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Idiots! Either Joffe and/or Stewart we're idiots, or they thought their audience idiots who would neither appreciate nor understand the gloomy, pessimistic and disheartening hard classic of Hawthorne. Joffe and Stewart insist on lightening up a book defined by its doleful darkness, and the resulting film carries incongruously cheery messages: "Be true to your own heart, speak your mind, don't bother about what other folks say and everything will work out for the best. The filmmakers are determined to make THE SCARLET LETTER the story of a great love that overcomes all obstacles." (McDonagh) Living up to their declaration of "freely adapted from the novel by Nathaniel Hawthorne," they change both characters and theme as proponent to please the audience and make money. The need to overtly adapt the novel lies in the idea that average person paying to see the movie hasn't read the book.
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