The Day of the Locust – Novel and Film
The year 1975 revealed John Schlesinger’s movie version of the novel The Day of the Locust (1938) by Nathanael West. The novel and the film are set in 1930s within Hollywood and surrounding areas of Los Angeles. Both tell the story of several characters mainly surrounding Tod, Faye, and Homer who hope to escape less than perfect lives and pursue success in Hollywood. Throughout the film version of The Day of the Locust, what happens to the characters is very similar to what happens in West’s novel. However, the movie is different from the book because it leaves out certain background details about the characters, is told mostly through narration instead of dialogue, and ends in a different way.
The novel did a better job in letting the reader understand the characters backgrounds and motivations for their actions. For example, the novel begins with an artistic and intellectual man named Tod Hackett, the protagonist, who has just ended his day. He hears a racket outside his office and looks out his window to see an army of British, French, and Scottish soldiers running and riding in frenzy. There is a little fat man running after the army yelling in a microphone, “Stage Nine-you bastards-Stage Nine!”(West 21) In contrast, Tod is not present in this scene in the movie version. The little fat man is not running at all but is seen opening a movie stage door and speaking through a microphone shouting, “Stage Nine - Stage Nine!”. Shooting this scene like this in my opinion misses the mark of setting the mood of Nathanael West’s vision of Hollywood. Hollywood is a place that corrupts the dreams of the ignorant, foolish, and naïve who tries to achieve the unreal glamour. Another character, Faye Greener, is portrayed the same way in the novel as in the movie version. She attempts to rise to the top of the movie scene in Hollywood, only prolonging her eventual failure with her beauty and charm. The character of Homer Simpson...