Books vs. Movies
In this podcast we set out to answer the age old question: is the book really always better than the movie?
Books vs. Movies
Ep. 35 The Breakdown by B.A. Paris vs. Blackwater Lane (2024)
Ever wondered how stress and lack of sleep could lead you to spend a day dissecting a thriller novel and its film adaptation? That's exactly how I, Lluvia, ended up falling down the rabbit hole of B.A. Paris's "The Breakdown" and its 2024 screen version, "Blackwater Lane." Join me as I unravel the tangled web of guilt, dementia fears, and murder mystery that our protagonist Cass faces. Despite the allure of a chilling Halloween thriller, I found myself wading through both the book and the film, seeking the gripping suspense I crave from a good thriller.
Picture this: a British tale transformed into an American cinematic endeavor, complete with expat characters navigating English locales. My exploration touches on creative shifts, like the book's deep dive into Cass's mental health swapped for her portrayal as a potential murder victim in the film. Together, we'll explore the notable absences and additions that mark the transition from page to screen, such as the intense near-drowning scene that remains locked within the book's covers. The film's TV-quality production and narrative tweaks left me pondering the essence of Cass's struggle to maintain her sanity amid an unraveling conspiracy.
As we uncover a secret burner phone, uncovering Rachel and Matthew's clandestine communications, the plot thickens. Cass's accidental snooping reveals a sinister plan to control her finances and sanity, turning the narrative into a thrilling unraveling of deceit and distrust. You'll discover how the murder weapon's revelation propels the story to its climax, and why, despite some convenient resolutions, the book still offers a more satisfying conclusion. Step into my world as we weigh whether the book truly holds the crown over its cinematic counterpart, leaving you to decide which version reigns supreme.
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Welcome to Books vs Movies, the podcast where I set out to answer the age-old question is the book really always better than the movie? I'm Yuvia, an actress and book lover based out of New York City, and today I will be talking about the Breakdown by BA Paris and its 2024 adaptation, blackwater Lane, starring Dermot Mulroney, maggie Grace and Minka Kelly. Hi everyone, I am no longer feeling like death. So I woke up this morning feeling like death. I'm not sick. I didn't wake up feeling sick, but I did wake up feeling like I could get sick. Yeah, I woke up this morning feeling like death. I think I've just been, I've just been so busy, which I don't necessarily mind, but it my sleep schedule has already been screwed up due to falling back, and which usually doesn't happen, which I do find a little concerning. But that, yeah, that usually the springing forward, yes, but not not falling back and just like I have, there's been like different factors that I've been like stressed about or have has given me a little bit of anxiety that's been preventing me from sleeping as well as I could. So I think it finally caught up to me yesterday. I woke up.
Speaker 1:Yesterday was the first time in which I fell asleep and I stayed asleep and I was having a really good sleep and my alarm woke me up and I turned it off and I slept for another half hour and I forced myself to get up at that point. But I could have kept on sleeping. I could have kept on sleeping. I could have kept on sleeping and I forced myself to go to work. And yeah, I just I don't. It was very hard for me to be a productive member of the workplace yesterday because I was. All I could think about was how much I wanted to sleep and just trying to stay awake, and I was just so self-conscious about the dark circles under my eyes because with, like my skin tone and everything, when I have dark circles, like you can notice them and my eyes just felt so like puffy. I fell asleep early last night and I, like Orlando, was even like I'm going to sleep on the floor tonight because you look awful and I want you to get the best sleep that you possibly can. So make note, I did not tell him to go down there. He did that on his own, so he slept on the floor and I had not, as I had pretty good sleep, not as good as I was like, if I had to compare to like the sleep I was having Tuesday night, I would say this this is, it was still good, but it wasn't like Tuesday night good. And when I woke up today, I still woke up feeling like I wasn't rested Again. My dark circles were so prominent, my eyes were so puffy, they felt like I felt like it was so hard to keep them open. So I took a sick day today because I was I needed it, and so I went back to sleep, did some productive things and then just I just woke up from another nap too long ago and I was like, well, because of how busy I've been, I haven't been able to do my podcast, and it's something that I really wanted to keep on schedule now that I have, like, more content to put out for everyone. So that's what I'm doing. We'll see what I do after this podcast, but otherwise, I'm expecting this podcast episode to be relatively short and sweet, because, well, let's get into it.
Speaker 1:The Breakdown by BA Paris was first published in 2017 and it follows our main character, cass. Cass, at the start of the book, is on her way down a road, a back road that leads to her home, and it's a stormy night. She promised her husband she would not take that road because it is dangerous to go down that road in a storm. And she sees a car. The car is just sitting there. She sees that there's a woman in the car. She doesn't know if the woman needs help, so she decides to pull over, wait to see if there's any reaction from the woman. The woman in the other car doesn't get out, doesn't wave her down, so the cast figures she's okay. She continues on her journey. The next day, however, it is revealed that that woman was killed and Cass is filled with an overwhelming sense of grief that she possibly could have stopped the murder from happening if she had just gotten out of her car and checked on that woman. However, cass has other things that are keeping her up. Her mother died of early onset dementia and it looks like Cass could be developing that as well. She's been forgetting the little things. She ordered a pram stroller, as we call it in the States. She ordered a pram. She forgot the alarm code of her new alarm system that she had in. She can't remember where she parked her car. So she has to worry about all these signs that point to her getting dementia, not to mention the silent calls that she's been receiving and feeling like she's being watched on top of the overwhelming sense of guilt.
Speaker 1:The 2024 adaptation Blackwater Lane stars Minka Kelly, dermot Mulroney and Maggie Grace and follows the story of a woman who drives down a secluded back road late one night and sees there's a woman in a car. That woman is later murdered. Terrifying events start happening all around her and she believes that she is the killer's next victim. So this was I'd never heard of this book. I'd never heard of this movie. This was on. We watched this in October because it was. It was on Peacock's list of like Halloween movies to watch. So I was like, why not Never heard of it? And yeah, it wasn't very good. Just getting straight up, say that straight off the bat. It was not a good film. But watching that, I did discover that it was based off the Breakdown and I read the Breakdown and you know that I love thriller. I love a good thriller book. That is probably my favorite genre and the book was also okay. It was better than the film. Did I just spoil the ending? I did just spoil the, the end of the episode. Oops, you know that's what happens, but it's fine. So now you know who's going to be the winner, but we'll make it official, but it was still just okay there was.
Speaker 1:I did have some aspects with the writing and things like that and we'll get a little bit into it. But, yeah, this should be a relatively short episode. There isn't too much. There are some changes that were made for the film, but I don't there's not like a whole lot that I need to talk about. So, yeah, let's get started.
Speaker 1:The overall premise of the film is the same as the book. There are some things that are. Obviously there are some changes and yeah, so what those changes are? So one of the big things that I remember the film starts on the last day of school and our main character, cass, is a teacher. This takes place on the last day of school. She just finished grading, she's a theater teacher, she just finished grading the students' final monologues, and then she goes about her way and one of her students actually plays quite a pivotal role in the film, but he's non-existent in the book because the book actually starts in the middle of summer break, so we don't know who her students are. We know she's a teacher, but we don't know who her students are and, as you may have noticed, I said that she forgot that she bought a pram, which is what the Brits call a stroller. Yeah, the Breakdown does. Well, both the Breakdown and Blackwater Lane take place in England, but the Breakdown is very much a British. It's a very much British book and the characters are very much British.
Speaker 1:They were made American, not sure why. I imagine because it was like an American production company that made it, which I mean doesn't really make sense to me because you can still cast British actors and make it. But this definitely feels has more of a vibe of like made for TV film, even though it was released very, very briefly in theaters. From what I saw, I didn't see it there. I didn't see it there, just being honest, but when I was reading up on it it did say it was released in theaters very, very briefly. So yeah, I mean it's an American made film. Like it said, it gives more made for TV movie vibes. So it's not like, it's definitely not like, meant to be like a blockbuster film. So I mean, I'm guessing that's why they made it. They made the actors or the characters American. They're all American expats living in England, which isn't a bad thing.
Speaker 1:But even watching the film before I knew that the book was so British. When I was watching this film I was like I thought that it might be like an American book, that they might have just switched, like maybe it was supposed to take place in like New York or Chicago, where thriller books usually take place, and then they just moved the characters to England because why not? I know, sometimes filmmakers have admitted that they write films in settings where they want to work for a little bit and visit. So I was like so maybe that's what they did. It's an American book that they just like wrote into the British setting. But no, this is very much a British book, british characters, british everything. It is so British and I kind of wish that they had kept that because, like I said, even just watching it, it just seemed a little too convenient that it's all these American.
Speaker 1:Yes, I'm aware that there are American expats in England, but this was just like. So they all happen to live in the same town and they are all like Kelly's character and Maggie Grace's character are like childhood friends that both ended up in England and she happened to like meet her husband in England. I think. I'm not too clear on that. I don't remember those details or if that was ever really explained, but it is explained that at least Minka Kelly and Maggie Grace's character are. I think one of Maggie Grace's characters' mom might've been British but she lived in the States and that's how she grew up with Minka Kelly's character and then they both ended up living in this. It just seemed like a little too convenient for me. Yes, I'm aware that there are expats obviously all over the world, but the explaining for this like even if they hadn't tried to explain it, I feel like I wouldn't have thought about it as much. But the explanation was just so clunky that I was like I don't know about this. And then I read the book and I was like that makes total sense. They're supposed to be British.
Speaker 1:But anyway, moving on, most of the things that happen in the book that mess with Cass's mind do not happen in the film. The film definitely focuses the like, making us think that she's the victim's next killer and whoever is, whoever's the one the killer is potentially exploiting her mother's early onset dementia diagnosis to make her believe that she's on her way to getting early onset dementia. But at the end of the day, we. The film definitely focuses more on we're going to find ways to mess with Cass that make her think she's next with. I'm explaining this really badly because the book does that, but I guess the book definitely focuses more on exploiting her possible early onset dementia diagnosis more than the film does. She still thinks that she could be next on the killer's list, but she's definitely while she's trying to figure out what happened to her friend, she's definitely a lot more worried about seeming sane to her husband and to Rachel that's her friend than in the film. She does have aspects of that, but she's definitely a lot more. It's a lot more threatening.
Speaker 1:You feel the presence of the killer a lot more than you do in the book. You feel more of like the emotional aspect of like I'm not going crazy, but how can I prove that I'm not when I received this early onset dementia diagnosis and I haven't, I can't really prove that. This isn't me forgetting things. So yeah, for example, in the film there is a moment in which Cass is alone in her house and she's taking a bath. She's just relaxing, enjoying her bath and we just see a hand wearing a black glove presumably the killer dunk her head underwater and try to drown her. When that fails, the killer obviously exits the house. That does not happen in the book. There's no moment like that in the book.
Speaker 1:There's also a moment in which she finds one of her earrings in the back road and so she's just like oh my gosh, like this earring was placed there by the killer. And of course everyone's like are you sure you didn't just lose it while you were there? Because she does lie. Initially because she promised her husband she wouldn't take that road because it's so dangerous, which is it takes her a while to report that she saw the woman who ended up getting killed. It takes her a while to report it because she doesn't want her husband to find out that she was there. So she obviously starts feeling really guilty about this because it's like I might have some like crucial information. So she goes in to investigate and she finds her earring there and then she ends up confessing to her husband like I was there, I saw, I'm sorry, don't be mad at me. Of course he gets mad at her and he's like well, how do I like what do you? What do you mean? Like the killer just placed your earring there. How do you know? You didn't lose it when you went, when you were there lying to me, and she's like, because I never got out of my car, and he's like OK, so yeah, that also doesn't happen.
Speaker 1:What happens more in the book is that she starts getting things sent to her house, like purchases that she doesn't remember making. She buys, as I said, a pram. A pram arrives at her house that she admired when she was inside a baby store but she'd never placed the order for that pram. She gets like threatening phone calls and by threatening, like she answers the phone and there's no one. She knows she can sense that there's someone on the other line, but they never speak. It's completely silent on the other end. And yeah, like whenever she goes into town, like she'll she might forget where, like she parked her car, things like that. So those are like the main things that that happen that are like different, like the.
Speaker 1:The film is definitely a lot more like the killer's onto you kind of suspense, but we don't really we don't believe that these things are happening. Oh, she also orders a new alarm system in the book that she doesn't remember purchasing and then, once the alarm is installed, she puts her like the alarm password is her and her husband's birthdays, but backwards, and she doesn't remember that at one point. So yeah, so it's. The book definitely focuses more on like the early onset dementia diagnosis and feeling like she's feeling really bad about herself because she doesn't remember things anymore or she keeps forgetting things, really obvious things. And the book, the film, definitely tries to go more for like the killer's aunt to you kind of situations, while kind of exploiting that early onset dementia diagnosis.
Speaker 1:The biggest difference comes with the plot twist. It is the same plot twist for both, but the way it is revealed is different. So it turns out that Rachel and what's her husband's name? Hold on, give me one second to look up her husband's name, matthew. So there is. It turns out that Rachel and Matthew are having an affair and when Cass's parents died they left her with an insane amount, like they were very, very, very wealthy, so they left her with a huge inheritance. So obviously Rachel and Matthew are having an affair and they decide that they want to. The reason they want to exploit this early onset dementia diagnosis is because they want her to be labeled as like they essentially want Matthew to become her conservator and say like well, she is not. She does not have the mental capability to be in charge of all this money. So that way Matthew has full control of the money and then they can like have her instituted for her dementia diagnosis.
Speaker 1:Okay, I'm gonna be completely honest, I fell asleep at some point watching the film, so I'm not exactly sure how she ended up finding out that Matthew and Rachel were having an affair, but she finds out at some point and the film definitely does one of those things where at some point she realizes it, but we as the audience don't know that she realizes it until it's revealed at the end, like she does this thing where Rachel and Matthew think they found. Actually, I think in the film they're trying to kill her. In the book they're trying to have her, they're trying to have him become her conservator and have her put in an institution. So in the film they are trying to kill her and she finds a way to get them over to her house to make them think like, oh, we found the perfect opportunity to kill her and they end up not killing her. And it turns out she set up like cameras, like video cameras and things like that, that record them confessing everything to her and the cops show up at the perfect time and they have like the recordings of them confessing and so they're able to get arrested, which I realized.
Speaker 1:I really don't like that trope. I think that's just so unrealistic. Like there have been moments in which people have confessed their crimes, unwittingly, to their friends. You know that's why sometimes, like they have what's it called when, like you're essentially hiding, like you're working with the police to, and you have, like you're like a really close friend and you're working with the police to get your friend to confess. So like they hide a tape recorder somewhere on you and then you go over to your friend's house and say, hey, so what happened that night? And because they're your friend, they trust you, they confess to you. Like that does happen. I'm aware that that does happen, but in something like this it just seems so improbable that like the police would be on it Because she like befriends one of the police officers, because they keep calling her, she, she keeps, keeps on ending having these false alarms.
Speaker 1:So the police it's the same like police officer that shows up and it's and of course, dermot Mulroney, as Matthew is like oh, it's just this false alarm, I'm sorry, like there's something wrong with my wife, and so like she ends up Cass ends up befriending the police officer in this instance, yeah, so like she somehow convinces the police officer to be in on it and like, hey, don't worry, I'm going to, I'm going to like almost let them kill me, but like you'll be there. So like don't let them kill me, but I'm going to get the confession out of them which is like I don't, I don't know, I don't know, maybe, maybe that does happen, where it's like I might, I might, die, and the police are police, are like, okay, yeah, that's, you can. You can put yourself in harm's way. We'll be listening. As far as I know, you're not, you're not supposed to be in danger when you're working, whatever. This is not the point. I'm going off on a tangent, so that just kind of bugged me, because it was just one of those like gotcha, I knew you were onto me, so I was actually onto you and whatever, you know, that whole, that whole. So yeah, so they ended up getting arrested and then the film ends In the book.
Speaker 1:What ends up happening is it's also very convenient, I will say so. It turns out that Rachel has a burner phone that she uses to text Matthew. That makes sense. But while she and Cass are at a cafe, there's like a group of French student tourists at the exact same cafe and whatever. They're teenagers and Rachel leaves. And as Rachel's leaving, one of the French students tries to call her, but she just ignores them and keeps on leaving.
Speaker 1:And then she's like hey, so my friend stole this phone from me. Oh sorry, so you know that I'm French? Oh sorry, and my friend stole your friend's phone. That was really bad French accent. I'm so sorry to anyone who's French. My, my friend stole your friend's phone. Do you mind? Um, giving it back to her?
Speaker 1:And Cass is like uh, this isn't my friend's phone.
Speaker 1:Are you sure that this came from her?
Speaker 1:And they're like like oui, madame. Okay, that was one thing that did bug me. I just said oui, madame, but in the book, for whatever reason, the French students were saying si. They were like si, my friend stole it. And I'm just like as far as I know, they don't say si in France, they say oui. And even if they said si, like clearly this student is fluent in English, so why would they say C? Yeah, I was just like why is this French student saying C when they should be saying Oui, like if you really want to throw in their Frenchness, because I think they would probably just say yes. But if you want to really show off their Frenchness, why are they saying C instead of Oui? But anyway, oui, madame, my friend, tu quittes la verre purse?
Speaker 1:And then Cass is like I mean OK, if you're sure this is hers. And because she doesn't recognize the phone, so she ends up like being like oh, I think I recognize this number. And she calls the number and well, she sees some of the text messages, and then she's like wait a minute. And Well, she sees some of the text messages, and then she's like wait a minute. And she calls the number and, sure enough, matthew picks up. Dun dun, dun. Yes, that's how she finds out that Rachel and Matthew are having an affair. And so she goes home and Rachel calls her like completely freaked out, and she's like, oh my gosh, like did I drop a phone? Did you see anything? Did I leave anything behind? And of course Cass is like no, well, I mean I saw some like students, the French students, playing around with like a phone, but I didn't say anything because I didn't recognize it as yours. And Rachel's like, oh yeah, you know, that's my work phone, so I should go back to the cafe and go get it. And then she goes downstairs and Matthew is like what happened? And she's like, oh you know, rachel lost her work phone, so she's going back to the cafe to go get it. And Matthew's like, oh well, I'm going to go hang out with my guy friends, so I'll see you later. Bye, and then he leaves. And then so she's home alone.
Speaker 1:She's had read some of the text messages. She reads the full history of text messages. And that's when she finds out that Rachel and Matthew have been plotting what I told you, that they're going to mess with her. They're going to make her think that she has early onset dementia so that she eventually reaches a point where she hands control of her money over to Matthew in the form of like some sort of conservatorship. I imagine it's still called that in England or it's like the same thing. In England they don't use the word conservatorship, that's why I'm saying that, but anyway, yeah.
Speaker 1:So Cass gets the, she reads the whole messages and she like retraces their steps. She goes back to this like the baby store and discovers that like Rachel had seen her out in town and like went into the and saw her walk out of the baby store and she talked to like the sales lady and bought the pram. At another point, while she was in town, matthew like moved the car. No, rachel moved the car. So Rachel, since she's having an affair with Matthew, she has her own set of keys to the house. So she like goes into the house. Of course she knows the correct alarm code because it is their birthdays backwards, but he switches the order. So either it is their birthdays backwards but he switches the order, so either it was like her birthday than his birthday, but he changes it to the reverse of that. Um, so she is able to like take down the alarm and everything, but she like goes over to cast his house, takes the extra set of keys, goes to the parking garage, moves the car to like a different floor and then moves it back when she goes to get the attendant that's working there. Um, so, yeah, so she like discovers everything.
Speaker 1:And then I found the way cass manipulates this information a lot better in the book than I did in the film. Like I said in the film, it's one of those like we end up finding out that, like she was on to them, she had been on to them for a while and this is how she got their confession. But yeah, so she. She ends up like what she does is she has all this information. She knows that Matthew and Rachel are messing with her. So she, she.
Speaker 1:In the text messages they reveal where the murder weapon was for the woman who was killed. So the woman who was killed is works Rachel, and she saw that Rachel and Matthew were having an affair At the time. She didn't know who Matthew was or who he was married to, until she and Cass went to a work function with Rachel and Rachel left her behind. At one point she became friends with Jane and then she went out for lunch with Jane and she's like, oh, that's my husband, matthew. And then Jane's's like oh crap, I know who that man is. That's the man that was having sex with Rachel. So she wants to tell Cass the truth but, like Rachel's like, no, I'll tell her myself. Meet me, here's why, here's why I don't want to tell her just yet. Meet me in this back road and I'll tell you the truth.
Speaker 1:And she ends up murdering Janeane with, like, this big knife and that's one of the ways they mess with cas again is like rachel leaves the knife, like right in front of the the like the door that leads into the backyard, and then so rachel I mean cas starts freaking out and she tells matthew, matthew's like what the hell? And by the time they come back, it's just it's been replaced by like a smaller knife. And he was like this, you, this. You're like, you're so paranoid about this killer that like it's messing with your mind, like this is this little kitchen knife, is not what you saw. And she's like no, I saw like the big kitchen knife, I saw the murder weapon.
Speaker 1:And so, of course, in the text messages it's revealed that they hid the knife in Matthew's garden shed. So she goes out and she finds it, and so she calls the police and she plays it off very well. She's just like oh, you know, I found the kitchen knife. I knew that, like the killer was out to get me. Is it possible that my husband is in on it, because it was in the shed? And then, like the police come and they arrest him.
Speaker 1:And then Rachel ends up showing up at some point and she's like why is Matthew arrested. And Cass is like, oh, you know, they think that. Like, okay, so sorry, she knows what the murder weapon is, but she doesn't realize that this knife was the actual literal murder weapon. She just thought it was a knife that Rachel bought to mess with her. So she's like, yeah, they found a big knife in the shed and I was. It's not mine, so it has to be Matthew. So they arrested Matthew because they think it could be the murder weapon. So Rachel's like, oh, okay, well, bye, I got to go now.
Speaker 1:And then she goes and she confesses everything to the police. And then that's when Cass is like, oh crap, like I didn't realize I was just messing. I wanted, I wanted to mess with them in my own way. I didn't realize that was the literal murder weapon and that my friend was actually the murderer Fantastic. So that's how that ends up happening in the book, which I, like I said, found a little bit more satisfying than the film. That being said, I did have pacing issues with the book. Just how everything ended up working out in the end just seemed very convenient. Just how everything ended up working out in the end just seemed very convenient. Like I said, the French teenagers stole the burner phone, how, like, what great luck that that happened, that kind of thing. So, yeah, I mean it was okay. It wasn't like it didn't keep me on the edge of my seat and it had the ability to, since it was different enough from the film, despite knowing the plot twist, like it definitely still could have kept me on my toes and the way behind her eyes did I have talked about how that one sucked me in. I knew how dumb that ending was going to be, but it sucked me in.
Speaker 1:The motivations on Rachel's end was very flimsy to me. Like I said, the ultimate goal is to have Cass deemed not sound of mind so that they can take over her money. In the book, in the film, they do want to kill her, but Rachel's main motivation is so growing up, rachel didn't have a good home life. She's a few years older than Cass and essentially she ended up being taken in by Cass's family and I don't want to say raised, because she was, I mean, she was a teenager by the time. She like started living with them and everything. But they did say like, apparently they would say, oh, you're the closest thing I've ever had to. Like. Oh, cass's parents would tell Rachel all the time like you're our second daughter, we love you so much, blah, blah, blah. And when they died and they didn't leave any of their fortune to her, she got really bitter about it and felt that she was entitled to some of that fortune because of everything. But I was like it's not like they raised you from birth, like they did take you in and they might've said that they loved you as a second daughter, but at the end of the day, like they only raised you for like the latter half of your teenage years and then you went off on your own. That doesn't mean that they don't love you, they don't care for you, they don't, they're not worried about you, but I don't think you're entitled to that money. Based on that alone. You're really not. I think about.
Speaker 1:Like the friendship I had the closest friendship I can compare it to is my middle school slash high school best friend in the whole entire world. Her name is Alex and we were inseparable through middle school. Like we were inseparable, you would not see one without the other. We spent a lot of time together. We spent a lot of time at each other's houses. We only became separated because she moved across town and went to a different high school, but even then, like we saw each other as much as we could, considering the distance that was now between us, and I mean her mom never said like, oh, you're like the closest thing to like a daughter to me or anything. But I feel like she wouldn't. She would have taken me in. I feel like, had I had a situation like that where I didn't have a good home life and like I feel like her mom would have reached a point in which she might've been willing to take me in.
Speaker 1:But I like, despite that, despite how much I really love and admire her mom and I'd like to think her mom really loved me at that point too, I don't think I would and I would not have felt entitled to Alex's money. Alex has a little sister, so I would have been like it makes total sense for your mom to leave that money to just you and your little sister, like she literally raised you I'm just coming in at like later on in your life. So, yeah, that motivation just seemed kind of it's like I don't understand why you're so bitter, cause it's and she did help a little bit when, like she was like one of the caretakers for Cass's mom after I don't remember what happened to the dad, but the dad died before the mom, like much sooner than the mom, and then when the mom got diagnosed with dementia, tess and Rachel kind of were both the caretakers, which maybe that's why she felt a little bit more entitled to it. But I still didn't get the sense that she was like a constant caretaker enough for her to leave all the money or part of the money to Rachel. So I was like that your motivation's a little flimsy. I know money makes people do weird things.
Speaker 1:So anyway, those are my final thoughts on the book and the film. The book was. It wasn't terrible. It's a solid thriller. If you like thrillers, check it out for yourself. I do recommend it. It's not like one that I'm like crazy about, but I do recommend it. Still, a solid thriller.
Speaker 1:This film you can skip for sure. I rated the film two stars. That's the lowest rating I've given so far. I rated the film two stars and I rated the book three stars. So the winner is, as I've said already, but let's pretend I didn't say it is the book. Definitely definitely check out the book and you can skip the film. You can definitely skip the film, which is funny because it has, like, a pretty solid cast. I mean, I like Dormant Mulroney.
Speaker 1:I'm not too familiar with Minga Kelly's work, but Maggie Grace, I mean, I've never had any issues with her either. I mean, very, they did it for the paycheck and I can't fault them for that. Sometimes you have to do things for the paycheck. But anyway, that is it for this episode of Books vs Movies. Thank you for tuning in. Next time I will be talking about the Color Purple by Alice Walker and its 2023 adaptation the Color Purple. This is the musical adaptation starring Fantasia Brino and Taraji P Henson. Please leave a rating and a review and tell your friends all about it. I am really passionate about this podcast and it makes me really sad that I that I've been really busy so I've had to neglect it a little bit. But thank you for tuning in and I'll see you next time. Bye.