Compare And Contrast All The Pretty Horses Book And Book

“All the Pretty Horses”, a novel written by Cormac McCarthy tells the tale about a man and his friend travelling the plains of Mexico after leaving their homes in Texas. As the novel’s name alludes to, horses are a central theme in the story as they represent manhood and freedom when John Grady, the protagonist, and his friend Rawlins get thrown in jail. McCarthy’s novel became critically-acclaimed which gained him more recognition, as well as a movie adaptation directed by Billy Bob Thornton. Even though Thornton’s adaption has the basics of the novel’s story it does not appropriately grasps its depth. While Thornton’s version stays faithful to the dialogue from the book’s included scenes it does fall short by having an erratic pace, having

Contrary to the story’s focus on horses, the movie focuses on the romance between John Grady and Alejandra as its poster has the couple with a greater presence compared to the miniscule graphic of horses shoved on the bottom; whereas the book’s cover is graced with the image of a horse and only of that horse. Of all the events that were absent from the movie, the romance scenes are the most kept intact as well as an odd addition of an onlooker dancing when John Grady finishes talking with Alejandra on the phone after being bailed out of jail. In fact, it feels like horses are more of an afterthought in this adaptation because John Grady does not put any emphasis on them as he does in the novel. While in jail, John Grady had a dream about horses, “… in the dream he was among the horses running and in the dream he himself could run with the horses …” (McCarthy 161) In the fashion of flickering images for a subliminal message, brief, flashing visions of Alejandra are injected into this dream when there were none. Romance is pushed as the main focus of the story, but it fails to make the couple fulfilling since the dynamic between John Grady and Alejandra is not developed well enough to make it

Thornton’s choice of location was suitable but he failed to translate the beauty of some scenes from the book to his movie. Overall, the main issue with the movie was the pacing if that was improved on then character development and how the audience understands the scenes would not have been impacted. It was a grim decision to shift the focus of the movie from horses to the romance of John Grady and Alejandra. Horses were emphasized because they were a symbol of the protagonist’s manhood and freedom, in the context of this story romance does not relate to these elements as well. Romance was a much smaller topic and occurs later in the novel while horses are immediately mentioned and emphasized. Thornton did not show the emotions of the characters well in his adaptation due to cuts in the story. Thornton’s movie skips when Rawlins was interrogated to John Grady’s interrogation, perhaps so the scene would not be repetitive but it was important to see why Rawlins had a breakdown after his. Torn apart at its seams, the story nearly changes into another especially when the original ending is bypassed and distorted into two friends reuniting with no mystery and wonder of what is to