Movie Recommendations For Book Lovers

One of the most frustrating things for any reader is watching an adaptation of a favorite book and feeling like the film completely missed the mark. I’ve sometimes wondered if the screenwriters even read the book before making it into a movie! And the same can be true of television adaptations. My family is currently hunkered down experiencing the crazy side of midwest weather (negative temperatures and A LOT of snow). I find we are all drawn to our favorite movies and TV after being stuck inside at home for a long stretch of time. If you’re feeling the same, here’s a few of my favorite screen versions of books. 

Note: everyone has different tastes when it comes to adaptations of books, so I’m obviously not promising you will agree with all my recommendations here. You may love something I hate or vice versa; these are just MY favorites! And I’m clearly not a “movie critic,” so please read this list as one created by a “lover of books.” Enjoy!

1. The BBC 1995 mini series of Pride and Prejudice: You will never see another version of Pride and Prejudice recommended on this blog (unless a really good, new one comes out!). I was so excited and hopeful when the 2005 version came out, but it definitely missed the mark (don’t get me started on Keira Knightley, who I have yet to like in a single movie). A mini series often succeeds in doing what a movie cannot: showing more fully the depth of a book. This makes sense because they have more actual time to tell the story in and therefore don’t have to cut out much, if any, of the story. BBC is often a solid choice for screen versions of books, though not always (I’m pretty sure watching the BBC version of Persuasion as a child is what ruined the story for me for so many years).

2. Sense and Sensibility, 1995: Let’s just get all of the Jane Austen favorites out of the way at the beginning! Sense and Sensibility is one of my favorite Austen novels, and the casting was really well done in this one.

3. Emma, 1996: If you’re going to watch a movie version of Emma, please do me a favor and make it this one (I would not recommend the 2020 version unless you’re okay with nude scenes, something that seems a little ridiculous in a Jane Austen movie). I know a lot of people don’t like Gwyneth Paltrow, but I personally thought she played Emma exactly as I pictured her when reading the book. 

4. Little Women, 1949: Here’s the thing with Little Women- you really should just watch all the versions! The 1949 version is my favorite because it’s what I grew up watching and because it contains some scenes from the book that others don’t. I also feel like they did a better job with Marmee’s character than in either of the other versions I’ll mention here (Susan Sarandon was much more feminist than Marmee is in the actual book, and Laura Dern in the 2019 version was much too bubbly). But if I’m being truthful I will probably show the Winona Ryder (1994) version to my girls first because it’s the easiest to follow. And I do love the new version too. Also, please introduce your girls to Emma Watson as Hermione before Emma Watson as Meg (or Belle for that matter); it’s very upsetting for us Harry Potter fans to hear girls calling her by anything but Hermione 🥺.

5. And that leads us to Harry Potter…: Obviously, the Harry Potter movies have to be on this list. I’m more than a little bit nervous about the new Potter series in the works; I think I’ve already made it pretty clear that no one else can play Hermione, but the same goes for so many other favorites- Hagrid and Snape being the first two that come to mind. I watched the first six movies before reading the books, so maybe that’s part of it for me, but I really do love these movies.

6. The Hunger Games Trilogy and Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes: There’s just no other series quite like the Hunger Games. Obviously, the movies can never be quite as good as the books, but these ones came pretty close. I recently watched the prequel in theaters and was surprised by how well they portrayed some very difficult scenes. Just please read the books before you watch!

7. The Inheritance, 1997: I grew up watching this adaptation of one of Louisa May Alcott’s lesser known works and still to this day think of it as my “sick day movie,” but I only recently read the book. The movie definitely pivoted from the story some, but it stayed true to the overall premise. And it’s such a good story, that if you like Little Women, I definitely think you’ll like this.

8. Anne of Green Gables (1985) and Anne of Avonlea (1987): Again, these were classics I grew up watching with my sisters before I even read the books. Unpopular opinion here: I don’t think it’s going to necessarily turn your children off from books if you let them watch the movie first. I fell in love with Anne through the movies before I was ready for the books, and I loved her stories all the more for it. I know the Netflix series Anne With An E has been pretty popular, but I didn’t feel like it kept to the spirit of the books like the 1980s versions did; also, I would caution against watching it with your kids since it had some explicit parts. I do not recommend the third movie (The Continuing Story) from 2000. I’m not exactly sure what happened there, but I’m pretty sure there is NOTHING in that movie that takes place in the books.

9. Road To Avonlea series: If your daughters love Anne, please, PLEASE introduce them to Sara Stanley. I was so obsessed with this series as a kid that I saved up my hard-earned money to buy the entire series off Ebay, since that was the only place I could find them (what a different world we lived in then!).

10. All Creatures Great and Small: I hesitate to add this because I haven’t read the books yet (the first is on my to be read shelf!), but it’s so hard to find “wholesome” TV that I have to include it here. One of our daughters is currently angry with us because we won’t let her watch it until she’s a little bit older (she’s our animal lover and I’m not sure she’s quite ready for some of the intense veterinarian scenes).

Happy Winter reading (and watching)!