I figured everyone already knew about the Fall Into Darkness tv movie starring Jonathan Brandis and Tatyana Ali, so I didn't mention it in the book post.
Jonathan Brandis played Chad. Tatyana Ali played Sharon. The rest of the cast were knobs and ham & eggers who I have never heard of.
For your viewing pleasure, I present YouTube clips from the movie. They're pretty useless; the first one is 30 seconds, the second one is about 1:30.
The director's website has a 6-ish minute clip of Ann jumping, Sharon being arrested, and the police interrogating a bunch of people. You can check that out here. I will WARN YOU that my antivirus blocked 3 worm intrusion attempts while I was watching it, so only check it out if you are using protection / enjoy living on the edge.
On JonathanBrandis.org there are 4 downloadable clips from the movie. Clips #1 & #4 are the same as the youtube ones. I watched Clip #2 with no sound, but I'd guess it's Chad and Jerry doing stuff that didn't happen in the book.
I kinda wanted to see this... I even emailed someone with a Pike fansite to see if she would make me a copy. After looking at the flat-out fricking cheesiness of the second youtube vid, I want nothing to do with it. Has anyone seen this, and is it as fromage-tastic as it looks?
6 comments:
I saw the movie when it first came out--I was so excited they finally made a movie from a Christopher Pike book! I wish they would make more. I haven't seen it since then, though, and that was over 10 years ago! I wonder if Lifetime or LMN will ever show it again. I'll have to watch these clips at home.
I caught half the movie when it first came out and was so excited but disappointed that they changed so much. Ten years later I got the DVD off eBay and you're not missing anything.
I remember watching the movie when it originally aired [it's still on tape, though probably unwatchable, wherever it ended up] and being horribly disappointed because they somehow managed to muck it all up.
That said, I still "borrowed" the movie cover of the book from the library and never managed to return it. Accidentally, of course.
I actually thought the movie was better than the book. They changed a lot of things, but I thought they changes they made actually made a lot more sense and filled in some of the holes the book left.
1. Sharon was a new student and Ann never liked her. She didn't even befriend her until after Jerry had died and that was to set her up. I think this was more realistic than having Ann turn against her lifelong best friend for essentially being too busy to date.
2. Ann picked a fight with Sharon at the campfire saying incredibly cruel things until Sharon ran off in tears. She followed her, ostensibly to apologize, and instead screamed something like, Ann, I'm sorry! Don't push me! Instead of simply, don't, which could mean a lot of things. In the book, for all the group knew, Ann wasn't even talking to Sharon when she screamed.
3. In the movie there was no trial, no verdict. The charges were dropped due to lack of evidence, which I also think is more realistic. That case should never have gone to trial. There was no motive, no witnesses, no one could even prove beyond a doubt Ann was dead. I refuse to believe a DA would move forward on such a flimsy, circumstantial case.
4. Chad was not the puppet master in the movie. He did kill Ann and Jerry, but Ann came up with the idea to frame Sharon herself. Chad ended up murdering her when he happened to stumble upon her while looking for her dead body. He was furious she was going to leave and let him think she had died. I think this makes more sense because that was hell of a convoluted plan in the book. He wanted Ann dead and Paul incarcerated for it, and never planned on actually letting Sharon take the fall for murder. Why not just kill Ann and frame Paul? Why set up such a complicted plan? I know CP likes his twists, but this just seemed unnecessarily complicated.
5. The always awesome Charlotte Ross played Ann, making her a little more sympathetic than she was in the book.
The movie was definitely an oversimplified version of the book, but then again, I thought the book was unnecessarily complicated and not one of his better stories. He should stick with sci-fi and leave the courtroom dramas to other authors, I think.
Weirdly, I read your post and then Lifetime was showing the movie on TV. IT. WAS. TERRIBLE. I mean, truly truly awful. You ain't missing much.
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