was adapted to film in 1996 in a Miramax

production starring Gwyneth Paltrow. This version retained the original period, setting and

plot of Emma as per the novel. In 1994 Amy Heckerling wrote and produced Clueless, set in

contemporary style. Most of the plot and theme was of Austen’s Emma but the names of the

characters were changed. A Bollywood movie directed by Vishal Bhardwaj, Haider which is

set in Kashmir was adapted from Shakespeare’s Hamlet.  

This paper is an attempt to compare and contrast both the evident and noticeable

differences between novels and films in the process of adaptation, with the aid of the

successful Hollywood movie Life of Pi conceived by Ang Lee and the novel Life of Pi penned

by Yann Martel.

Life of Pi won the Man Booker Prize in 2003 and it was also awarded Canada’s Hugh

MacLennan prize for fiction. Critical reception was focusing on Martel’s ability to make a

fantastical story. Some critics found the theological preoccupations in the novel heavy-

handed, unnecessary, inconsistent, or simple, while others thought that he successfully dealt

with a potentially controversial subject in writing an explicitly religious book in a

predominantly secular country. Fox 2000 pictures bought the screen rights to Martel’s novel,

and the film was made in 2012.The readers must have assumed that this novel cannot be

transferred into silver screen. It is the twenty-first century’s technicality that made it appear

on the screen. When converting it to images Lee has deleted some parts of the novel and

included visual effects and some new characters to make the movie interesting.

Life of Pi tells the fantastic story of Pi Patel, a sixteen-year-old South Indian boy who

survives at sea with a tiger for 227 days. Pi, born Piscine Molitor Patel, grows up in the South

Indian city of Pondicherry, where his father runs a zoo. An intelligent boy, by the age of

fifteen Pi—Hindu from an early age—has also adopted Christianity and Islam, and considers

himself a pious devotee of all three religions. Due to the political upheaval that has long been

distressing Pi’s father, the Patels decide to close the Pondicherry Zoo and move to Canada

when Pi is sixteen. Pi, his mother, father, and brother Ravi all board the Tsimtsum along with

the zoo’s animal inhabitants (who are on their way to be sold around the world). An

unexplained event causes the Tsimtsum to sink, and Pi is the only human to make it onto a

lifeboat and survive. Along with Pi, the lifeboat contains a hyena, a zebra, orange Juice the

Orangutan, and Richard Parker the tiger. The hyena kills and devours both the zebra and

Orange Juice an Orangutan, before Richard Parker kills the hyena. Pi is left alone on a

lifeboat with an adult male tiger. Pi and Parker eventually lands upon the Mexican sea.

The narrator of the novel is the narrator-author himself in the beginning and in between

the chapters. The novel begins with the author protagonist’s search for a story but on the

screen the adult Pi is seen as narrating instances from his childhood. The narrator-author

never interferes with Pi in the movie but interrupts the readers to their surroundings.

Description about his home and family is introduced to us by the author. Both in the novel

and film adult Pi narrates his story to the narrator- author.  A detailed description about his

thesis on Religion and Zoology covers the first part of the book. Martel has given a detailed

description about the animals in the zoo but too much narration in a movie would make the

viewers impatient. The narrator-author appears in between the flashback to their surroundings.

While writing the screenplay for the movie Life of Pi, the script writer has executed certain

rearrangements from the novel Life of Pi. For instance, in the novel, Pi’s family is introduced

in the beginning whereas in the movie they are introduced towards the end. The film takes the

liberty of adding a character and giving Pi a love interest that does not appear in the book and

also deleting the characters like Mr. Sathish kumar and Mr. Kumar from the book. Atheism

was introduced to Pi by Mr Sathish Kumar in the book but on screen Pi’s father teaches him

about science. Islamic prayers were introduced to Pi by Mr. Kumar. Pi plays tabala for the

dance class and from there he meets Anandi his love which can be viewed on screen. Ravi

trying to enter the cage of Richard Parker has been taken over by Pi in the movie. When they

were travelling in the ship to Canada, Pi happens to hear a sound at night and set out in search

of that, but he forgets and enjoys the rain from deck, but on the screen Pi was able to

recognize there was a storm and he calls his brother to join him to watch the rain. A turtle is

employed in the novel which comes along with an indulged reader on going through the pages

whereas in the movie the screenplay expels the turtle, probably because the scriptwriter would

have felt its presence would make no considerable impact, in the movie as it did in the novel.

David Magee has written a remarkable screenplay for this movie.

Religion has a great importance in Pi’s story and it has been the most controversial in

reviews of the book. Pi transcends the classical division of religion and worship as a Hindu,

Islam and Christian. Pi says “I would like to be baptized and I would like a prayer rug” but he

still respects the atheist because he sees him as a kind of believer. Pi’s devotion to God is a

prominent part of the novel; but in the movie it becomes, however, much less prominent

during his time aboard the lifeboat, when his physical needs come to dominate his spiritual

ones. Pi never seems to doubt his belief in God while enduring his hardships, but he certainly

focuses on it less. This in turn underscores the theme of the primacy of survival. In the last

part of the movie, Pi narrates two versions of his stories to Japanese visitors. Which version

one believes in decides whether he believes in faith or reason. This question of faith or reason

is posed not just to Pi’s listener’s on the screen, but to the audience also. Whichever version

of Pi’s story is acceptable to us, as the viewers, decides our own inclination to fact or faith.

Martel does not intend the reader to read Life of Pi through a lens of disbelief or uncertainty;

rather, he emphasizes the nature of the book as a story to show that one can choose to believe

in it or not.

Life of Pi can also be classified as a work of magical realism, a literary genre in which

fantastical elements—such as animals with human personalities or an island with cannibalistic

trees—appear in an otherwise realistic setting. There are many elements of magical realism

compounded to this battle of survival. Magical realism is representing ordinary events and

details together with fantastic and dream like elements as well as materials derived from myth

and tales. In the movie Life of Pi we can see the elements of magical realism. At night Pi

watches the deep blue ocean which is lit up by the shining fishes. The 3-D effect enhances the

visual effect of the scene. He moves his hands in water and feels the waves, even though

alone with a tiger, he feels something wonderful and smiles. The big whale coming from the

deep jumps high and Pi is thrown into water. He loses the food and fresh water in the life

boat. “Hunger can change what you have thought initially”, Pi starts fishing to feed his fellow

traveller. Another scene where magical realism can be seen is in a shot where Pi starts

speaking to Parker. At night Parker looks into the sea and Pi sees that the animals which were

tied together are made free and he sees the reflection of his mother and the wrecked ship in

the deeps. It is the scene that reveals the mind of Pi and Richard and shows that they share

these feelings.  Martel uses magical realism when describing the "carnivorous island". The

mysterious presence of meerkats, algae, dead fish, and teeth are puzzling features of this

island. Until the discovery of all the teeth, these things are left unexplained. Later Pi realizes

why the island is so magical. Being at sea, Pi starts to lose sense of reality, and when he

comes upon the island, neither the reader nor Pi believes that the island is really there. This is

a great element to use when writing fiction, because it is gripping for the reader. It is used

with the paradise island that Pi makes with his own imagination, however as one progresses

more into the story Pi realizes that it is a carnivorous island, and after Pi has been in the sea

for so long he starts to detach himself from reality and then he really believes that the island

was overlooked and that’s the impact of magical realism. The movie combines various

religious traditions to enfold its story revealing the wonder of life. Pi and Parker with fishes

beneath them and birds above them, floating island populated by meerkats; all together Lee

creates an incredible sequence. Ang Lee’s vision is beyond every one’s imagination. Some of

the scenes in the film, for instance the opening credits, the Krishna-Yashoda solar system

sequence and towards the end, the ocean sequence enriches the visual experience.

Life of Pi which was released in 2012 has grossed over $450 million worldwide. The

entire movie was shot using 3D cameras. Shot digitally with Arri alexa cameras, the film has

a very clean look. Life of Pi a realistic natural story which makes us believe in faith or in God

has used 3D to gain the real effects. Lizard, a fluttering humming bird, out stretched hands, air

bubbles in water, driving rain pellets, an air borne whale and the attacking tiger, all burst forth

breaking the screen’s 3-dimensional barriers. The shot where camera is placed below the

water and looks right up past the boat, which is on the sea surface, into the far away sky above

and another scene where the tiger and Pi looks deep into the ocean , these visuals have

transformed themselves into dialogues. It is the creativity of Lee that shows the survival of Pi

and the Bengal tiger Richard Parker. As Martin Scorsese proved with Hugo in the hands of an

accomplished director, 3D can add magic, a breath taking sense of realism to movies that

enhance both their sensory and emotional impact. Lee used this 3dimentional technology to

explain what cannot be told cinematically.

The human mind is an amazing instrument. In the face of the horrors of life, it creates a

magical story that allows it to continue living with truths it otherwise might not be able to

accept. The struggle for existence, the struggle for survival, the inner strength to find and

tame and become the master of one’s existence, are all realities one has difficulty admitting.

The film and novel do not establish the dominance of faith over reason or vice versa, rather

leaves that part for the audience to decide. The two sides of life, one positive, feeding and

renewing the spirit, the other negative, poisoning and destroying it, and the choices one has to

make regarding them, are also hard to face. In the film and in the novel, this is represented by

the island Pi and the tiger find and rest on, but ultimately had to leave. One often prefers one’s

magical thinking to accepting and facing the reality of one’s own life, as did Pi. With the use

of magical realism Martel is able to create a change of mentality and a change in the sense of

surroundings.

Shakespeare wrote "the play's the thing," but in the case of Life of Pi, images speak louder

than words. The re-creation of Life of Pi with a few elements added and removed from the

novel has done justice to Martel’s Life of Pi. The inspirational tale surely possesses the power

to move an audience, but the breathtaking visuals stir the soul. While connecting novel to the

film's narrative and underlying philosophy, its imagery instantly captivated the viewers. The

film received 11 Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture, and won four Oscars,

the most noteworthy of which was Lee's well-deserved prize for Best Director Almost all the

nods came in technical categories, but that's where Life of Pi shines the brightest.

References

PRIMARY SOURCES

Ang, Lee “Life of Pi” movie , 20th Century Fox Motion Pictures.

Martel, Yann, “Life of Pi” New Delhi, Penguin Publishers,2002.

SECONDARY SOURCES

Abrams, M.H “A hand book of Literary Terms” Cengage Learing,2011

Seger, Linda “ The Art of Adaptation: Turning Fact And Fiction Into Film” (Owl

Books) Holt Paperbacks (15 February 1992)