When The Guernsey
Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society was released some days ago, I made a point of
watching it because a long time ago, I had felt intrigued by such a long and funny
title when the novel was on display in bookshops shorlty after its release. As
the film hadn´t had so much hype and the time I had chosen for the performance
isn´t usually one of the most popular ones, I was surprised to discover that
the cinema was packed, the answer was
simple: most cinema-goers were readers
of the story who enjoyed the novel and were looking forward to watching it on
the big screen. I enjoyed the film a lot and I have the feeling that it also
lived up to the expectations of most of the people who were there, probably of
most of the readers of the novel. Enjoying a story which is new to you, even if
you are roughly acquainted with the plot, is a a very different experience from
enjoying a story you are already familiar with, especially when you have a very
clear idea of what the characters as well as the setting must look like since
you have a very good grasp of the“literary” lives of the characters and the age
they live in. The cinematic terms into which the book story is translated
usually involve changes that cannot be avoided so to put in a nutshell, you
can´t expect the film to be just the
same as the novel. However, readers of a novel aspire to find the essence of
the story that grabbed their attention for a while, the essence of the
characters that lived with them for some time, the essence of the story that
made a difference in their lives as readers and as human beings. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie
Society tells us the story of a
group of people in 1946 Britain after the war is over, but it tells us about
the harsdships of the characters during the war, about being hungry and lonely
all the time and about the importance of being with other people in order to
cope with those difficult times and above all, it tells about our love of books
and how that love helped the characters to tackle one of the darkest periods of
their lives.
The historical novel on which the film is based.
The official poster for The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie
Society.
Today it is Armistice
Day, a day to celebrate the end of the first world war and today too we mark the
centenary of the armistice. It may be just a coincidence but I think that
watching this film can be a good way of understanding the meaning of such a day. As
historians explain, the end of the first world world was somehow the origin of
the second world war.
