Once again, our friend Jerry from the Beat Museum has written a terrific piece for The Huffington Post. Here’s an excerpt and please make sure you visit the site to read the rest. The more traffic they get, the more articles like this one will get written.
‘On the Road’ Movie Trailer Promises an
Adaptation Worthy of Kerouac
Controversy has raged for decades among Beat Generation fans as to whether this movie should even have been attempted. I can understand both sides of the argument. On The Road is a very personal novel for many, many people. At the Beat Museum, located in San Francisco, we see people from every corner of the world walk through our doors daily who are on their own personal journey kick-started by their reading of Kerouac’s books. On The Road holds a very special place in the hearts of many of these people and they don’t want their vision of Kerouac’s book (and their own personal journeys) messed with.
The flipside of that argument, of course, is that On The Road must be made into a film. Jack Kerouac himself sent a letter to Marlon Brando back in 1959 imploring Brando to make the film. Kerouac understood that a novel is not a movie and he even told Brando he was willing to write the screenplay himself incorporating whatever accommodations and changes needed for the story of the book to work as a film.
In 2012 that argument still has not subsided. But with the release of the trailer for Walter Salles’ film adaptation of On The Road I believe the filmmakers have magnificently met their obligation to the true fan and to their own artistic callings.
Captured in this 1.45-minute trailer is all the energy, drive, excitement and uncertainty of the book itself. The raw sexuality of Garrett Hedlund as Neal Cassady and Kristen Stewart as his 16-year-old bride, Lu Anne Henderson. From the dance halls of New York to the hotel rooms of Denver to the whorehouses of Mexico, Kerouac’s words come alive on the screen.
Keep reading at The Huffington Post
Related posts:
- The Beat Museum Reviews On the Road and Loves It
- Beat Museum – Arrival of the ’49 Hudson
- Journey to the Beat Museum
- Supporting the Beat Museum – About Heroes & Why the Museum Exists
This entry was posted on Saturday, March 10th, 2012 at 3:35 pm and is filed under On The Road. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
