Going to see the Studio Ghibli Tales from Earthsea movie tonight, with some trepidation… will it piss all over my memory of those beautiful books, as the SciFi Channel’s abomination did? Le Guin’s own opinion seems to be that it’s better than that, but still not right.
UPDATE: Well, that was odd. Lovely looking film, but it wasn’t Earthsea – it was a film with some characters in it with the same names as those in the books. I’ve yet to see an adaptation where the film’s plot bears less resemblance to the original story. Oh well. The dragons were good.
Unfortunately someone decided to get Hayao Miyazaki’s son to write and direct it, rather than the master himself.
I understand Miyazaki was stepping down, and the son took over to do his first film. At least, that was Le Guin’s impression at the time. Later she found he’d come out of retirement again, and was a little teed off. Blimey, she’s had some bad luck with adaptations.