Was thinking about movies made from books that manage to be just as good or even better than the books. Sacrilege? Maybe.

The topic came up at home when my husband couldn’t find the Blu-ray he was looking for in our movie cabinet, and had to dig out stacks and stacks of things in the process. I heard him cataloging what he found. “Cold Comfort Farm.”

I LOVE Cold Comfort Farm, the movie. I saw it years and years ago, before I knew there was a book. Rufus Sewell being all steamy. Stephen Fry playing it straight and randy. Joanna Lumley before she was Absolutely Fabulous. Kate Beckinsale before she had her teeth fixed. I LOVE it.

And then I read the book last year, and it shot to my all-time-favorites list. If I’d read it before I saw the movie, I might not have liked the film.

Other movies that do the book justice: To Kill a Mockingbird, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, something else without a bird in the title. Jurassic Park. Shawshank Redemption (it was only a novella in book form, for one thing).

One movie that it’s cool to hate, but that made the story actually operational: Forrest Gump. Have you read that book? It’s terrible. Although I did enjoy when Forrest became a professional wrestler in Muncie, Indiana. Other than that, though, give me the Tom Hanks version.

I’m about to read a book by Shannon Hale called Austenland, as the movie version enjoys its opening weekend. Will I see the movie? Maybe. Depends on whether the book is any good, amIright?

What movies from books do you recommend?