"There must be something in books, something we can't imagine, to make a woman stay in a burning house; there must be something there. You don't stay for nothing." Fahrenheit 451, written by Ray Bradbury, is a well-known science fiction novel that successfully influences readers; make us to rethink about the importance of books and how grateful we have the freedom to read nowadays. The book includes lots of details and description about the story; Francois Truffaut's film in 1966 is a more visual way to look at this story. The film expresses the themes well, shows the ideas of negative dystopian society and censorship. However, the film is a quintessence version of the book, therefore there is many differences between them. There are three major differences, the characters, the setting, and the plot.
First of all, the character is the key that expresses the ideas of both the movie and the book. When I was reading the book, the protagonist Montag appears to be a gentle, attractive man and he becomes to doubt himself and his life since he met Clarisse. Apparently, Oskar Werner expresses this character well in the movie and the character does not change a lot when transforming from the book to the movie. Meanwhile, Clarisse's characters changed dramatically. In the book, Clarisse is described as a young girl and basically an "antisocial" person, she thinks about something that Montag never thought about and influences Montag. However, in the movie, Clarisse is transforming to a young lady. She is a teacher and trying to influence her students through unconventional methods. Also, she appears to be fond of Montag. Different from dying in car accident in the book, Clarisse survives in the movie, she escapes from the city and starts a new life with Montag in the end. At this point, the characters Faber and Granger do not exist in the movie. Instead, Clarisse becomes the one who guides Montag outside the city.