Anthony Minghella (1954–2008)

An old man tells folktales to his dog.

At its best it's fun, and at its worst it's at least interesting. It's one of the only faithful screen adaptations of fairy tales. They just don't make shows like this - and understandably. Henson and Minghella apparently just said "fuck it" to every conventional idea of what audiences like and made the weird-ass show they felt like making.

Concept: A
Story: B
Characters: C
Dialog: B
Pacing: C
Cinematography: C
Special effects/design: A
Acting: B
Music: show more B

Enjoyment: A

GPA: 3.0/4 show less

Saw this on cable and fell in love with it. Basically a British version of "Ghost" without the Hollywood subplot. Beautifully made, beautifully written. I'd never heard of Ms. Stevenson, but she is amazing. Rickman is a revelation for those who are familiar with him only as a psycho bad guy--a delicate, nuanced performance full of humor and sadness. Finding this film (and a few others) was worth 20 years of crap on Cinemax.

The very first Morse episode, wherein Morse meets Lewis for the first time. Two plot lines are well interwoven by the scriptwriter (Anthony Minghella) and some good performances among the supporting cast. Morse's car gets bashed about a lot more than in subsequent episodes. As so often in this series, his romantic ambitions are thwarted.

First I want to make clear that this review is only of the labyrinth.
The movie is better!
What typically makes the books better than the movies is painstaking details about scenery, character descriptions and development, and the ability to imagine and get lost within the book. This book did not add to the movie at all. It was better than reading a screenplay but was quite literally reading the movie.
No David Bowie.
I will be donating this book as it is not a keeper even with the beautiful show more drawings and sketches.
Jim Henson’s notes are interesting but also do not add anything to the story.

Movies based on books; yes.
Books based on movies; no. show less