The Giver's First Trailer Shows Off All-Star Cast

[roseofbattle]

The Giver's First Trailer Shows Off All-Star Cast

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Many familiar faces will appear in the film adaptation of Lois Lowry's The Giver.

The film adaptation of Lois Lowry's 1993 book The Giver opens in theaters on Aug. 15. Today the first trailer for the movie premiered on today's Today Show and released online today and will begin appearing in theaters tomorrow.

The Giver takes place in a "perfect world" with no conflict where every person has their own role to fulfill. Jonas, a 16-year-old boy (12 in the book), is selected to be the Receiver of Memories. His role allows him to meet The Giver as he learns more about the history of the world and why it is the way it is today. In this world, "The way things look and the way things are are very different," as The Giver tells Jonas.

Playing The Giver is Jeff Bridges. Brenton Thwaites plays the protagonist Jonas, Meryl Streep as the community's Chief Elder, Odeya Rush as Fiona, Katie Holmes and Alexander Skarsgård as Jonas's parents, Taylor Swift as Rosemary, Cameron Monaghan as Asher, and Emma Tremblay as Jonas's sister, Lily.

In a time when young adult dystopias are all the rage now, The Giver is one of the earlier modern examples of the subgenre, and a book many students read in school. The characters for the movie appear to be aged up a few years, so the intended audience may be a little older than that of the book.

Source: YouTube [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYZxZups06w]


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[(whitty name here)]

The fact that this trailer has color makes me feel like this isn't going to be very faithful to the source material.

The fact that the government controls literally everything about your life, from your haircut to who you marry, to WHAT COLORS YOU CAN SEE, is kind of an important part of this book.

Or maybe it's in color to not spoil that to people who haven't read it and the actual movie will be black and white until color is introduced.

 

[Casual Shinji]

Another bland movie about a bland dystopian future with an appropriately bland title.

"When people have the freedom to choose, they choose wrong." Seriously?! They haven't sucked all the marrow out of this concept yet?

 

[Quazimofo]

The fact that this trailer has color makes me feel like this isn't going to be very faithful to the source material.

The fact that the government controls literally everything about your life, from your haircut to who you marry, to WHAT COLORS YOU CAN SEE, is kind of an important part of this book.

Or maybe it's in color to not spoil that to people who haven't read it and the actual movie will be black and white until color is introduced.

Of course it's nearly impossible to preserve that twist in a visual medium because up until the point it's revealed there was no way to know that they literally saw in black/white/shades of grey. Even if they try to, the trailer covered a bit after that reveal, so people will see it coming.

Still, looks like a very unfaithful "modernization" of a classic. I wasn't a particularly big fan of The Giver (or the genre in general), but I wish they'd at least try to be more faithful. The whole dystopian future thing really could be interesting, but not if every friggin' movie plays it so similarly.

 

[Tanis]

I have a feeling this will end up like 'The Road'.

A mediocre film that's barely anything to do with the actual source material.

 

[LysanderNemoinis]

Another bland movie about a bland dystopian future with an appropriately bland title.

"When people have the freedom to choose, they choose wrong." Seriously?! They haven't sucked all the marrow out of this concept yet?

Well, when it stops being an issue, it may finally lose steam. After all, we're seeing that mindset all over the world, especially with Russia having their fun (unopposed) in Crimea, and our government too busy implementing laws with the same "We're smarter than you" mentality to do anything about it...that is, if you believe they actually want to stop it.

 

[sXeth]

The fact that this trailer has color makes me feel like this isn't going to be very faithful to the source material.

The fact that the government controls literally everything about your life, from your haircut to who you marry, to WHAT COLORS YOU CAN SEE, is kind of an important part of this book.

Or maybe it's in color to not spoil that to people who haven't read it and the actual movie will be black and white until color is introduced.

Of course it's nearly impossible to preserve that twist in a visual medium because up until the point it's revealed there was no way to know that they literally saw in black/white/shades of grey. Even if they try to, the trailer covered a bit after that reveal, so people will see it coming.
.

I would just run it in color, up until the twist, then use some POV shots from Jonas persepctive to illustrate whats going on. Then you could do the black and white thing as applicable.

 

[soren7550]

I remember really not liking the book (along with its... sister book I guess you could call it, Gathering Blue), and from what I can remember of it, based on what the trailer shows, this probably is going to be a loose, crappy adaptation of the novel.

 

[(whitty name here)]

The fact that this trailer has color makes me feel like this isn't going to be very faithful to the source material.

The fact that the government controls literally everything about your life, from your haircut to who you marry, to WHAT COLORS YOU CAN SEE, is kind of an important part of this book.

Or maybe it's in color to not spoil that to people who haven't read it and the actual movie will be black and white until color is introduced.

Of course it's nearly impossible to preserve that twist in a visual medium because up until the point it's revealed there was no way to know that they literally saw in black/white/shades of grey. Even if they try to, the trailer covered a bit after that reveal, so people will see it coming.

Still, looks like a very unfaithful "modernization" of a classic. I wasn't a particularly big fan of The Giver (or the genre in general), but I wish they'd at least try to be more faithful. The whole dystopian future thing really could be interesting, but not if every friggin' movie plays it so similarly.

Well, even by making everyone older, it completely eliminates the puberty subplot. They don't need to show supressing hormones and making everyone go permanently on birth control if everyone has already been doing that cause they're fucking 16.

I don't know. There are so many red flags in this trailer for me. Maybe I'm just overreacting.

 

[mattttherman3]

I remember reading this book in high school, I hated it. I thought it was a boring, depressing pile of Hogwash. Give me Flowers for Algernon any day.