Fahrenheit 451: Did the adaptation work with book changes?

HBO’s Fahrenheit 451 was a modern-day telling of the story with some significant changes to the book. Did it work or was it too much?

Michael B. Jordan took on the role of Guy Montag in HBO’s Fahrenheit 451 last weekend. It was a modern-day telling of the original story, written by Ray Bradbury. HBO’s adaptation made some major changes to the book from the very beginning–for one, Montag wasn’t married in the movie but he is in the book.

Not all of these changes worked, but some helped to tell the full story. After all, Fahrenheit 451 ends with a weird, not-quite-finished ending. It tells the story of how Montag realized that what was happening in the world wasn’t right and he needed to help preserve the books. It finished with him finding his way to this underground network of resistance fighters.

That’s certainly not how the movie ended. And this is the point where I tell you that there are many spoilers for the movie and the changes from the book made for this adaptation. If you haven’t watched the movie yet and do intend to, then you may want to click away and come back when you’ve finished it. If you want to know about the changes, well, read on!

Not quite the same level as excitement

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I was optimistic about the movie after watching HBO’s promo for it. Sure enough, there were elements that I enjoyed. In fact, some of the changes were the bits that I liked the most. But for the overall storytelling, I just didn’t feel connected to the movie.

There were times I was literally on my phone chatting to friends rather than watching the movie. That is when something doesn’t hold my attention. It mostly happened somewhere in the middle, as Montag started to realize the world wasn’t quite as perfect as he initially seemed; when he realized his memories were being suppressed.

The book, on the other hand, drew me in. I wanted to learn more about the world and needed to know what Montag would do next. It was hard to put down–and not just because there were no chapters to find a stopping point! With the changes, I expected some of the same excitement (I don’t like exact replicas of books on film), but just didn’t quite get that throughout.

But that’s the bad. There is plenty of good that came from the movie.