Lord of the Flies Movie and Book

The movie The Lord of the Flies, directed by Harry Hook wasn't as appealing as the book by William Golding because the symbolism is lost or not noticed, the captains presence changed the dynamics of the kids and how the comparison of Jack being like the Borgia Pope (in the dark stages of the Catholic church) was shown in the book but not the movie.

In the book, one of the symbols that wasn't shown at all was the forest scar. The forest scar demonstrates how before the plane had crash-landed, the island was a paradise, but now that the plane had crashed it left a permanent scar showing how when humans had first arrived to Earth there was destruction and how we had abolished everything that was paradise. Without this symbol, part of the allegory is not present.

In the movie, the director decided to add an extra character, the captain. In the book there is no captain or any adult that was ever alive during the time that the kids were on the island. The captains presence changes many thing from the book. One of the important things that it changes are the dynamics of the kids. The kids were supposed to take care of the captain and because the captain was still alive, the kids hadn't come up with the "beastie", which was one of the most important things in the book.

The book is an allegory, and one of the things the book shows is the comparison of Jack being like the Pope in the dark stages of the Catholic church. You can notice that from the beginning of the novel from the time that Jack shows up to be the leader of the choir. He was physically shown as the leader of the Catholic religion in the island, but he didn't show any characteristic that the Catholic religion should have; peace, love and empathy. In the movie, you couldn't see that because Jack isn't the leader of the choir, and also there isn't any choir.

Really, many things of the book were taken away from the movie. This makes me think that the director, Harry Hook, of the 1990 Lord of the Flies didn't spend enough time noticing the true meaning of the book. These important parts of the book were taken away from the movie causing the disappointment to the people who read the book and saw the movie as well.