Adapting novels: the pressures on the screenwriter

The top Golden Globe winners this year were movies whose screenplays were adapted from novels (Ian McEwan's Atonement, Cormac McCarthy's No Country for Old Men and Jean-Dominique Bauby's The Diving Bell and the Butterfly) and a Broadway musical (director Tim Burton's adaptation of Sweeeney Todd). How hard is it for screenwriters to adapt books and plays to the big screen? What kind of pressures do they face? Read more about that in this article published by the Associated Press.

See also
an interview with screenwriter John Milius about his adaptation of the novel Heart of Darkness, which became the film Apocalipse Now.