John Green’s extremely successful YA book has translated to a compelling and heartbreaking romance film. It’s quite close to the book and uses some narration from it. If the book didn’t leave you in tears, the film is certain to.
The story follows Hazel Grace Lancaster, a teen with terminal cancer who meets the charming Augustus Waters at a support group. Her depression lifts as they fall in love. Together they’re on a mission to find some answers to a book written by the elusive author Peter Van Houten. The actors Shailene Woodley and Ansel Elgort are brilliant and credible as Hazel and Augustus. This being the kind of film where the story rests on the characterisation, in this respect it’s very successful. Laura Dern and Sam Trammell as Hazel’s parents are wonderful too, as is Nat Wolff, who plays Isaac (Augustus’ best friend).
I think the film is very well-crafted and can’t think of anything to criticise. Anything to dislike about it would be down to flaws in the original book. While the film would be categorised as an American teen romance, it’s down to earth and bittersweet. Not as many gritty details as the book but I would say it’s a near perfect adaptation.
Low-resolution poster sourced from Wikipedia.
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