Fiction Adaptation - Initial thoughts

If I understand the brief for this unit and I would like to think that I do then I will reveal that my personal aim for this unit will be to put in as much time and effort during the pre production stage as possible. Due to the lessons learnt from the triumphs and disappointments during the productions and post production stages of all of the direction unit episodes that I worked on last semester I would love to be able to submit a piece of work that looks professional. For the work to be done to this the highest possible standard my aim is for this work will be executed with both precision and creativity in a combined harmony.

I have now read all of the five poems and contacting and discussing the basic narratives, meanings and tones behind each. I did this with a good friend of mine named Erin Murrell who is currently in her second year of an English literature degree who helped me whittle the five choices down to two then. I was left with The Listeners by Walter de la Mare which unless I’ve misunderstood   this poem depicts the tail of a traveller that comes knocking at a mysterious moon lit door to give a message in order to keep his word.  It’s a silent moonlit night, and nobody replies to the travellers calling.  There are ‘phantoms’, ‘ghosts’, ‘spirits’ in the house that hear the traveller, but do not answer him. The perspective changes during the poem, it comes firstly from the traveller, but at the end of the poem it is from the perspective of the ‘phantoms’ and they watch him leave ‘.

The second remaining contender was The Horses by Ted Hughes this is drawn from the poets fascination with nature and in this poem horses.  He starts in a bleak state of mind, reflected by the colourlessness drab scenery around him.  When walking he comes across a group of horses the more he studies them the more he notices their beauty, nobility and strength as well as the beauty of the nature around him.  There are many points of note during this poem and whilst reading it I had many ideas pop into my head regarding what, where and when I could shoot.  He then states at the end that where ever he is in the world he will and whatever is going on he will always remember the vision of what happened that day. This thing that I particularly like about this poem in regards to adaptation is that there is a big turning point in tone in the middle of the poem.

After thinking about both of the poems it would have appeared that I have veered towards The Horses. This is mainly because when reading it I had a number of ideas that I feel will look impressive on screen.