- The boy movie vs script differences-
I finished reading the script for The boy and I thought it’d be fun to share some of the main differences between the script and the movie, mainly because I find interesting how the differences between the character’s personalities affect the construction of the environment in the story.
The original name was “In a dark place” and not “The boy” I believe making reference to Greta’s (who’s name in the script is Gerti) feelings and mental state when she arrives to the manor, since she’s struggling with deep negative emotions that she’s trying to escape. Then, as the story advances it diverts from her mental state to the manor and the aura that it holds with the creepy doll and narrow halls. This last is addressed several times during the story, and lets on that Brahms world behind the walls is not exactly a cramped one. The actual house is tighter so that he can move freely inside the walls.
Greta is more relatable, human and real in the script than she ever was in the movie. She isn’t super smart or brave, but holds a deep sense of loyalty and family-oriented feelings. Additionally, she has a better developed personality and we get to know how she responds to being frighten in a way that feels a lot creepier and more normal. Despite the above, I still think movie!Greta captured the essentials perfectly fine and that’s pretty great.
One thing that people need to understand is that when you’re adapting cinematographic content from literary script to the screen, the latter serves as a guideline for the actors interpretation, but not so much for the visual storytelling, since for that specific task we have the technical script which holds all the camera movements and (sometimes) photography specifications. For that reason, sometimes things cannot be “adapted to the letter.”
Despite the challenges the above might have represented to the production team I think that William Brent Bell did a decent job with the adaptation processes and general storytelling, however in my opinion there were details that he could have worked to contribute the essence of fear if left in the movie, like the scene where Brahms gifts Greta a diamond necklace.
Let’s see the main differences, shall we? first, Script!Greta is blonde! and described to be super skinny and secondly, she likes spontaneity and adventure, therefore struggles following the daily agenda that Brahms has. She doesn’t like routines, but she does her job anyways. We can see that once she believes that the haunted doll is the little kid she starts to unfold herself and be much more talkative even when the doll never responds.
Another thing that contributes to the story terrifying atmosphere and therefore, that affects Greta’s character directly is the fact that the Heelshire left everything they own to Greta. The money, the house, their proprieties across England, everything. She finds the “Last Will” papers and realizes that they aren’t coming back and accepts it. In her mind, the Heelshire chose her to take care of their sons for a reason: she asked for something like this to happen, for her life to have meaning. The girl gives a damn about how rich she is now, she just cares about the little child she thinks is living in the doll. She’s too selfless for her own good.
She tells him what’s the deal with her ex, how he was charming and loving but when angry he mistreated her. She tells him one time after he beat her up and she ended up at the hospital she found out about her pregnancy and wisely decided not to have the baby. Greta then affirms that ever since that horrible experience she’s been praying for a sigh that life wasn’t so small; and we have this beautiful and disturbing dialogue:
All in all, she was rather disturbed and sad and the seemingly haunted doll helped her to put her life together. This is what gives the plot wist even more emotional weight.
*Deep sigh* Well, he doesn’t really have many changes in his personality or development. Script!Malcom is… more Malcom, if you know what I mean. Lame jokes that make him seem adorable, he is kinder, understanding and loving towards Greta. He and Greta did fuck in the script lol poor Brahms. He threw a tantrum the next morning but I’m sure the little bitch jerked off to watching them making love.
Anyway, one thing that does changes is that script!Malcom puts up with Brahms shit in a more direct way. He had his shirt stolen and half-dead rats put on the glove compartment of his car. Additionally, he had to put up with Greta’s stubbornness and reluctance of leaving the house once things got more and more creepy. In the script is evident that he got stuck in the crossing fire, while in the movie he’s just strictly Greta’s love interest and her assistant in the final battle.
Let’s take a look at the badass entrance he had on the script please:
Brahms. Mother fucking bastard son of a bitch. This little spoiled bastard. Script!Brahms is way more violent, forceful and stinkier than movie!Brahms. He isn’t burn and therefore he’s less aware of the “actions have consequences” phrase. You’ll see, this might be just my personal take but I think that, since in the movie he got trapped in the fire, Brahms has one clear and only example that bad things happen to you when your actions are wicked and that could be a point to use in favor to pursuit future positive character development.
In my opinion movie!Brahms is less scarier because he feels a little bit more human. He’s soft where script!Brahms is rude and violent. Script!Brahms was completely thought to be a nasty, crazy man. Additionally, he is way meaner. I’ll give you a few examples:
In the scene were Greta showers and he takes her dress and clothes, movie!Brahms leaves the towel for Greta to cover, since he took everything else, while script!Brahms took everything, forcing her to walk naked to her room –presumably watching her– and take the bed sheets to cover herself.
In the attic scene, movie!Brahms waits until Greta is up to close the stairs, while script!Brahms doesn’t, he simply yeets her up along with the stairs.
In the scene of the peanut butter jelly sandwich outside her door, movie!Brahms does it as in “Don’t be scared of me, I mean no harm, just follow the rules” it’s played as an attentive gesture reinforced by the quote “it’s your favorite” but script!Brahms just scared the living shit out of her so hard that Greta locked herself in her bedroom for an entire day. Can you imagine being locked in a room for a whole fucking day without eating? And then the sandwich is left there as in “I have to be careful that you don’t die of hunger”. Not a word spoken.
And please don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that movie!Brahms is a sugar cube, he’s not. He is still a twisted and highly dangerous man, I’m just saying he’s not as evil as his script counterpart is. Movie!Brahms somehow makes you feel sympathy, if even a little. Of course there’s also the damn cute head tilt. God, *rises fist* it makes me weak I swear
In the final scene, after Cole breaks the bloody doll movie!Brahms bursts trough the wall and he’s fucking livid. This man has invaded his home, tried to take away the object of is affections and on the top of that destroyed the doll he used to interact with world. Brahms had all the motives to be angry at Cole –that doesn’t justify that he killed him, of course, I’m just saying that his anger was valid– but even in his rage he didn’t purposely inflict harm on Greta.
Brahms grabs her from behind in a dominant way that seems more desperate for taking her out of the living room and / or having her close to him, rather than hurting her. He’s a little rough due to the sudden emotional outburst, but it’s not intended.
Now, script Brahms is a totally different story. He comes out though the secret door in the clock placed on the living room –this is cooler in my opinion, the clock having a secret door to the inside of the walls and everything– and lashes out, fuming, completely lost in rage and straight up objectifies Greta, claiming her as his own.
Then he proceeds to beat up Malcom with the cricket bat knocking him unconscious, afterwards, he violently grabs Greta by her hair and starts pulling her with him inside the wall. This shit is fucking terrifying, yo. she’s crying begging him and screaming and he does nothing but keep pulling. Script!Brahms gives two fucks if he’s hurting her or not.
Right after the above he stabs Cole in the chest with the knife. It’s not long before Malcom hits him in the head and tells Greta to run. They both do so but when Brahms is back to his feet he chases Greta to the kitchen and everything, from the look on his eyes to his body language says: “I’m going to take you. Don’t care if I need to hurt you to do so. I don’t care. I just will do it because I’m angry.”
However, she manages to avoids him and she and Malcom end up inside the walls, discovering his room, like in the movie. Here he has more porn magazines aside form the peaces glued to his bed-wall. He has several. The room aside that is the same. The letter however, says: The girl is your doll now, take care of her and show her your loving side” The Heelshires helping reinforce the idea that she is an object to be own and therefore he can treat her like so and not like a human being.
Now, does script!Brahms really has ‘loving side’? I think he does. No person is pure good or evil, and Brahms isn’t the exception. Before his true identity is reveled he makes Greta a gift; he gives her a necklace and in my opinion it wasn’t a ‘just-one-time’ kinda situation. I think he did things like that for her periodically because as I’ve seen to be addressed before, Brahms idea of conquering a woman’s heart is terribly old-fashioned and he was probably doing that as a way of courting her.
This implies that script!Brahms looses himself in the rage he feels fully and completely to the point he doesn’t even care if he hurts Greta, which makes more accurate that he killed Emily. I think that even when this a shared feature he has with his movie counterpart, in the movie is not shown as raw.
Another thing that I would like to draw your attention to is the fact that movie!Brahms uses his child voice when he first come out of the wall while calling Greta. I think that –aside the it’s a horror movie it was made like that so it would be creepy– he did so because a child’s voice would probably be more familiar to Greta, and therefore, hopefully she wouldn’t be as afraid.
Now, another difference is that Script!Brahms is more manipulative. In the scene where Greta manages to escape the house he reverts to little boy voice and drags Malcolm unconscious body to the doorway as he says “He is hurt, he needs your help. Come back” because he spied Greta’s conversations on the phone with her sister, and knows her. He knows she has a strong sense of family and friendship, he knows she is loyal, he knows she’s good, he knows she will try to help.
But Greta is smart and waits. Then, upon seeing it didn’t work he lashes out again, and he have the dialogue: “if you leave I’ll kill him, I’ll kill him just like the other one” which clarifies that he didn’t meant the others as in ‘the other nannies’ as many people on the fandom believe. He was just talking about Cole but the movie got this wrong, I suppose. Or maybe movie!Brahms felt responsible for his parents suicide? He behaves like a child but he’s an adult capable of thinking and internalizing what he feels so it might be a possibility.
Script!Brahms then pleads in his child-like voice: “Don’t leave me” Nothing. Greta doesn’t come back. “I’ll be good, I will” he reassures but you can’t believe him due to the shit-show he just up Greta through literal minutes a go.
Meanwhile, when movie!Brahms says this is, in a way, less terrifying since he wasn’t violent directly and propitiously towards Greta. It is mentioned in the script that when Brahms calls her he does so like a person calls for their pet, which is awfully descriptive as how he sees her. The calling in the movie seems more desperate to me, more as if he really needs her to stay, and it doesn’t really sound like a man calling for a pet to me, but a child calling his mom. And I sincerely don’t know which is creepier.
Let me know what you think!
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