Page to Screen: Safe Haven

In the segment “Page to Screen” I thought we could look at books that have been adapted for the screen.

I read Safe Haven a few months ago after seeing a trailer for the new movie.  I’m a pretty voracious reader, so it frosts my cookies (thanks for the phrase, mom) to admit that I only read this book because of a movie…If that isn’t proof that film advertising does its job, I don’t know what is.

Safe Haven was a simple read, but that’s not the reason I finished it in only one day.  This book is one of Nicholas Sparks’ more suspenseful and interesting stories.  Don’t get me wrong, I love The Notebook and The Last Song but there’s an element of danger in Safe Haven that’s missing from the others.  The movie translates the thrills from the text perfectly, even if a few details were changed.

When Katie meets Alex, her new love-interest, she also meets his two young kids.  Book Kristen and Josh are adorable and sweet, but apparently two well-behaved kids is boring.  Josh is much more of a nuisance on-screen than he is in writing.  All of the pouting and anti-Katie sentiment (typical “you’re not my mom” stuff) was put in the movie for added drama.

Hush, film-Josh, can’t you see the grown-ups are busy?

Both the book and movie switch view points from Katie to her crazy police-officer husband, Kevin.  After she escapes from their abusive relationship, we watch as she becomes comfortable in her new surroundings and cringe as he feverishly searches for her.  In-text and on-screen, the POV shifting builds suspense right up to the end when he finally finds her.

Some parts of the movie might look a little familiar…

“Safe Haven” and “The Notebook” -both by Nicholas Sparks

But Safe Haven is a unique story despite…similarities…with other films.

Hey, Nicholas Sparks can do whatever he wants with his 17 best-selling novels and their multi-million dollar movie adaptions.