Mcteague Movie Versus Text

Watching the movie changes the emphasis that I see. The movie depends more on the characters interpretation and ability to get emotions across without words. It is very interesting how Trina looks from the wedding scene to the scene in her bedroom. The wedding shows her in a prettier more innocent perspective. When we see her greedily hoarding the gold she is much uglier. Her hair is raggedy falling all around her face. She is less innocent with her facial expressions and her pale makeup turns her into a ghoulish greedy creature, lifeless like a corpse walking around. A student mentioned in class feeling sorry for her and looking at the dialogue that could make sense but she is so terrifying looking that I cannot feel sorry for her. In the book I don’t have to deal with the expressions and look of Trina so I can feel sorry for her and her interaction with McTeague, though Norris does give a voice that seems to say that Trina had it coming. Another contrast that we talked about during class was the difference in the two fighting scenes. It is interesting how noticeable the difference is between the acting during the Death Valley scenes and the Mac killing Trina scene. The passion in Marcus is very apparent when he is beating his chest telling the rest of the party that he will pursue Mac by himself. This chest beating is something that Norris would have like I believe as a reoccurring theme in the book is the animal side of men. Marcus is very much like an ape fighting for dominance when we look at this scene. The fight between Marcus and Mac is very much how Norris would have portrayed it as well. I think he would be very happy with the way that scene turned out. Overall I think Norris would have enjoyed the parts of the movie that we saw, but voices would have been an interesting element that would have been necessary for Norris.