Talk:The Professor and the Madman (film)

mathematics...
The first - un-cited - line of the Production section reads:
 * "Mel Gibson worked on adapting the book The Surgeon of Crowthorne for over 20 years before production began in 2016"

Given the book wasn't actually published until 1998, can the assumption be made (again, there is no citation) that Gibson began attempting to adapt this book at least 3 years before it was even published? If there is no citation in 2 weeks, I'm deleting this line.Robbmonster (talk) 06:26, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

Movie Review?
This Wikipedia page reads like an imdb page might read. The book was a very good read and the movie is quite different in many aspects. The story is a true story with the book and movie with the same name. Either Mel Gibson researched this story far beyond the book and included aspects and "facts" not included in the book or took a dramatic license to film storyline/dialogue not in the actual book or story. If it is the former, the film should have been retitled or should have specified in the film that other research sources were used to justify the change in the storyline. If it is the latter the name of the film should have still been changed with a disclaimer "based on the life..." and listed as a fictional account. The differences are listed nowhere in the Wikipedia article and are as follows:

1) Eliza does not take to prostitution in the book. Nor is she identified as Illiterate in the book.

2) Eliza does not befriend W.C. Minor in the book, nor does she become enamored with him.

3) Eliza's children never visit W.C. Minor in the book.

4) Eliza visits only once/twice in the book to discuss/agree to accept W.C. Minor's pension.

5) The film elaborates on W.C. Minor mental torture in a way the book doesn't. (The book suggests his torturers as male sexual demons attempting to molest/seduce him suggesting Minor possibly being homosexual. Meanwhile, the film suggests a disgruntled soldier who Minor may have branded on the face, as punishment, for deserting his unit during the Civil War).

6) The self mutilation of Minor's genitalia is in the book. However, the book explains Minor does this to quiet and send the demons away. It is not because of some love interest expressed by Eliza in the film.

The above listing is not intended to be exhaustive in the differences between the book and film.

I am well aware of dramatic license when producing a film based on a book. However, when the book was based on real events and film production takes such a dramatic license with the story to adapt to film, the film is no longer based on the true events and it becomes fictional.

Perhaps, the article should be edited in order to disclose the differences between the book and film. After all, other novels (fictional) adapted to film disclose the differences between the two and the story isn't even real.

There was such a time I would have undertaking to editing the article to explain the differences between the film and the book. However, after many edit wars, accusations of vandalism and the back and forth with other editors, I simply do not have the patience to expend on such a project, no matter how small. After all, I am merely an IP address and surely would accused of some nonsense.

Good day and God Bless us all. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:1700:7610:41E0:C:29FA:1CDF:AC1C (talk) 22:56, 9 August 2020 (UTC)


 * (2 years later) Are we going to make this article properly encyclopedic and add at least a few words explaining if this film is more or less faithful to the real-life story it purports to tell, or whether it took multiple liberties with the story? 173.88.246.138 (talk) 03:09, 29 May 2023 (UTC)


 * Near the end of the film's credits, there is this disclaimer: "The characters, entities and incidents portrayed herein and the names used herein are fictitious, and any similarity to the name, character or history of any person or entity is entirely coincidental and unintentional." 173.88.246.138 (talk) 21:20, 29 May 2023 (UTC)


 * The book does state that Minor told Murray that Eliza came to visit Minor "quite frequently" and "at regular intervals" "for some months" in the early 1880s. 173.88.246.138 (talk) 01:14, 12 June 2023 (UTC)