Watch: Netflix’s ‘The Guernsey Literary & Potato Peel Pie Society’
Movies can never replace or even compete with a great book, but in the case of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, it is possible to love and appreciate both, even though in several ways they are quite different.
Both the film and the book set the stage for the ensuing story when London-ite Juliet Ashton, wartime author of short stories, receives her first letter from Guernsey Islander Dawsey telling her he found her address in the front of a Charles Lamb Book he was reading for his Book Club.. There is an almost immediate shift in Juliet which gives her a “renewed sense of purpose, a specific problem to solve, and a mystery to uncover. It provides a sense of inspiration that she’s been lacking.”
Movies don’t have the time to include every character and every subplot that books can. Several subplots were cut from this film version and some of the characters were eliminated or combined. The book gives as much importance to the Society members’ stories, historical insight, and an in depth study of survival under wartime occupation, as it does to Juliet and Dawsey’s relationship. The movie, while still painting a vivid picture of the Island and its residents under German command during WWII, focuses more on the beautiful love story unfolding. I loved both.
It’s difficult to have formed an opinion in your mind from a favorite book of what the characters might look like, sound like, or act like if you were to meet them, and then have your vision spoiled by a casting director’s choices. I thought the Guernsey Literary Society movie was brilliantly cast and brought the events of the Occupation and the tender love story together beautifully.
If you can read the book first, PLEASE DO! But, if you happen to see the movie first, please do not forego the exquisite pleasure you will find reading this gem of a book.
Although you won’t find the same depth and substance in the movie as the book, I found the movie to be a delightful cozy comfort watch, and one that I highly recommend! It’s a heartbreaking, heartwarming, and beautiful story of a challenging time in history that wasn’t widely known before.
The scenery is stunning, but not shot in Guernsey. A local wrote that it was pretty darn close, but nothing was as beautiful as his Island of Guernsey. SO - that means, we’ll all just have to GO there!
It’s 5 cups of tea for me!
