I have watched “The Devil Wears Prada” more times than I can remember. It is a fun movie with a great cast. One of my favorites. So I finally decided to pick up the book, under the theory that the book is always better than the movie. I wish I hadn’t.
From the beginning it was clear that this was not going to be the same. Miranda is largely the same, maybe a little more psychotic. Emily is much more sniveling. But my biggest problem was with Andie. In the movie she is a sweet young woman who ends up a little misguided but finds her way. In the book she is a self-absorbed young woman who becomes more self-absorbed. In the movie she mildly damages her relationships though neglect. In the book she throws a fire bomb at them.
There is no happy ending like in the movie. Sure, Andie finds herself and goes groveling back. But her friends are less forgiving of the real damage she has caused. She gets what she deserves. I did not have any compassion for her at all, like I did her movie character. In fact, I felt more for Emily than I did Andie.
After it was announced that Hollywood would be making The Devil Wears Prada 2, I came across the 2nd book and decided to read it anyway. A huge mistake. Where the first book at least had some character development, in the 2nd book the characters fell flat. Andie, a successful editor of her own magazine, has become her 1st movie character – a naive and well meaning sweet young woman. Except now she is supposed to have learned from her experiences with Miranda. She sort of has, she is wary, but she is way too trusting in a way that made me just want to scream at her, or sit her down for a girl heart-to-heart.
Miranda appears only a little bit in the book and is the same character, as expected. Emily appears quite a bit and without giving away anything, is not as changed as she lets on. One would think that Andie would have been able to see through this, given her past experiences, but yet she is again blindsided by everything happening to her. I think that is my biggest problem. For a supposedly successful and intelligent woman, life happens to her, at least until the end. This book foreshadows the happy ending we saw in the 1st movie, (but given how the first movie ended it will be hard to see how they incorporate this into the 2nd movie, but I digress).
Ultimately, for me both books were a huge flop. A rare case of the movie is better than the book, at least the first one. When the second movie comes out I will go to see it. I just hope that the great cast deviates enough from the book to make it worthwhile.