30 Days of Night: Page to Screen Pt. 2

One of the biggest differences between the comic and the movie versions of 30 Days of Night may seem subtle, but it represents a difference in the overall dynamic that causes the movie to lose much of the "heart" that's in the comic.  In the comic, Eben and Stella are happily married.  In the movie, they are estranged.  At some point in the creative process, someone must have decided that it would be better dramatically if, during the story, the two realized they really did love each other and should never have parted.  I don't necessarily agree.

It's easy to believe that the stress of the situation would cause Eben and Stella to think they made a mistake. But, if two people have enough personal problems that they would separate, those problems are still going to be there after the crisis goes away.  Call me a Mr. Half Glass Empty, but I wouldn't see their relationship lasting.  It turns out that it's a moot point, because their relationship ends up exactly the same in the comic as it does in the movie.  I'm just saying, for me, it would have been more effective to show how much they loved each other all along.  Call me Mr. Glass Half Full, but I think a consistently happy relationship is more romantic than an occasionally turbulent one.  Their relationship in the comic is more heartbreaking for me than their relationship in the movie.

A final way to fill time is to explore new themes.  30 Days of Night, the movie, attempts to weave the "importance of family" theme throughout its story.  Not only are the characters of Eben's grandmother, Helen, and younger brother, Jake new to the movie version, but Eben often opines about family.  "Such and such is what family does"… "You don't do such and such to family"…  Like most of the other additions to the movie, these are blatant and distracting.  In its efforts to add depth, it just comes across as artificial.

However, I do like the more subtle implication that the vampires are family, also.  When the aforementioned ultraviolet light burns a lovely young vampire woman, the head vampire (Danny Huston) is obviously distraught and subsequently kills her to put her out of her misery.  That one scene is more touching than any of Eban and Stella's drama or Eban's philosophies about family.

It's odd that the movie jettisoned two entire subplots and one major character from the comic that could have more satisfactorily occupied time in favor of these failed attempts.  In 30 Days of Night, the comic, a group in Louisiana uncovers advance warning of the vampire invasion and races against time to reach Barrow in order to collect evidence.  Also in the comic, the character of a head vampire named Vicente arrives to chastise Marlowe and crew for drawing attention to themselves; he orders everyone killed and the town destroyed.  (In the movie, the town is destroyed simply to make the massacre look like an accident; there is no ulterior motive.)

While the story elements of 30 Days of Night, the movie, are not completely successful in transition from 30 Days of Night, the comic, I'm happy to say that the visual elements fare much better.  In the comic, most pages are gray, the only color being splashes of red (blood) and orange (fire).  Not as literal a visual translation as Sin City, the movie still does a great job of duplicating the look of the comic, although with its snowy landscapes and blizzards, it uses more white than the comic.  That makes an even more stark contrast for all the blood that is spilled.

And the vampires are fantastic.  In this one area, the movie actually improves upon the comic.  In both, the vampires have mouths full of teeth, long fingernails, black eyes and blood all over their faces.  But in the movie, you get movement, and its vampires are fast, brutal killing machines.  They don't so much suck your blood as savagely tear your throat apart.  They also have their own language, a nifty addition that probably could not have been successfully sustained in the comic.

I've tried to objectively demonstrate the issues to consider when translating a comic book into a movie.  Unfortunately, this approach has emphasized the failings of one movie.  If you want to have some fun, compare for yourself one scene from both versions.  In the comic, it begins on page 15 of the graphic novel; in the movie, it starts at just over 18 minutes from the opening frame.  It's the scene where a mysterious stranger in a restaurant simply wants to order some raw meat.  The movie lifts some dialogue word for word from the comic, so it’s the perfect way to examine how two different mediums tell the same story.  This scene may make the process seem easy, but if 30 Days of Night is any indication, it's a lot harder than it looks.

 

 

 

 

If you enjoyed this article, check out my review of the direct-to-DVD sequel, Dark Days over at Downright Creepy...