Oh, it was the translation of the book to screen, or rather the lack thereof. They only covered the first half of the book, and even then they completely closed off the first half with a false ending made up out of whole cloth.Don't hold back now, tell us how you really feel.
Seriously though, I can't tell if you didn't like the translation of the book to screen, or if the horrors that film contained damaged you emotionally. Both are valid answers...
You see, it's like this. I was an impressionable kid back then who loved to read. I was at that age where I was transitioning into more complicated young adult/fantasy style books if I recall. Anyway, my dad bought me a copy of The Neverending Story. It was a big book by my standards at the time. And once more, it was outwardly beautiful, but the real beauty came in reading it.
And even the beauty in reading it was on two levels. On one level, as I recall it was a wonderful and compelling story. I only read it maybe once as a kid and never read it again. I suppose somewhere deep inside I want to hold on to that memory, and I have almost forty years later. It is one of the few memories I have as a kid where I can recall that childlike sense of wonderment we all had growing up. It is still an unspoiled beautiful memory of young me curled up in bed enthralled and totally captivated by the written word.
On the second level, my hardcover copy of the book was written in both green and red ink. One color representing the real world, and the other representing Fantastica. It was such a different way to jump between worlds. I had never seen a book written in two different colored inks at the time, and I have never seen another like it since. The dichotomy of print on the pages, the colors changes that occurred as worlds shifted, or as realities blended. It really combined a beautiful visual aesthetics along with the kaleidoscope of imagined worlds in my head.
And as stated, the movie only addressed the first half of the book. I think I might have seen part of the second movie, maybe a couple minutes, enough possibly to throw up in my mouth a little.
SO WHY DO YOU ASK? Why do I hate this F'ING movie so much? Because this is where I learned you NEVER, EVER, EVER, see a movie about a book you love and cherish.
I was just a kid back then. Just a young and impressionable kid. I went to that theater to go see the film version of my favorite book!! I was stoked as all hell! None of my friends had read this Magnum Opus! They had NO idea of the worlds this work of wonder would open for them. I was all in, it was like there was an open bathroom and I finally had my Orphan Annie secret decoder ring. Man, was I excited.
Then I watched the move......
.... and everything I loved was ripped asunder. They murdered the book like they murdered my childhood. I was in disbelief. How could someone do this? Ralphie's 'Son of a Bitch' was too light a phrase to describe my disappointment. This was my first introduction to the fact that movies made about a book can go way south of your personal expectations if you had read the book prior. It could be a damn shame if you had liked the book and they blew the movie. But as a kid, when they destroy something you love, it hits like your first real gut punch. The kind that really knocks the wind out of you, we tend to remember that first real hit. I was devastated then.
I'm pissed off now for them fucking over that kid who so enjoyed the memories of that book. And I'm doubly pissed now for still being pissed about the whole fucking affair. I'm sure somewhere there is a third meta layer of piss-offatude somewhere I'm missing, but when I find it, I'm going to say fuck off to the movie once more. There might be a meta meta layer as well, and I plan to hire Triumph, the Insult Comic Dog handle that one. That's what forty years of anger gets you.
Where's the aspirin?