Catch-22
Would I have liked this as much if I hadn't read the book? That's hard to say.
In some situations where you've read the book before you see the movies, you sense that you would have liked the movie more if you hadn't. Sometimes you get the sense that you would have liked the movie less. And it doesn't seem to have anything to do with how much you actually liked the book. Oh well it's an old argument.
In this situation I LOVED the book. It's one of the best books I've read in a while. You know I'm maybe even thinking it's the best book I've ever read. It blends absurd humor and gritty realism in the most affecting way. I feel like I'm tapping into the core of humanity when reading it. It takes repetitive events and pushes the repetitiveness so often that it goes from amusing and silly, to unbelievable and annoying, back to something endearing and brilliant. I've never felt such strong duel emotions as the horror and joy of the absurd humor I felt as when reading the chapter where it is finally revealed what fully happens with Yossarian when he is with Snowden in his final moments.
I'm not sure that a movie could ever capture the same feeling. And much of it is because of the same reason most movies based on books can't. The amount of events in the book is just too long to show on screen. But I was amazed at both the quality of the acting, and especially at the amount of money that was put into the money to film some of the most elaborate sequences. And many of them are done all in one long take! I was just commenting on how well this was done in Children of Men recently, but that wasn't even a comedy!
Quite an unusual movie for Mike Nichols as he comments on in the DVD commentary. The stuff about the front screen projection is pretty interesting as well if you are curious about technical stuff like that. The scenes in the aircraft really are gorgeous.
I think the casting of the movie is near perfect too. And John Voight would have been dead on perfect as Milo except that I was missing the so often mentioned big red moustache from the novel.
Rating: 9/10