Reading versus Movies

[Siobhan]

Liam's favourite is a Postman Pat counting book - as soon as he sees Jess, he points to it, says "Look, Cat!" and then "Miaow" and can count to 5 already. Too many parents sit their children in front of the tv and ignore them.

Ben's favourite is Billy goat gruffy and bob the builder (in german).. He doesn't know the character of Bob in english, only their german names... Just for yourself Em (or other parents), If you feel comfortable reading in another language it is highly recommend to do it at an early age like for Liam..

[pookie1968uk]

i love reading books and my daughter still reads a lot of books and she is 13, maybe not quite as many as she used to but i try to encourage her too still. her english teacher said to us that she can tell if a child reads a varied range of books by their standard of english at school, she said it does reflect.
i read a lot of books but do love a good movie too, i think there is room for both.

[Emma-Lou]

I prefer reading to watching a film.I read everynight before i go to sleep to calm me down.I used to read more than i do now when i was a bit younger but i do still read alot espacially when i go on holiday i end up read the books more than once as i havn't taken enough with me.Ever since i was young i was read to every night and i looked forward to it i remeber books such as Guess how much i love and many others.I prefer to read a book before i see the film as it makes me think about what they look like.

[Chloe O'brien]

I have voted both as sometimes It's just nice to chill out in front of the telly without having to strain your braincells. I still read to Marley most nights we are working our way through the harry potter books at the moment, she loves to read the Christmas before last she got £30 worth of vouchers for waterstones and she was delighted.

Once thing I have found out is if I have read a book before I have seen the film sometimes I am disapointed with the film especially some of the Stephen King films. Some of his books are really spine chilling and creepy but when they are made into films they're rubbish

[Tori]

i prefer reading it must be said. films really don't grab me and i have to watch them at least twice to get the hang of whats going on! i prefer to read because you can do it anywhere and if its a great book you won't notice the noise around you!

[Abigail]

Books all the way for me. I always look forward to going to bed and reading for a few hours every night. It's kinda my "silent time" where nobody can disturb me.

A lot of the film adaptations that I've seen have missed out so much (I know it's difficult to cut a book down to two hours or so) and so many funny bits.

I went to see the new Harry Potter film with my grandparents who hadn't read the book. They came out asking me questions about it, how the Order knew Harry etc were in the Ministry that weren't explained in the film.

Films also take away my image of characters and locations. After seeing all five Harry Potter films all my ideas of what characters and places look like have been replaced by those in the films.

[Kim]

I generally prefer films, as like my dad, I hate reading. I can rarely find a book in which my interested is sustained, with the exception of Harry Potter and several others. I prefer the Harry Potter books, particularly the last few given that so much has been cut out of the film. I still like to watch the films though as a way of seeing an interpretation of the novel that isn't my own.

[laurouski]

I voted books, purely out of bitterness about the way they have (IMO) ruined the Harry Potter books in the film versions.

Having said that, I am looking forward to film adaptations of a couple of books I've read and liked, but that's only really because these books are one-offs, and so I didn't really like the characters, etc., in the same way as I did when reading Harry Potter. Plus, Harry Potter books are quite mysterious, but most of the mystery has been removed from the films.

I still like to watch the films though as a way of seeing an interpretation of the novel that isn't my own.

I agree completely with that. As much as I dislike the Harry Potter films (the way they have changed things, not the films themselves), I still watch them.
I also like to see animate versions of characters I've read so much about.

The only thing I don't like about the Harry Potter books is the fact that they take longer, so when I know that there's a good bit coming up, I always end up skipping and then having to go back and force myself to read the bits before.

I'm still reading the final book because of this. I've just read the bit where

Spoiler:

Voldemort kills Harry,

and skimmed through until the bit where

Spoiler:

Mrs. Weasley duels Bellatrix Lestrange.

There's a bit that says something like

Spoiler:

"Then, Harry knew what was about to happen".

but I managed to force myself to stop before I found out

Spoiler:

if any of them die.

That was about a week ago, and I still haven't been able to find the morale to read through the extremely boring chapter in which

Spoiler:

Dumbledore speaks to Harry about Harry not actually being dead.

Most of you probably have no idea what I'm talking about, especially since this isn't actually a HP thread, but I just had to get it out of my system.