The Worst Movies Based on Young Adult Books
10. Twilight - Teen Bella meets and falls in love with vampire Edward, who must save her from another vampire. I was surprised that so many fans of the book actually liked this movie. The movie progressed too quickly and the characters were drastically underdeveloped.
9. Bridge to Terabithia - Jesse befriends newcomer Leslie and together they create adventures in their pretend world of Terabithia. Imagine the surprise when fans of the book discovered Terabithia is a woodsy Cinderella castle. The overdone special effects killed this movie. Sometimes less is more.
8. The Time Machine - An inventor travels into the future, where he makes a startling discovery about the human race. Did the writer even read the book? Not only is this a horrible adaptation, there are countless plot holes.
7. Eragon - A boy finds a dragon egg that leads him on a quest to protect his home from an evil king. Poor acting and a sketchy plot wins the movie a spot on this list.
6. Around the World in 80 Days - Two men travel around the world using various means of transportation. This movie had one good thing going for it - the martial arts scenes. The rest was a flop.
5. The Scarlet Letter - Hester Prynne must wear a scarlet letter "A" for committing adultery. Had they cast anyone other than Gary Oldman for the role of Arthur Dimmesdale, this film would have been salvageable. But they didn't and it wasn't.
4. The Princess Bride - A man must save a kidnapped woman from marrying an evil prince. This one hasn't been done before - handsome man saving beautiful woman from evil dude. Oh wait, it has, but not this cheesy.
3. I Know What You Did Last Summer - Four teens are stalked by a man they hit with a car and left for dead the previous summer. This is one of the worst horror movies ever and the horrible acting doesn't help either.
2. Beowulf - The mighty warrior Beowulf comes to the aid of a town terrorized by a monster. Between the bad adaptation and disturbing sexual innuendo happening with animated characters, this was a complete disappointment.
1. Journey to the Center of the Earth - A scientist takes his nephew on a trip to the center of the earth in hopes of finding a long lost brother. From Brendan Frasier's acting to the special effects, this movie was just bad.
Published by ED Watts
ED Watts has been writing since 2000. She currently works as a freelance writer and editor. View profile
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5 Comments
Post a CommentI agree with most, but Beowulf actually is thousands of years old and was not written for teens
Nicely Written :)
I almost always enjoy a book over a movie! Good selections :)
Rarely is a movie better than the book...good list
I knew this would probably be the most controversial pick when I started writing. The Twilight movie needed more character development specifically for Edward and Bella. I'm a big fan of the books and didn't feel like the movie did a good enough job of showing why there was such a huge attraction between those two. It was very drawn out in the book (part of why I liked the book as much as I did), not so much in the movie, which made it a huge letdown. For what I was expecting and what I got, it was probably the most disappointing movie I've watched in a while, though I suspect it was largely due to budget, which shouldn't be an issue for the next movies. If it worked for you, great, but it didn't for me.