On April 18, my friend Karena from Discovery Writer wanted to watch Flipped and I hadn’t read the book yet. I had it sitting on my kindle waiting to be read – I just hadn’t gotten around to it. So I was faced with the dilemma that all book lovers have – book or movie first?? I still had about 4 hours before we would get together…and the book was only 200 pages long…so I told Karena that I would read it before coming to her house that night. She didn’t quite believe that I could start and finish a book in that time (and make dinner for my kids, too). And I was all: Is that a challenge?
I finished Flipped right before going to her house. You can read my book review of Flipped here. I really liked the themes in the book of valuing what’s on the inside instead of on the outside. We had a lot of fun chatting about the movie while we watched it and here’s what we thought.
Flipped was such a cute movie. Like most adorable romantic comedies, I thought the music in the movie was very cheesy. Karena didn’t notice the music much, but it bugged me. Melodramatic is a good word for the score. The setting, characters, and dialogue were very similar to the book. There were small inconsistencies in the plot but overall it was extremely close to the book. It was so close to the book and had so much voiceover that Karena said, “That’s the greatest movie I’ve ever seen on audiobook.” Haha that totally made me laugh. It really was like watching an audiobook version of the book since they were almost exactly the same. I noticed the very small differences only because I literally had just barely read the book. If I had read the book even a week earlier I don’t think I would have noticed hardly any differences.
That being said there is one major difference between the book and the movie. The book has a contemporary, early 2000s setting while the movie has a 1950s setting. The movie also highlighted some things that I didn’t get from the book. It wasn’t so gross just reading about snakes eating eggs, but watching it? Definitely gross. I also got the feeling from the movie that when Bryce’s dad accuses Juli’s brothers of doing drugs that it was because he had done drugs as a teen. It’s just a theory, but the way he looked ashamed in the movie and then how in the book it talked about him getting very quiet after that made me think that he probably did.
The ending was much better in the book. View Spoiler »
Overall, despite the fact that the plot of the movie and book are virtually the same (as well as a lot of the dialogue and characters even), I would still pick the book over the movie because the book just went into more detail and made me more emotionally invested in the characters than the movie was able to.
Movie Trailer
Reading this book contributed to these challenges:
My name is Jessica. I love to read Young Adult and classic literature. I’ve been a book blogger for six years and I haven’t gotten tired of it yet. I’m a very curious reader. Writing about all the questions and thoughts I had while reading a book is the best hobby ever.
I have never heard of this movie or book before, but I am so intrigued!
Missie @ A Flurry of Ponderings
I read the book for school and I loved it. Once my teacher told me there was a movie, I had to watch it. I loved it.
Is the movie the same thing as the book?
I watched the movie and saw the book in school and i thought it was AWESOME!!!!!!!!
Same here!!😆😆
I watched the movie with my siblings and it was very nice. My favorite part was when Bryces grandfather helps with Juli’s front yard. Now I’m reading the book for a book report and so far it is technically the same as the movie.
I honestly loved the book and movie. There was so much intense scenes in the movie that I just wanted to re-wind and jump in the movie to say things that I think were right. And in the book I was so interested in how much action took place. My teacher would always stop the class when the book had made me think. My class and I had not finished the full movie but, there was only about twenty-three minutes left. Later on, I had wished to finished the movie so I did. My friend and I had met each other and finished the movie together. I as a child which I still am, I do not really enjoy reading that much, but this is one of the few books I have enjoyed. I recommend this book to children from the ages 10-14.