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I'm am seriously pissed off now about the Matrix. [message #54666] Mon, 10 November 2003 13:19 Go to previous messageGo to previous message
boma57 is currently offline  boma57
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The Matrix could never have been a book.


Ahem. Read Neuromancer. It's a book, and much like the Matrix. But also...

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1932100024/qid=1068420010/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/102-9650581-9013755?v=glance&s=books
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/081269502X/qid=1068420010/sr=1-2/ref=sr_1_2/102-9650581-9013755?v=glance&s=books
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1932700005/qid=1068420010/sr=1-3/ref=sr_1_3/102-9650581-9013755?v=glance&s=books
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1576834786/qid=1068420010/sr=1-4/ref=sr_1_4/102-9650581-9013755?v=glance&s=books
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0312313586/qid=1068420010/sr=1-7/ref=sr_1_7/102-9650581-9013755?v=glance&s=books

Yeah...definitely not enough content to make a book, eh? :rolleyes:


Sarcasm always take the place the place of intelligent conversation.

Did you read the synopsis of any of those? Because any one can do a quick search and come up with much better resource material then those. And no there is still not enough thought or material to go in to a book. If you look closely those volumes are but swinging off the Matrix's nuts, you even missed a few, my favorite is 'becoming the one.' All of them are utter crap, not one of them would help write anything. None of them are really connected or have anything to do with the original drafters and screen writers who put the first script together. Please don’t tell me you thought other wise. Its always best to be careful with your research material.

The matrix would make a graphic Novel, a good one too. But that's as far from paragraphs and chapters of a good read. 10,000 words is a hard mark to hit with stuff like that. A graphic Novel (of which I have a few) is just a set of stills with speech bubbles and have only a small amount of depth to the story (my favouet line is from an alien story ‘But I do know a son of a bitch when I’m looking at one) - they glide across it - this is why I called the matrix in my post 'A glide short story' Or didn’t you notice that in my post or even knew what that meant?

Open any book. Lets see 'Neuromancer' now. Lets start with dialogue.
You will see, blocks of paragraphs, Now for most of them you get one or two words and a block of character related description/narration. 'See the rules below.' You will also notice the way the dialogue is put together, always should 'she said/he said follow and usually a little description - 'she said, edgeing away a little further.'

now I know this isn’t what you expected, but I do this for a living.

Here we see the characters prattle on about what ever it is that troubles them, their feelings, all the other 'bullshit' things that have to go in. Depending on the author, and what type he/she is, there are varying amounts and diffractions between the description and dialogue, books written in the last 20 years tend to be driven toward 'Bullshit' which is a pretty term used to describe the overuse Dialogue and narration.
-alot of scfi and fantasy writers have missed this 'Bullshit' trend. One of the most notable being Steven king in the dark tower books, and Frank Herbert (godresthim) who wrote Dune(, although most people have only read the first two- personally I think the last two were better, and God emperor made me grin. Long live the face dancers!)

Now lets look at the film. There is only enough dialogue to fill 20 pages, the rest is a mixture of situation - hard to get right - situation description - these are mainly pan shots and the wordless moments - these are easy to write (think about the squids as they glided toward the ship as neo lay helpless trapped within the Matrix, running for his life.)

Now take your book, and this is that hard part. I want you to count the number of scenes- the whole book. That will take you a while - now if you have the Matrix script handy count the same in that, and you will notice something funny, there aren’t that many. And all of them are very short. The content is low.

ok lets try and hit this head on, 'Yeah...definitely not enough content to make a book, eh? ' To this I say, You have never written a book in your life.
Because there are a few rules.
- Description
- Narration
- Dialogue
- Plot
- Opener
- Closer
DON'T MIX, BUT DO CONNECT!
and of course the younger ones,
-situation description
-plot description.
and the three that I added for my own use.
- Money talks bullshit walks
- Too much meaningful bullshit drowns the plot
- Books are 10% truth 90% bullshit.

Most of the film struggles to meet them and I will tell you why.

Those are the rules. They can only be put together in certain orders, and if you don’t believe me - check the little book your holding. Although not iron clad, I’ve not met any one who doesn’t use them, in one form or another. Check for your self.

Now lets get back on to Dialogue, look up at the 'the rules' and then at the book your holding. You will see that 'Dialogue' and 'Plot' are pretty much the same thing. You can’t add to one with out adding to the other. If you add dialogue you move the story, and that moves and alters the plot, if you added dialogue to the Matrix, you would have to add the description that comes with it and thus alters the plot. The same goes if you alter the plot. The first matrix was so good because it didn’t bog the story down - it glided - to write a Matrix book would be to add too much and risk changing it from what it was in to something harder.

I'm not saying it can't be done. But remember one thing - no book has ever gone to film a 100% (,no not even the god father, and if you read it you would know why,) and no good book ever came from a good film. If you don’t believe me You should start with 'Jurassic park by Michael Crichton' to start - then 'Dune by frank Herbert, there was a mini series for the first few books' then 'Do androids dream of electric sheep by Philip K.Dick, look up blade runner' Those are just the ones of the top of my head and that would give you the better chance of seeing and reading, I can think of 20 others, both from book to film, and film to book.

Now do you want me to go threw the other rules with you? Do you want me to go threw the first film bit by bit, because I can. It's not hard and would only take me 2 or three hours.
- Hell If you start a thread starting a short about the matrix keeping it as close the first film as possible, I will write it with you. That’s easy for me. We can even go threw the other films and have one big happy FanBoy punch up. All the mistakes, plot holes, continuation errors, all of it.

But I would rather enjoy the films for what they are.


Don't take things so personally.

Rather than attempt to retaliate such comments as "didn’t you notice that in my post or even knew what that meant?", I'm not going to bother because I do agree with you on many points and realize that a single confrontational sarcastic remark can be infuriating after attempting to prove a sophisticated point. I do agree though, that either way, books and movies are usually not transposable forms of media. Although, occasionally an exceptional book can be turned into a good movie (Though usually not without cinematic tweaking).

I also agree that the Matrix is one of these. Sarcasm may be the opiate of my discussion, but note that I did only say it could make a book - not a good book. At least it couldn't directly translated.

I believe with utmost sincerity that nearly any writer could write an interesting novel based on the premise of the Matrix (humanity having been enslaved by machines, et cetera). As you said, though, the Matrix screenplay lacks what it needs to become an actual novel; But that's because it's not a novel, it's a screenplay.

The point I was trying to convey was not that you could replace every "NEO" in the script with "Neo said," and get a good book. What I was trying to convey is that with a given amount of creative liberty, a skilled writer could indeed create a successful book based off the premise of the Matrix, though the further from the direct storyline and characters it is, the better it would most likely be.

That is why the books I linked to on Amazon were accurate supports to exemplify my claim. They weren't direct translations of the movie, they weren't even the same type of literary work (fiction). However, their content was fueled it.

Oh, and yes, I have written a novel. Several infact, though only one published. I have also published some poetry.

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