The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodent is not one of those times. I don’t think a film adaptation would ever fully do justice anything written by Terry Pratchett. So much of the pleasure readers take in his storytelling is found in the word play, allusions, pop culture references, historical references, social observations, philosophical musings, etc. Even the books intended to draw in younger readers are dense, without ever feeling dense (or stodgy). You couldn’t possibly translate them 100% to film.
Still, sometimes there’s a scene or a sequence that’s so perfect and cinematic on the page I can easily “watch” it with my mind’s eye. All a filmmaker has to do is recreate it just as written – so I’m aghast when filmmakers…don’t do that. In the otherwise enjoyable Going Postal, a hilarious scene with “Spike” and her dangerous stilettos gets mangled and loses all its bite. In Hogfather, an early scene involving a monster under the bed feels weirdly infantile, but it’s the poignant little matchstick girl sequence being reduced to a throwaway moment that stings the most. You can’t translate everything, but with an author as quoted as Pratchett, you should try your best to honor the most celebrated lines and scenes, especially when it’s already filmable as written.
I had high hopes for The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents. A lot about the adaptation left me confused in addition to disappointed. It includes a couple visual nods to The Nightmare Before Christmas. To my knowledge neither Tim Burton nor Henry Selick was involved, and all it did was make me think of how much better the movie could have been with someone like Henry Selick at the helm. His Coraline adaptation is mostly faithful to the excellent novel by Neil Gaiman, and I loved any minor modifications like the film’s approach to the eyes/spirits. I was even more pleased with the film adaptation of Stardust that took full advantage of the lightning pirates (such a cool idea wasted as a single paragraph of deus ex machina in the book), added depth to characters and their relationships, and raised the stakes in the second half.
Pratchett, like his friend and one-time partner in crime Gaiman, does not talk down to his audience – which is why books like The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents can be enjoyed by all ages. Sadly the same can not be said for the film adaptation. While some of the story’s darker elements remain, unnecessary narration insults the intelligence of even younger viewers who still have better comprehension and inferential skills than filmmakers gave them credit for. There’s certain realizations readers make about Maurice, for example, that don’t hit the same when they’re spelled out for us. We may not all get there at the same time, but we deserve a chance to figure it out. I think Discworld denizens like Susan and Tiffany would share my irritation.
The book opens strong with a hilarious scene involving Maurice, the rats, and an attempted theft that reads like it was written expressly with the screen in mind. The movie replaces the action with dreary exposition by the first of two (!) narrators (why?!) – then shoehorns the comedic bit into a scene involving the pied piper in the third act that may as well have been cut because the character no longer had any real connection to the central story. Someone, quite literally, lost the plot. Its awkward placement also disrupts the pacing and undermines the emotional impact of the big showdown with “Spider”. Even though they kept a key moment involving a beloved Discworld character, it didn’t resonate the same way. They took away its power because they didn’t have enough faith in the source material or audience.
You know what it’s like?
It’s like the movie version of those adults who do not know how to interact with children, try too hard, and talk down to them.
The book is the adult who “gets it” and talks to children like actual people.
Adaptations like Coraline or The Secret of Nimh stand the test of time because they respect the source material and they respect the audience. There’s hints of appreciation in The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents, like a brief bit between perceptive Peaches and manipulative Maurice demonstrating an awareness of their special dynamic, but most additions took away more than they added and what they replaced is sorely missed. The movie is shorter (and slighter) than the book but feels so much longer. It drags.
It’s on Hulu now. I wish I could enthusiastically recommend it. Instead I can only hope it doesn’t put anyone off reading the book or green lighting another adaptation. The source material is not to blame for lackluster performance. I will say one kid still liked it (but both loved the book).
