More Subjects
Name of Student
Name of Professor
Name of Class
Day Month Year
Compare and Contrast Essay
Compare and contrast essay is useful to enhance your writing and critical analysis skills. It helps to observe the similarities and differences between the two things that acquire the same nature. For my essay, I have chosen the book "The Killer Angels" and the movie "Gettysburg" based on the book to compare and contrast. The Killer Angels were written by Michael Shaara in 1974. He got the award of Pulitzer Prize for fiction for this novel in the year 1975. The novel is based on the theme of civil war in America, and it covered three days of the battle story in detail. The main character of the story is Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, and the title of the book is based on this character. Gettysburg is based on the movie, "The killer angels." It was released in 1993. Although it did not adopt the name of the book it was named as Gettysburg as the movie was totally based on the battle of Gettysburg. Main characters of the movie were performed by Martin Sheen, Tom Berenger, and Jeff Daniels. It is one of the longest movies.
The book and movie are based on the Gettysburg Battle. It covers the historical event during the civil war, but the dialogues used in both are fictional. The story starts from the 29 June 1863, when Confederate army spy noticed the attitude and movement of the Union army. The spy told about the movement of the Union army to the general James Longstreet, but he did not respond the way he should. General Jeb Stuart who did not know about the situation, after getting information from the spy did not even try to inform other confederates. In both the movie and book, this scene was covered; they presented it almost in the same way. Also, this was the key point which shows the lack of coordination between General Jeb Stuart and General James Longstreet.
The next major scene was of July 1st. It was a rainy morning. It covers the situation before the war. The tension and worries of Gen. Robert E. Lee for the enemy position were covered. The book detailed the emotions and heart palpitations that he was feeling. Lee took the decision over the position and moved his troops towards Gettysburg. Longstreet disagreed to Lee’s decision. Lee was also frustrated with Gen. Richard Ewell, and he was new in command of Lee. The movie also portrayed all this part excellently. Rain, orders of Lee, argumentative decision of Longstreet, the introduction of Gen. Richard Ewellalong with the expressions, environment, and situation were well executed.
The Second day, i.e. July 2 covered the preparation to attack the union. Lee wanted to attack the union with full force, the very next day. Arthur, Fremantle, an observer of the situation believed that victory would be for confederates as union soldiers were rabble. He also believed that just like England, America has also failed in democracy due to the division of Southerners into a rigid social hierarchy. As Lee wanted to attack but later they came to know about the changing position of Union. It leads to extra marching for the troops who were already tired. Longstreet was ready to attack, but Hood argued that it would cause heavy loss as the union had already known their position. They attacked the Union and fight started. After the day when the fight was finished, Longstreet visited the hospital and found that most of the people blame him for the heavy loss. All these aspects were covered by the movie while in the book there is more detail, i.e., about the argument on Longstreet decision, Scenes of fights and the difficulty they faced while fighting, which was not posturized in the movie. Still, the part which can bring the story together was fully covered about July 2.
The third day, i.e. on July 3, Lee was adamant on the Longstreet decision about the frontal assault due to the previous loss. Longstreet held the charge of the central union on the order of Lee. Longstreet advised avoiding direct frontal warfare. This advice was again rejected by Lee. After all the strategies and planning when confederated, Longstreet felt so helpless. The closing scene was the feeling of Longstreet, who knew that his men would die. Lee was also ashamed and apologized. He agreed to his bad decision and poor planning. Lee then told Longstreet to withdraw all the troops ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"xlMu3QRC","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(Hardy)","plainCitation":"(Hardy)"},"citationItems":[{"id":113,"uris":["http://zotero.org/users/local/huOLSO3Z/items/8S3BT763"],"uri":["http://zotero.org/users/local/huOLSO3Z/items/8S3BT763"],"itemData":{"id":113,"type":"post-weblog","title":"The War Movie Buff: BOOK / MOVIE: The Killer Angels / Gettysburg","container-title":"The War Movie Buff","URL":"https://warmoviebuff.blogspot.com/2011/12/book-movie-killer-angels-gettysburg.html","shortTitle":"The War Movie Buff","author":[{"family":"Hardy","given":"Kevin"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2011",12,4]]},"accessed":{"date-parts":[["2019",3,9]]}}}],"schema":"https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json"} (Hardy). For future battle, Longstreet ordered to retreat. This part from the book was posturized in the movie withholding all the essence of the imagination one can collect while reading. Every role and scene was clearly explained in the story of the book.
Above were the similarities between the book and movie but there are many differences as well. For instance, the book focused more on the feeling and heart condition of the Lee due to the poor decisions and exhaustion. The movie did not focus on this context much. Some part of the movie is totally different from the book, i.e. book covers the death incident of the Reynolds on June 1. Also in the book, there was the situation when Lee sent his order to take cemetery hills. It created Lee's reaction to the complaint of Trimble about the weak initiative. It goes deep into these parts and discussed more details about the characters. Through the back story of the characters, it is known that the father of Chamberlain was referred to as the murdering angel. On the other hand, the movie limited its focus on the decisions, and conditions of Chamberlain and Longstreet. The title of the book "the killer Angels" came from this character and its back story.
The movie did not use the title of the book instead made the theme over the historical event of civil war. Perhaps it uses the phrase "the killer Angle" in between; Kilrain used the phrase in one of his dialogue. Just like Lee’s condition, Longstreet emotions were also discussed in the movie, especially of the moment when he lost his three children.
One major difference that anyone can notice is skipping the whole chapter of the book. In the book, a complete chapter is written which detailed about the discussion between Longstreet and Fremantle. Their talk includes the topic of trench welfare need, which was quite important for the story. The movie ignored all the part completely. They only selected the section of Trimble's rant. Fremantle was the character which was written in detail within the book, but in the movie, the role of this character is very limited. He claimed about England as a country with anti-slavery attitude. Book and the movie both expressed sympathy for the south and highlighted the argument of state rights ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"gPzXDyKt","properties":{"formattedCitation":"{\\rtf (\\uc0\\u8220{}From Page to Projector\\uc0\\u8221{})}","plainCitation":"(“From Page to Projector”)"},"citationItems":[{"id":114,"uris":["http://zotero.org/users/local/huOLSO3Z/items/78M5DFX6"],"uri":["http://zotero.org/users/local/huOLSO3Z/items/78M5DFX6"],"itemData":{"id":114,"type":"webpage","title":"From Page to Projector: 'The Killer Angels' / 'Gettysburg'","container-title":"The York Daily Record","abstract":"The Battle of Gettysburg took place 151 years ago this month, the bloodiest battle ever fought on U.S. soil.","URL":"https://www.ydr.com/story/entertainment/books/blogs/book-buzz/2014/07/11/from-page-to-projector-the-killer-angels-gettysburg/31969491/","shortTitle":"From Page to Projector","language":"en","accessed":{"date-parts":[["2019",3,9]]}}}],"schema":"https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json"} (“From Page to Projector”).
Another difference between the book and the movie was about character Longstreet. The book went deeper and discussed the thought of Longstreet. This detail can help the people while watching the movie about the action and behavior of Longstreet. Individuals can understand easily about from where Longstreet is coming from. It does not mean that the movie is unclear as the movie also covers some of his thoughts. For instance, the scene in which he visited the hospital and noticed that everyone was blaming him for the damages in the fight. It told about the fact that Longstreet was not a big fan of Stuart. His expressions and feelings were very much cleared and similar to the book.
If we compare and contrast between the movie and novel, then it will not be wrong to say that both narratives line up identically. It is a common phenomenon that while making the movie, directors often change the story or add some extra element in trying to make their work more efficient. In the case of these two narrative movie makers tried to maintain their focus on the book. They avoid unnecessary edition or fictional facts to make their movie catchier. It is a masterpiece and remarkable work, the way movie sticks to the book material. If someone watches the movie after reading the novel, he will be glad to notice the main theme, dialogue, circumstances in the movie as they were in the novel — the story of the movie set up perfectly into the frame of the cinema. The condition of the battle in particular three days provides the excellent three-act structure of traditional Hollywood. Although the book emphasizes more on the character while the movie gave little more to the battle sequences, still it maintains the connection of the audience with the characters. The book went deeply about the war condition, the terror, killing, blood, and pain but the movie in comparison lessens the impact. They captured a good amount of blood and terrible condition of war through battle scenes and hospital conditions.
Therefore, it can be concluded that the movie and novel are almost identical. Movie makers have used the novel efficiently. The movie is the work, which have not carry outside materials and totally based on the storyline given by the novel. The main characters were Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, Lee, and Longstreet. Both the novel and movie showed the event of civil war impressively. The similarities between the book and movie include the worries and emotions of the Lee at the very first day and the decision of the Longstreet, all regarding the civil war of America, the battle of Gettysburg. Then the movement of the troops toward the union and loss of lives in the battle on the second day were covered. Second-day there is the focus on the Longstreet who came to know that people blame for the bad decision which took a lot of life. His feelings and emotions were centered in the book and movie. The third-day related similarities include the Lee command, his attitude, and rigidity. Longstreet felt helpless as Lee was not considering his advice and at the end, they had to experience the taste of failure.
The major dissimilarities include that movie did not cover the thoughts of the Longstreet while the book has discussed it in detail. Secondly, the movie skipped the whole chapter from the book in which Longstreet talked to Fremantle. The movie lessens the part of battle and bloodshed while the book covered the battle situation in detail. The best thing about the movie is that it becomes unnecessary to read the book before watching the movie. It is because the movie has provided the deep essence and complete storyline within the 4 hours and 25 min movie. It is obvious that no movie maker can add all the theme and aspects of the novel in a movie, the thing which matters is that how much movie maker detract from the actual story, and in case of movie "Gettysburg”, move makers have done full justice with the novel “The Killers Angles”
Works Cited
ADDIN ZOTERO_BIBL {"custom":[]} CSL_BIBLIOGRAPHY “From Page to Projector: ‘The Killer Angels’ / ‘Gettysburg.’” The York Daily Record, https://www.ydr.com/story/entertainment/books/blogs/book-buzz/2014/07/11/from-page-to-projector-the-killer-angels-gettysburg/31969491/. Accessed 9 Mar. 2019.
Hardy, Kevin. “The War Movie Buff: BOOK / MOVIE: The Killer Angels / Gettysburg.” The War Movie Buff, 4 Dec. 2011, https://warmoviebuff.blogspot.com/2011/12/book-movie-killer-angels-gettysburg.html.
More Subjects
Join our mailing list
© All Rights Reserved 2024