Shopping List

Normally, I find list-based articles, especially ones purporting to rank something in entertainment, really vexing, just because they're so arbitrary, and so frequently lazy.  But I actually think the choices in this New York Daily News list of books that would make great feature films is largely dead-on.  A couple of them in particular I'd be a total sucker for.  Someone would have to be tough and very careful in doing The Secret History, which is a remarkably brutal book for all its languor, and the explanation of ancient Greek worldview and ethics would be tough.  I also have no idea who you'd cast in a number of the roles.  And Ender's Game is one of those books that I love but am truly relieved hasn't been adapted until now, when I think filmmakers finally have the technology to do the book justice.  Can you imagine the aliens of District 9 as the Formics, and the Battle Room looking like something out of Tron 2?  It'd be hellaciously expensive to make, but amazing-looking if it could be integrated smoothly into a coherent universe.  And given the rise of the blogosphere, the book's subplot about the internet could be pretty powerful, too.