The Color Purple

I was skeptical about how the new rendition of The Color Purple would turn out. After watching it, I like it better than Spielberg's rendition. First off it's shorter, or at least feels shorter (haven't checked the runtimes). A lot of scenes in the Spielberg version run too long (the Christmas eve scene with Sofia in particular). Most of these differences chalk up to this film version to be an adaptation of the Broadway revival, rather than the Spielberg version which was directly sourced from the book (I've never read the book ). I liked all the casting choices. Celie's actress is actually the Broadway lead. Speaking of, there are musical numbers which are all carbon copied from the play with well-planned choreographs.

Some changes I thought made sense was Celie's childhood home being on top of a general store owned by the stepdad, rather than a separate piece of land. This flows well into when Celie inherits the property later and opens her shop, rather than somehow getting the funds to open up a separate shop in the Spielberg version (it's never explained). The intimate relationship between Celie and Shug is better expressed , although still way toned down from the source material. The dinner table scene is shorter yet just as powerful, and it's made crystal clear that Mister gets cursed. This was left vague in the Spielberg version. Speaking of, his character is still a sufficient butthole although I wish the scenes with his father were more fleshed out.

I still like the Spielberg version because it has its own quirks. It is just a much more tragic rendition than the Broadway revival adaptation, at the expense of character development in Celie not present in his version.