I tried watching The Personal History of David Copperfield on the TV the other night, but gave up. It wasn't the actors that annoyed me, but the way they'd butchered the plot. The filmmakers jarringly departed from the Charles Dickens novel. I stopped watching rather early, when David ventures to find his great-aunt and she takes him in. In the movie he is shown to be a young man, while in the book he is just a young boy who loses everything on the journey, even having to sell his outer clothing to buy food.
There are glaring omissions. Here's a list (just off the top of my head):
No Barkis, so no famous statement; Barkis is Willin'.
No badly run Salem House school David is sent to by his stepfather, so how does David meet Steerforth and little Tommy Traddles?
Did they have David's mother giving birth to a son by his stepfather?
When mother and baby die, David is sent to work at a wine merchants. He meets Mr Micawber at that point but when Mr Micawber ends up in debtors prison, David runs away while still very young. Yet the movie shows David to be quite mature and he learns of his mother's death while working at the wine merchants.
David's great-aunt, Betsy Trotwood lives in Dover, in a house located not at all as shown in the movie.
I stopped watching. No Barkis, no Steerforth nor Tommy Traddles. I imagine the good school David's great-aunt sends him to, Dr Strong's will be where David meets Steerforth and Tommy Traddles for the first time. Was this good school shown to be like the badly run Salem House? I can only speculate.
Have these philistine filmmakers no respect for literature?
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