Beth, Alex, and I saw The Seeker a few weeks ago. I had looked forward to seeing this movie - with a certain amount of dread based on what Hollywood has done to other books I like - since I started seeing trailers for it earlier in the year. As it turns out, my fear was well placed. This movie was bad. It was bad in a Michael Bay way - you know, the theory that when you are at a loss for how to move the plot forward you should go with the flashy special effects. In fact, if you have a really cool special effect warp the script any way you need to so that you can get that effect in the movie. Plot development, dialog, acting - bah. Just throw in a cool effect sequence.

The movie is based - very, very, very loosely - on the book The Dark is Rising by Susan Cooper. This book - which is part of a series of five - was one of my favorite books when I was a child. The author combines English and Celtic myth and legend to create an amazing world, a world in which forces of the Light and the Dark strive for dominance. Most importantly to the younger version of myself, Ms. Cooper created a world in which children play a key role in fighting off the Dark. I read the series at least a half dozen times while I was in school, and in anticipation of the release of the movie I reread the entire series.

To say I was disappointed by the movie is a drastic understatement. This was one of the few movies that I entertained thoughts of walking out prior to the end. Of course, there was this almost sick fascination of staying to the end to see exactly where they were going with their version of the story.

Now I do understand that it’s not possible sometimes to translate a book to the big screen. I understand that sometimes minor plot lines and characters have to be written out, and other elements adjusted to make a better movie. However, the screenplay for this movie goes far beyond that. The distortion of the story was so breathtaking that it seemed as if were written by someone who had either never read the book or at the very least had a strong dislike for the book.

It’s not just the minutiae that has been changed in this “adaptation”; the changes include the main plot points. The whole purpose, history, and meaning of the signs - one of the major drivers of the story - has been changed around. The key figure of Merriman Lyon is converted, along with the other Old Ones, from dignified and powerful to mundane and at times comically irresponsible. A twin brother is created for Will Stanton, the family is transformed from English to American, and a love interest is tossed in. To top it all off the concept of “Dark Matter” is pulled whole from the buttocks of the screenwriter and deposited in the script along with some very weak ties into the original story.

Told you I didn’t like it.

Beth’s opinion was that the movie wasn’t bad, provided that you hadn’t read the books before. Alex - who at the time had not read the books - was somewhat lukewarm on the movie. We’ve since started reading the series together. We’re into the last third of the Dark is Rising, and it puts a smile on my face to see him hanging on every word as the book moves towards the climax. The subtle building of tension, the struggle by Will to be both an adolescent boy and an “Old One”, the author’s descriptions - these have pushed the cheap theatrics of the movie from his mind.

Susan Cooper - who’s official website is here at www.TheLostLand.com - talked with NPR about the movie in this interview, which took place prior to release. She makes the point that novels and screenplays are very different. In her words, “You do have to do violence to a book to make it into a screenplay;€” the two mediums are so different,” she then continues on to address the movie version of her tale directly, “But the alteration is so enormous in this case. It is just different.”

Different indeed. The same article goes on to talk about how Susan Cooper sent a letter requesting certain changes to the script. Based on the end product, I’m guessing they were ignored. That’s a shame, because both Ms. Cooper and this book deserved better.

Folks, skip the movie and read the books - amazon.com carries the series in a nice boxed set. Susan Cooper is a wonderful author - her story deserves to be told in her words, not in the bastardized version in this train wreck of a film.