A great deal of blockbuster movies has been based on books. Here is a list of some of them: BEN-HUR Wallace, Lew BRIDGES OF MADISON COUNTY Waller, Robert James DRACULA Stoker, Bram THE EXORCIST Blatty, William FAHRENHEIT 451 Bradbury, Ray FORREST GUMP Groom, Winston FRANKENSTEIN Shelley, Mary THE GODFATHER Puzo, Mario GONE WITH THE WIND Mitchell, Margaret I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER Duncan, Lois JAWS Benchley, Peter LES MISERABLES Hugo, Victor THE MAN IN THE IRON MASK Dumas, Alexandre MESSAGE IN A BOTTLE Sparks, Nicholas PLANET OF THE APES Boulle, Pierre PRIDE AND PREJUDICE Austen, Jane ROSEMARY'S BABY Levin, Ira SILENCE OF THE LAMBS Harris, Thomas THE THREE MUSKETEERS Dumas, Alexandre A WALK TO REMEMBER Nicholas Sparks THE WAR OF THE WORLDS Wells, H. G. And of course my all time favorites: Harry Potter by J.K. Rowlings and The Lord of the Rings, by J. R. R. Tolkien; among many, many others. So here is the question: Is it worth spending hours, maybe days or even weeks of our precious time reading books when we can actually get the same content in a 90 minutes excellent produced movie? I say ABSOLUTELY YES! Books are by far the most reliable source of any kind of information. There is no way we can compare the long amusement we get by reading a book with the thrill and short excitement we get when watching a movie. When reading a book, a novel, a fairytale, any kind of story, the author gets us inside the protagonists heads, we become aware of their past, their instincts, their movements, we become part of their thoughts, their ideas, we become accomplice of their actions and we secretly feel doers, not only spectators. I don't think there ever be a director good enough to fully get us inside a great book, let's say Harry Potter for example, don't get me wrong, I think the movies are really good, but why denied ourselves the chance of creating our own magic world? Get it our way, unique, special, private, only in our heads. Another person's perception is not enough. It shouldn't be. In the seven book saga, J.K. Rowling gets us inside Harry's mind; it's a hilarious place to be. Especially with friends like Ron, Fred and George. The actors playing these roles are very good, but how can they show us what was going through Rowling's mind when she wrote the dialogues? They can't; that, we get from the books only. Same thing with the romance going on within Ron and Hermione. No way will you get that from a movie. A glimpse, maybe; but you'll be missing a great deal. In the other hand though, I've heard, can't confirm, but I heard the movie BEN HUR is way better than the book. Now, I know the movie is great, but said I can't confirm because sadly, I didn't read the book. In that case, I must say it's possible that a movie could be just as good as or even better than a book. I would say this can happen because the book was poorly written, or maybe the movie had great special effects, the actors were especially charming or they added things to the original text. But for this to happen, especially in our days, I say we must not hold our breath. We have excellent writes nowadays, awesome writers. So I say: Read! Not only because we have to, but because we want to. There is an art in reading, as Isaac D'Israeli said, as well as an art of thinking, and an art of writing. "No matter how busy you may think you are, you must find time for reading, or surrender yourself to self-chosen ignorance." - Confucius Zelene Cruz writes about books, movies, music, artists, entertainment. Find more about her in her blog: http://blogger.com/profile/13698904653727416399