Jenkins, Greg

(1952– )

   Greg Jenkins is the author of Stanley Kubrick and the Art of Adaptation: Three Novels,Three Films, published by McFarland & Company in 1997. Jenkins restricts his study to three films, LOLITA, THE SHINING, and FULL METAL JACKET, following an introductory chapter titled “The Problem of Adaptation” as it relates to STANLEY KUBRICK. He concludes, not surprisingly, that “As Kubrick remakes the original narrative, he tends, with some exceptions, to simplify it,” subtracting “more material than he adds. ” The director “makes his heroes more virtuous than the novels’ and his villains more wicked. ”At times, Kubrick “invents his own material outright, and imposes it on the new narrative. ” Kubrick also “lowers the amount and intensity of violence found in the original,” true not only of Full Metal Jacket, which Jenkins examines but also of A CLOCKWORK ORANGE. The book might have gone on to consider other adaptations such as PATHS OF GLORY, A Clockwork Orange, and BARRY LYNDON, since most of the director’s films were adapted from literary sources, but it is a sincere attempt to analyze the films treated.

   J. M. W.