Jessica Turni's review

The Outsiders

The novel “The Outsiders” written by S. E Hinton in the year 1964 is a story based on two different social groups, the Greasers and the Socs who fight out their differences. The story is told from the perspective of PonyBoy Curtis, who is one of the main characters in “The Outsiders”. The novel goes into more detail of the themes of preserving childhood innocence, individual identities and different social groups. In 1983 a film was made of the novel, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, the film focuses more on the conflict between the social groups. There are some major differences between the novel and the film making the novel in my opinion more compelling and effective.

The film differs from the novel focusing more on the conflict between the Greasers and the Socs, leaving out some of the story line told in the novel. A point from the novel that was excluded was the court case, it explored the brother hood of the gang members, as Johnny tried to rescue Ponyboy and in return for taking the blame of the killing of Bob on himself. Another scene that was excluded was when Ponyboy smashes the glass bottle and threatens the Socs with it, this shows his childhood innocence fading away. Instead the film focuses on the events of Ponyboy and Johnny passing time at the church and the over dramatised shooting of Dallas. The detachment from the characters is compensated by the film with over dramatising of events.

The exploration of the characters and their relationships is a vital part of the novel but is only slightly touched upon in the film. In the novel Sodapop’s sensitivity was revealed in the description of the relationship with his horse, Mickey Mouse. In the film however, the sensitive side wasn’t portrayed to this extreme and the entire story of his horse was excluded. Although the story of Mickey Mouse was excluded the novel and the film described the relationship between the Greasers to the same extent. In the novel it was stated that Dally had an “unfortunate and mean face” whereas in the film his physical appearance was not what it explained to be in the novel, in fact he had a rather innocent face.

Stylistic features were used differently in regards to the perspective of the novel and film, while the sunsets/sunrises were used both in the novel and film. In the novel the story is described out of the perspective of Ponyboy, it gives you an insight on his feelings and thoughts, this is an effective technique as it makes one sympathise with Ponyboy. The reader is lead to understand Ponyboy’s point of view. This makes it a very emotional journey for the reader. On the contrary, the film tells this story from a third person’s perspective, making the viewer automatically more distant from the story. By leaving out parts of the journey and mainly focussing on the conflict between the Greasers and Socs, the viewer misses out on the emotional attachment. Both novel and film use the sunsets/sunrises to portray a time were characters reflect on the day before, when they show emotion and sensitivity, it especially shows the childhood innocence of Ponyboy fade away as he witnesses gang violence. The sunsets/sunrises in the novel and film don’t only represent emotion and sensitivity but also tranquillity and calmness, for example when Ponyboy and Johnny were at the waste ground looking up into the night sky.

In conclusion, the novel engaged readers significantly more, as it allowed readers to let their imagination play the story in their head. The novel builds an attachment to the characters and makes us more sympathetic towards them. Whereas the film excludes this emotional attachment as it omits the sensitivity of the characters, it tries to evoke these feelings by over dramatising the events.