10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
NOT BAD, NOT BAD, May 19, 2000
This review is from: The Fifth Element: A Novel (Mass Market Paperback)
A taxi driver, a monk, a D.J., and a supreme being are thrown together into the battle to save earth from Evil, a giant ball of volcanic rock plumeting towards our world.
The novelization contains Bisson's usual rich prose, but the mostly visual film doesn't exactly translate all that well to written form.
Most of the humor comes from a wacky narrative in the style of Douglas Adams.
About half way through the book, extreme differences from the film appear. It makes one wonder if the studio ever updated Bisson on script changes.
The story itself is fun. The characters often goofy. But differences from the film somewhat deter our interest.
But it's not all that bad.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Forget the novelization, just watch the movie, September 16, 2009
This review is from: The Fifth Element: A Novel (Mass Market Paperback)
An ancient secret is needed to save the world, hidden deep in the deserts of Egypt. The movie starts with a prelude from 1914 when the Monascheiwans come to Earth to remove the four Element stones and the Fifth Element because war is coming. The priest in charge of the secret begs the Monascheiwans not to take them, for Evil is coming soon to Earth (every five thousand years) and the weapon of the five elements is needed to destroy the coming evil. The Monascheiwans assure the priest that in three hundred years, when Evil returns, so shall they.
Skip to three hundred years later. Mankind has mastered space travel and the new modern world is built into extremely high structures that loom far above the garbage and fog below. Major Korben Dallas has retired from the military and now drives a cab for a living. His ex-wife left him for his attorney, and he now lives in a singularly tiny apartment in a shady part of town with a cross-eyed white cat.
Priest Vito Cornelius is the priest in charge of the key to the temple in Egypt and the secrets of the five elements. He attends the president and begs that the newly discovered ball of flame not be fired upon, for he knows it is the Evil foretold in the legend. Ignored, the military fires upon the dark planet-like globe, increasing it's size by two hundred percent and wiping out the Earth vessels there to monitor it. Now Cornelius is listened to. The wreckage of the Monascheiwan ship entering Earth's territory is searched and there is just one survivor, a few cells still alive in a metal casing. Technology is such that the being is rebuilt from the few cells, and what the military and scientists don't know is that the woman they have just brought back from death is the Fifth Element from the legend. Escaping and pursued, the Fifth Element, LeeLoo, jumps from the building's ledge and winds out landing in Korben's cab. LeeLoo directs Korben to take her to priest Vito Cornelius, who discovers from LeeLoo that the four element stones were not on board the Monascheiwan ship but entrusted to a Diva named Plavalaguna who is doing is charity performance on the planet Flostan in the Agean system.
Korben and LeeLoo must fetch the stones and bring them to Earth before Evil arrives, fighting both the evil corporate magnate Zorg and his army of Mangalore warriors. As they struggle to gain the stones, time is running out for planet Earth, and the entire universe.
I used the same plot summary for the book as I did for the movie, because unlike the movie being made from the book, the book is a novelization of the movie. I don't normally purchase these because too often it's like reading a script. That's what happens to Terry Bisson's novelization. Bisson did not bother to delve into characters or build them any sort of background, they just became puppets of no more than the movie showed. There's no internalized thoughts behind the characters motives or actions. And changing Ruby Rhod's name to Luc Rhod was stupid, not to mention he didn't even come close to capturing Rhod's personality type like the movie did.
The writing is very wooden and uninspired. The characters are only knee-deep, and there's no outside descriptiveness from what you can already see in the movie. Don't bother picking up this novelization, you'll get less from it than the movie.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
A movie lies between these covers., October 15, 1997
This review is from: The Fifth Element: A Novel (Mass Market Paperback)
A great supplement for fans of the movie, this book fills in gaps and smooths out plotholes present in the film. A clean, original story, it's only fault is that it was written after the film, and retains the superficiality of the movie instead of using the ability of text to further define and deepen the story.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
![[Start the discussion]](http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/x-locale/communities/discussion_boards/start-new-discussion-sec._V192250339_.gif){kind=small}
