John Green gave us laughs and tears with The Fault in our Stars (TFIOS) film and the same moving drama is expected to be seen at the release of Paper Towns into UK cinemas on the 17 August 2015.
When leaving the cinema, after watching TFIOS, it was clear the amount of emotion it had evoked. Girls left screaming, running to the toilets to clear up the mascara tracks running down their faces, whereas guys contained barely muffled sobs, though their red puffy eyes made it clear that they too had been crying. No one was exempt from the raw anguish John Green had magically brought to the screen.
So, the question on everybody’s mind: can Paper Towns possibly live up to the expectations left by TFIOS?
Well, firstly the two have very different story lines. TFIOS focuses around an epic love story of a terminally diagnosed teen, Hazel, and her thoughts and feelings as she battles against cancer and falls desperately in love. We’re aware there’ll be a tragic ending almost from the start and I’d say the pessimistic note to this novel is its main difference from Paper Towns.
Throughout Paper Towns I felt shrouded in a vague level of optimism, because as a coming of age novel there seemed so much hope for the future of these characters. Yet, in both TFIOS and Paper Towns, John Green seems to have waged war on happy endings… cleverly written Paper Towns had me in both tears and hysterics!
Paper Towns tells the story of Quentin (Q), an anxious teenage nobody, just about to leave school. The only extraordinary thing about his life is his miracle - Margo Roth Spiegelman, who he happens to live next door to. When Margo goes missing, Q sets on an adventure to solve the mystery she’s left behind and find her. How the characters change from beginning to end is fascinating, as Q’s perceptions of the world and people are altered.
Yet, for me there wasn’t the same heart wrenching material that made TFIOS such a success. The ending if you ask me, slightly anti climatic, although maybe this was to be expected, considering John Green makes the point things are always much more ordinary than what you misimagine.
So, overall, I think Paper Towns stands an exceptionally good chance to living up to the hype, especially with actors Nat Wolff and Cara Delevingne starring, but whether it can pack the same powerful emotional punch as Tfios, well, that’s debatable...
In the end, I thoroughly enjoyed the book with its witty humour, interesting characters and strangely philosophical revelations, yet the trailer left me wondering how different the film adaptation will be from the book.
My first fear: losing the mystery of Margo
The ambiguity surrounding her character is one of the things that makes the book so irresistible, both ours and Q’s cluelessness about the truth of her personality, allows her to be imagined in a thousand different ways. The reverence in the way Q talks about her makes her almost seem a godlike being, so I’m worried too many scenes with Cara will take away from one of the key aspects of the story.
Secondly, I’m terrified of scene cuts
Inevitably, the story has been shortened to fit into the film’s one hour and 53 minute running time, but John Green writes so beautifully that even the cutting of a single sentence could cause disappointment. I only hope the script has kept the same wit, charm and depth so apparent in the book. Surprisingly, I actually understand the cut of the SeaWorld scene from the film, because, despite being comedy gold and an incredible moment in the book, since the making of the documentary Blackfish, visits to SeaWorld no longer seem quite so fun and innocent.
My hopes are that the wit and humour of the novel will be transferred to the screen and that the teen cliches usually seen in coming of age films will be ditched, in favour of John Green’s more original line of story telling. Also, I hope the actors can live up to their multi-dimensional characters and show that transformation all of them go through during the novel.
Despite my scepticism, I’m extremely excited for the film’s release and any future works of John Green’s, either as a book or on screen. He is truly one of the only people to understand teenagers, who isn’t actually a teenager.
Not yet read Paper Towns? Or want to read it again with a bit of company? Join our readalong in partnership with Bloomsbury, which starts in full here on the site on Monday 3 August – including great discussion ideas and more! We’ll be discussing the Prologue and Part 1 on 3 August and using #PaperTownsRead on Twitter, Facebook and on the site - so do get ready to join in! Get your copy of Paper Towns at a reduced price from the Guardian bookshop.
We want this blog to grow so share your hopes and fears for the Paper Towns film on Twitter @GdnChildrensBks or by email childrens.books@theguardian.com and we’ll be sure to add them!
Your thoughts:
Site member Confessionofabooklover
Paper Towns was incredibly unique as a book. Many people hype TThe Fault in our Stars, when actually for me Paper Towns is the better of the two (or five…). With The Fault In Our Stars, I felt that the movie was turned too much into a romance, more of a money-maker than I think did justice to the book. But for Paper Towns, romanticising the book is a much bigger fear. Sure, Q and Margo have a low key romance going on, but it’s not the forefront of the book, and to make it the forefront of the movie would just kill it completely for me. Margo and Q are also very distinct characters. They each have their own unique traits about them; the wisdom of Q and the mysterious personality that Margo has. The thing is though that these unique character traits and personalities are essential to the plot, and any change would have a massive impact on the final outcome. If there has been any change to the characters, I don’t think that this film could ever compare to the book. But Paper Towns has always been a book that I read and thought, “This needs to be a movie.” My hope is that the next few weeks speed up so that I can see Paper Towns as soon as possible, and I hope that the film wows me just as much as the book. In other words, 20th Century Fox really have their work cut out for them to make me a fan of the movie.
I also want to share something I found on John Green’s website which you might be interested in:
“Q. How much did you change in the Paper Towns screenplay? A. A lot. (For one thing, the ending was completely different.) I’ve always believed that a movie CAN’T be faithful to a book, because a book is something that happens in conversation between a writer and a reader, whereas a movie is mostly something you look at. So, like, trying to render the people and events of a novel on screen is impossible, I think, because you’ll only end up with some poor approximation of the magic of the book. So in the end I’d rather make a good movie than a faithful one, which is what I tried to do. I wanted the ideas of the book to be preserved, but mostly I just want the movie to be good.”
Site member OrliTheBookWorm
I’ll admit when I heard Cara Delevingne would be playing Margo in Paper Towns, I was anxious, and a little disappointed. My biggest fear is that one of the most beautiful supermodels on earth playing a supposedly down-to-earth, normal kind of girl just won’t work. I’m worried I won’t be able to immerse myself in the story, because all I can see is Cara Delevingne giving you yet more reasons to be insanely jealous of her life. And seeing the trailer didn’t stop that worry, either. It just didn’t work for me. Saying that, I trust John Green, and I trust that the film will be sensitively and well done with his expertise and aid: I’m hoping all the humor and metaphors and philosophical messages will come out in the film, filling people with the same vibrance the book did, and be portrayed with the same brilliance as The Fault in our Stars was. Fingers crossed!
Site member, Patrick
If Hollywood keeps up its current rate of one John Green film per year then he may well descend into Nicholas Sparks territory. But compared to that noted romantic novelist, Green’s novels are consistently good. The Fault in Our Stars, the most famous feather in Green’s cap, is an excellent piece of fiction and a bracing romance to boot. Before that novel, which catapulted the author to celebrity status, we had Looking for Alaska (set to make the leap from the page to the screen next year), An Abundance of Katherines and, of course, Paper Towns.
My memories of Paper Towns are hazy. I read it before The Fault in Our Stars, a friend having recommended it to me and lent me a copy. I remember it as a slightly forgettable teen mystery yarn, nothing particularly exciting, but I’ve grown to appreciate it more upon a re-read. Green has a firm handle on what it’s like to be a modern teenager: the existential angst, the occasional flashes of pretension, the state of being lovelorn. Similarly, he knows how to write a compelling mystery with clues and red herrings sprinkled throughout, all leading to a satisfying reveal.
The characters, like most of Green’s novels, are Paper Towns’ greatest strength and I hope that director Jake Schreier and screenwriters Scott Neustadter and Michael H Weber retain their essence (the latter pair penned the script for The Fault in Our Stars last year and did an excellent job so I’m quietly confident they’ll pull it out of the bag again). There’s been aspersions cast on Cara Delevingne and her acting ability since she nabbed the role of Margo, the book’s vanishing heroine. Everything in the trailers suggests Delevingne is perfectly cast (her subtly smoky voice combined with her flawless American accent works superbly, and her arresting appearance is almost exactly how I pictured Margo, although she fits Green’s description of Alaska Young more) and she’s making waves throughout Hollywood (literal waves when she pops up as a mermaid later this year in Joe Wright’s Peter Pan reimagining) so it seems unlikely that she’s a wooden actress. Hopefully she’ll be able to bring the right amount of swagger, vulnerability and wile to the role of Margo in what should be an excellent film, if The Fault in Our Stars is anything to go by.
Site member justonemorepage
My biggest fear for the movie is probably the character of Margo. She’s not supposed to be the manic pixie dream girl in the end, and I’m worried that’s exactly what she’ll be portrayed as. The idea of scenes being cut is, of course, positively horrifying to any bookworm, but hopefully if they do cut scenes then it won’t be the good ones. However, I’m definitely looking forward to the seeing the collection of santas!
Though Paper Towns isn’t one of my absolute favourite books, I’d like the film to be a good adaptation – nearly all the time, the book is better, but like with TFiOS you can still get a pretty good film out of it.
Site member
The arrival of Paper Towns to cinemas near you is imminent, so the question ‘what will it be like?’ arises. Looking back at The Fault in our Stars and the Paper Towns trailers, I think the film will be a loyal portrayal of John Greens novel, which is every booklovers dream. Will it be as popular of TFIOS? I think it has the potential to be very popular, with great names like Cara Delevingne starring as Margo and the John Green fanbase bigger than ever but I think it will be in a more quiet way. TFIOS was a well known book before the film because of its themes, so maybe the Paper Towns film will draw more attention to the book. I’m expecting a great young adult film which will warm hearts everywhere.
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