'Adaptation' and adaptation : the implications of the very title of the film

Abstract

This dissertation focuses mainly on a close analysis of the film Adaptation by director Spike Jonze and screenwriter Charlie Kaufman. The film is adapted from the bestselling novel The Orchid Thief by Susan Orlean, and it borrows and refers to directly from concepts from Robert McKee's book Story: Substance, Structure, Style, and The principles of Screenwriting. These two works especially Orlean's has been scrutinized in reflection of the film. During my comparison of both the film and the book and how one was adapted from the other I have brought in concepts from McKee's principles, from literary metafiction and from Classical film Theory.