So I just read Christopher Buckley’s satire “Thank You For Smoking.” It’s a great, though dated, summer read, if you’re looking for something to swim through in a day at the beach – funny, hyper-sexualized, over the top, and even occasionally insightful.
But it’s not as good as the movie. A couple plot lines were completely added in the movie that make Nick Naylor into more of a reasonable character – namely, his son Joey only gets a few paragraphs worth in the book, whereas he’s a fairly central character in the film.
Maybe it’s because I saw the movie first, and loved it, whereas book fans may have had a different reaction. Maybe it’s because the book is 15 years old (Buckley himself admits that Naylor today would not have been a tobacco lobbyist). But I think the story was just better told in the movie.
Anyone have a similar reaction to TYFS? Any other movies you thought topped the book version?
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Tags: book, Buckley, Christopher Buckley, film, film adaptation, movie, novel, screenplay, Thank You For Smoking, tobacco
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