The Outsiders Essay

Cassidy Perling
Mrs. Bergstrom
English 8A
31 October 2011 The Outsiders essay There are many novels that have been adapted into movies. Some of these novels are The Wizards of Oz, Alice’s adventures in Wonderland, and Peter Pan. Of all the novels that have turned into movies, S.E Hinton’s book, and Francis Ford Coppola’s movie, The Outsiders is definitely the best. Even though it is the same book and movie, they differ in some ways. Some similarities and differences include the characters, the plot, and the relationships. The movie contains mostly all of the same characters, but some are different in small ways. In The Outsiders movie, Dally does not like little kids, but in the book he does not mention them. In the film there is a part when Dally, Johnny, and Ponyboy come across three little boys and Dally says, “I don’t like little kids, I don’t know why, but I just don’t.” After he says that he chases them and scares them off. Another difference in the characters in the movie is that Dally is more paranoid after Johnny kills Bob, than in the novel. For example, in the movie when Dally, Johnny, and Ponyboy are sitting in the car eating, a girl came up to them and asked for a nickel, and Dally kept telling her to go away, because he wanted to stay incognito. Dally wanted them to stay incognito because he did not want Johnny and Ponyboy to go to jail for killing Bob. In the book Dally waned to go eat, and was telling Johnny and Pony that it did not matter if anyone saw them. A similarity that the book and the film shared is that they had the same characters in the Soc and Greaser gang. In the Greaser gang there is, Darry, Soda, Pony, Steve, Dally, Two-Bit, and Curly and Tim Shepard. In the Soc gang there is Bob, Steve Randle, Randy, and Jerry. One more similarity in the book and movie is that Dally is not a good influence, even though Johnny thinks so. Dally is a bad influence because, he has no respect for the law, gets drunk often, lies, cheats, steals, robs, and even beats up little children. Even though Dally does all these bad things, Johnny loved and idolized Dally because Dally had his back for everything that Johnny did. Besides the differences and similarities in the characters, there are also similarities and differences in the plot. The first difference in the plot between the novel and film is the beginning of The Outsiders. In he begging of chapter one in the book it starts off with Ponyboy and Johnny walking out of the movie theater. In the beginning of the movie, it starts off with Ponyboy starting to write The Outsiders book. The second difference between the book and movie is that in the book there is a trial scene. The trial scene is held in the book to see if Soda is going to jail for the killing of Bob and to see if Ponyboy gets to stay with Darry. In the movie they completely skip that scene. The first similarity in the plot is that in both the book and movie, Johnny kills Bob. This is a huge event in The Outsiders because the killing causes many events in this story. Some of these events that take place are Johnny and Pony running away to the church, and the fire at the church, that causes the death of Johnny. If Johnny had not killed Bob the story of The Outsiders would we very different. The next similarity is that at the end of The Outsiders Pony reads the letter that Johnny writes to him. When Pony reads the letter, it gives him an inspiration and he immediately knows what to write a story about. He starts to write the beginning of The Outsiders book. In the book and novel there are many relationships between the characters. In the movie the first relationship that was different was between Sodapop and Sandy. In the book Soda had a relationship with Sandy, and they discuss how she moved away, and also how Sandy sends back the love letters that Sodapop had wrote to her. In the book it also discusses about how Soda wants to marry Sandy and how he goes places with her. In the movie, it does not mention Sandy at all, which is strange that they completely left her out of it. The next difference between relationships involves Darry and Ponyboys relationship. In the movie it did not seem like Darry at all hated Ponyboy, it just seemed like he really cared about Ponyboy, and that Darry just really wanted to keep him safe. In the book it describes there relationship as if they cannot stand each other, and that they barely can stand each other, which is definitely not true. A similarity between a relationship in the book and movie is that Soda and Ponyboy were really close. In the book and movie, Ponyboy is always talking about how Soda is always sticking up for him, and how he is never mean to him, and they definitely are two of the closest people in the whole entire book and movie. In the book and movie, the whole Greaser gang is really close. Everybody in the Greaser gang was family to each other, since most of them did not have a family, or had a family that abused them, and hated them because they thought they were no good. The Greasers are always there for each other and care for everybody in the gang, and they always have each other’s backs. There are many novels that have been adapted into movies. Some of these books are Dorothy trying to get back to Kansas, Alice in a crazy new land, and the boy who never grows up. However, The Outsiders is my favorite of all. Of these films and novels, they all contrasted and compared in some ways. The Outsiders book and film were related and different by the people in it, the events, and the bonds of characters. Many of the movies created are based off the book. The Outsiders was very good and interesting. I loved everything about it, and it really entertained me. The main reason I liked it was because it was not make believe, and there was so much action involved.