Blog For Week: 5.16.16 - Of Mice and Men: The Movie

      We just recently finished the novella, Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, and yesterday finished the movie. Both were great, although there were some things that were different from the movie than in the book. There were also some scenes that were added into the movie. For example, the movie shows us the incident in Weed, when in the book, we hear about it from George reminding Lennie why they are on the run.

Section III

      Although the plot has the same ending in both the book and the movie, the actual ending moments of each piece are different. The movie ends with a flashback; the book ends with dialogue.

      The flashback at the end shows Lennie and George "buckin' barley bags", as they would say, and then walking off together. This shows that Lennie and George are a team and they work together. Always. This leaves the audience (at least, in my opinion) feeling sad, knowing that George has just killed Lennie, and destroyed that friendship and teamwork. 

      The book ends with a quote however. The last line is, "Curley and Carlson looked up after them. And Carlson said, "Now what the hell ya suppose is eatin' them two guys?" It kinds shows that it wasn't normal to really care about another person. It was kind of like it was every man for themselves. That's why everyone was so surprised that Lennie and George traveled together because it wasn't common for men to do that. And that is what the quote shows. It shows that Curley and Carlson thought that it was unusual for Slim to feel kind of sympathetic towards George because he had just killed his best friend. This shows that back then, it was every man for themselves. It kind of makes me feel bad, the line because no one really had a true friend or people that they could rely on. So I don't think that the feelings at the end of the book and the movie match up that much. 

Section IV

What are your general thoughts, feelings, reactions of Of Mice and Men? What had the most profound impact on you or your understanding of the novella? Who would you recommend this  book to and why?

      I really like both the movie and the book Of Mice and Men. Although I think I like the book a little more, I think in the movie, it gave off slightly different emotions (like mentioned, with the ending). In the ending of the book, there was a quote, which some people think takes away from the death of an amazing character. In the ending of the movie, there was a flashback which shows how much of a team Lennie and George were, which makes you feel really sad because that was just destroyed.

      I would recommend this book to everyone. I really would. I think that this is an amazing book and I've seen so many people (classmates), who usually don't enjoy reading, fall in love with the characters, and cry/get upset when something happened to Lennie and when Lennie died. So I think I would recommend this book to everyone.