I'll be honest: I watched the movie before I read the book. I'll be really honest: I watched the movie three times before I read the book. Now, usually, I believe that if you watch the movie first, then you might as well not read the book at all (and you don't deserve to be literate). Half the fun of watching a book-to-movie adaptation is bitching about how they cut scenes or changed characters that feel integral to the story.
With Perks, though, I'm kind of glad I watched the movie first. It has been billed as "the Breakfast Club of the new millenium," and although this is a high standard to measure up to, I think that Perks pulled it off. The movie was written and directed by Stephen Chbosky, author of the book, which ensured that the movie was as close to the book as possible. There's also amazing acting by the three stars. Logan Lerman, at over 20 years old, realistically portrays a troubled fourteen year old. This was the first movie I had seen with Ezra Miller but it made me love him - his portrayal of Patrick was immediately likeable and surprisingly un-cliched.The film also shows Emma Watson is capable of expanding her acting abilities and can play more than the Hermione Granger character. And Mae Whitman, who voiced Katara in Avatar: The Last Airbender (the TV show, not the movie), was fabulous as Mary Elizabeth, one of Charlie's new friends.
Basically, Perks is the story of Charlie's freshman year of high school. At first, I was kind of afraid it was going to have that after-school-special feel ("and then the ugly nerd girl turned into a cheerleader and all the football players accepted the gay guy and they lived happily ever after"), but soon it became clear that that wasn't even close to the real story. Then I was sure it was going to be a Go Ask Alice/Jay's Journal situation ("and everything was terrible and nothing would ever get better and so she killed herself and he died of an overdose and that's what being a teenager is all about"), and actually that was a lot closer to the mark.
Charlie (played by Logan Lerman in the movie) is an introverted freshman who clearly has some issues, but finally feels accepted when confident, beautiful senior Sam (Emma Watson) and her similarly confident and outgoing stepbrother Patrick (Ezra Miller) take him under their wing.
The book is written as a series of letters to an unknown recipient, addressed simply as "dear friend." They chronicle Charlie's journey through his first year of high school, from his predictably unrequited crush on Sam to his first forays into drug use (he accidentally takes pot, then later purposefully drops acid), to his painful descent into a confused haze.
Even when everything seems to be going fine, there's a nagging feeling that something's off - Charlie keeps dropping hints about having "the memories" again, although the reader doesn't know what this means. At first it seems likely that they could be related to the suicide of his best friend, which occurred just the year before, but it soon becomes clear that there's something more.
As in Catcher in the Rye, it's clear that the protagonist might not be unbiasedly telling the whole story - while Holden is just a narrator whose perspective can sometimes be untrustworthy, Charlie's naivete and repressed memories conspire to make his version of reality less than reliable.
Perks is also similar to Catcher in that both main characters are lonely and struggling to be heard, and both of them end up in a psychiatric hospital, but that's where the resemblance ends. Holden is cynical and aloof, while Charlie is naive and desperately wants friends - he trusts everyone.
Although Perks was published over ten years ago, it's still popular, and is still quoted often on tumblr (next to John Green quotes and artsy pictures of coffee). One of the reasons I think both the book and the movie have been so successful is their realistic look at high school. Although admittedly I don't have much experience in a "real" high school environment, this John Hughes-esque take on the teenage experience seems much more probable than the High School Musical version. It doesn't show the world through rose-tinted glasses but offers up glimmers of hope in what would otherwise be an incredibly depressing situation.
Perks is never nostalgic, and openly mocks people who yearn to return to their high school "glory days" - but it also acknowledges the feeling that future is coming too fast, and the fear that "someday all these pictures will be old photographs." It's surprisingly funny even when it's heartbreaking, and most of all, it's utterly believable.
-Maya
