Thoughts on the How I Live Now Trailer

Let's talk about this.

Yep, it's a trailer for the movie based on Meg Rosoff's How I Live Now. And I have some thoughts, so let's get started.

First of all, ComingSoon.net calls the movie a "doomsday thriller," which is not exactly (or at all) how I ever thought of the book. I mean, yes, I guess it is, but I don't think of explosions and running for your life when I think of HILN. I think of Daisy and Piper eating poisonous mushrooms and Edmund, and the other cousin, the one who doesn't ever talk. I think of how weirdly surreal the whole story is.

Which is what the trailer is missing. From the trailer, this movie looks wholly modern-day and bright and vivid and colorful while I think of the book in muted colors.

There are certain things I'm hoping they don't erase for the movie (her eating disorder and the fact that Edmund is her cousin for two -- those were both really big, really important parts of the novel), and other things that I'm not convinced will translate. I think one of the biggest things that made the book work so well for me was that it was from Daisy's POV. I mean, this is a book that deals with some really really really dark and strange stuff -- war, incest, anorexia, hallucinating because of eating poisonous mushrooms -- but Daisy's personality and attitude make it... not better exactly, but different. Because we're in her mind, we know that she knows how messed up things are and isn't completely off her rocker (mostly though, mostly). In a movie, I don't know that they'll capture that. There are certain lines in the book, certain things Daisy thinks -- her reaction to the soldier being surprised at her cousins smoking and her fervent big-sister-type love for Piper, for instance -- that were just so perfect. How will that fit in a movie? And, if the movie is going to be a "doomsday thriller," will they even try?

Thoughts/expectations for the movie?