The Shipping News: A Screenplay by Robert Nelson Jacobs

Rating:
Summary: INJUSTICE
Review: DO NOT SEE THIS MOVIE until you have read the book. While "The Shipping News" film is enjoyable it does not accurately portray the characters of Annie Proulx. In the book, the characters are not simply meshed into your memory as they are in the film. For example, the relationship Quoyle develops with Wavey happens over the course of many trials that both must endure before gaining the other's trust. However, the film version portrays their relationship as nearly instantaneous in that they see one another, have a couple conversations, and have one fight towards the end. Is that a fair representation of the careful and elequent caracterizations Proulx enmeshes our psyches in? No. In other ways, too, the film does a great injustice; but it would be a great disservice to whomever reads this to divulge too much and ruin the plot.
My point is very simple. The film version of "The Shipping News" takes out so much of the original substance by deleting the life stories of some very important characters (and some characters themselves) as well as moving the plot around at an inconsistent level that the viewer is left with more of a blueprint of Annie Proulx's aesthetic and charming brilliance than a final draft.
If you are one of those people who hopes to get by with a minimum knowledge of the characters in books, then this film is just for you. On the other hand, if you are a person who craves to understand what is important about the story and all the elements within it, I implore you to read the book before seeing the movie. You will be able to see the pitfalls of the movie that the book explains in a very well-defined manner.
Take your pick:
:0) Book first: Strong comprehension of the material
:0( Movie first: Poor comprehension of what is taking place before your eyes

Rating:
Summary: The Feel-Good Film of the Year
Review: Hollywood took a realistic book filled with tough hard characters and an even tougher and more unforgiving place and turned it into the feel good film of the year. (At least it wasn't as bad as the Disney-fication of the black academic comic novel, Krippendorf's Tribe.)

Rating:
Summary: Will Tide You Over Til the Next Big Thing
Review: The Shipping News is an enjoyable fictional novel written by Anne Proulx, which follows the life of Quoyle, a man whose entire life has been littered with misadventures. It is a story that tracks Quoyle's barely tolerable life as he travels from one dead-end job to the next. Eventually Quoyle finds a job as a reporter for a small newspaper. He had originally applied to be an ink setter. However, the Editor of the paper told Quoyle that he needed reporters, not ink setters.
After losing his parents to suicide, an utterly destroyed Quoyle looks to his dead-beat wife for guidance. Her response: Taking their two daughters and leaving with one of her many "friends", as Quoyle calls them.
Shortly after a crucial area of the novel, Quoyle is reunited with his daughters, as well as a long lost Aunt. The small group decides to move back to Quoyle's ancestral land in an attempt to repair their lives.
As the novel progresses we see Quoyle grow from a timid, depressed man, who migrates from job to job, into a man full of love for both his family and his work.
Overall I believe the story is well written. Both the vocabulary and the sentence structure are easy to understand, and the readability helps the story to fluidly flow from beginning to end. Make no mistake, there are some graphic scenes depicted in the book, which aren't suitable for the younger audience.
Proulx writes in a manner that makes the plot quite believable. Proulx' writing also helps to create a realistic reality, one where the characters to interact amongst themselves and one another in. The characters themselves are quite remarkable as well, and we can see them mature as their lives unfold before our eyes. All in all, The Shipping News is a thoroughly enjoyable, though sometimes shocking read from beginning to end.
Coming from a fairly knowledgeable reader, this book is a decent read if you have some free time. But this isn't one of those novels that shouts exceptional quality or style. It will tide you over until one of those groundbreaking novels does come out.