Introduction
Published first in 1843, The Tell Tale-Heart by Edgar Allan Poe is a short story that trails an unknown narrator who is adamant that he is sane even after brutally slaying an old aged man who has a “vulture eye”. This is the version of the story in written; however, in the film the story is different. It describes the narrator (Edgar) as an insane man who gets fanatical about his girlfriend (Betty). Betty also does show interest in a much younger and handsome guy who happen to be Edgar’s friend. This gets so intense to a point where Edgar ends up killing his own friend.
The thyme of the two versions makes up one of the major contrasts between the film version and the original version of The Tell-Tale Heart story as it appears in the book. The killing is meticulously executed and the corpse chopped to pieces then concealed below the floorboards. This paper compares and contrasts the written and film version of the story The Tell-Tale Heart by Edgar Allan Poe.
Discussion
As illustrated by (Dray); what makes this story very interesting is the confidence of the narrator. He is so overconfident to the extent that his insanity leads to his own downfall. This story has so many versions that do have different intrigues and fascinations due to the fact that the killer is physiologically unstable. The first indication of insanity of the narrator is when he says, ‘why will you say that am mad?’
The film version of the story takes on a totally different perspective as it brings in the love triangle conflict that eventually leads to the killing of a man because Betty (Edgar’s girlfriend) who has romantic feelings for Edgar’s good looking best friend, Edgar then eventually ends up killing his friend to keep the Betty for himself. This aspect of the film version is not included in the original written version of the story.
In the review (tale heart 1960); the film version of the story that is in total contrast to the original written version of the story is the lack of suspense. Unlike the written version, the film version that has additional storyline makes it quite obvious what is going to happen next especially when the Betty meets Edgar’s handsome and much younger friend for the first time. From that point on it’s quite easy to predict what is likely to happen in the next ten-20minutes. To make it worse, this scene drags on for quite a while which takes away all the fun.
The motive for the brutal murder in the original version of the Tell-Tale Heart was the “vulture eye when he says in (Poe & Buchta 65); “I suppose it was the look of his eye! Definitely, it was the eye! The old man had the eye of a vulture –a light blue eye, which had a film over it”. The narrator commences the detailed account leading to the killings; he had nothing against except for his bad eye that whenever he looked at it, it drove him crazy. This is the original version of The Tell-Tale Heart though none of it appears in the film version. (Edgar Allan Poe)
As revealed in (Poe & Buchta 90); the narrator can’t stand the old man’s defective eye that irks him so much so that he had to find a way to get rid of it making the old man just a victim as explained in the original version. Before the narrator could get rid of the eye, he had to put his plans on hold for week as he kept on finding the old man asleep and he couldn’t see the evil eye staring at him. The narrator would crawl to the old man’s room every night for one week to see if he was awake or not for a whole week before finally the old man met his death. (Edgar Allan Poe)
From the analytical point of view, this story is best illustrated in words rather than in film especially when the love triangle is made the motive for the killing of the man by the disturbed man. This part is done in order to make the film longer since the original story was rather short and therefore was not sufficient to make a full length film. Also the gender of the narrator remains unspecified intentionally leaving the reader with a disembodied voice that makes it easier to contextualize the whole plot as indicated in (tale-tell heart 1960).
As reviewed by (Dray); “the film version makes it clear that the mysterious killings happened because Betty (Edgar’s girlfriend) had started falling in love with his boyfriend’s best friend. Edgar decided to kill his own friend for him to be able to keep Betty. The original version of The Tell-Tale Heart offers better and wider variety of reactions than the film version which simply dwells a lot on the sweaty face of the disturbed man”. This is one of the major areas that make the original version of The Tell-Tale Heart better in words rather than the film version. It’s more or less a rhetoric storytelling rather than an ordinary story that leaves room for response from the reader or viewer for that matter.
The Tell Tale-Heart usage of vulture does not necessarily refer to the old man’s eye, but it relates to one’s eye thus disassociating it from the main plot. Eventually after the Edgar commits the murder in the wee hours of the morning, he chops the body into pieces making it easier for him to conceal them under the floorboards. The policemen respond to a call made by a neighbor who heard a shriek when the narrator committed the murder. He lets them in with the notion that he has done his best to conceal all evidence of any kind murder, as indicated in (Poe & Buchta 156).
The policemen find no evidence of any kind of foul play and the narrator goes to the extent of giving them seats in the same room he committed the murder placing his own seat right at the spot he concealed the body parts of his victim. The narration of this particular scene is better understood in written than in film since he expresses all the emotions he goes through such as the noises in his head that get louder as the policemen chat away animatedly after getting convinced that nothing happened in the same room they were seated.
On the other hand, the film has very little to offer in this section apart from the persistent close ups of the sweaty face of Edgar throwing objects around. When compared to all the emotions well documented in the original version, the film offers very little in this regard. When the noises steadily increased in his head, the more he started hallucinating with a notion that the policemen were convinced he had indeed committed the gruesome murder to an innocent victim who did not deserve to die as reviewed in the tell-tale heart 1960.
As shown in (Poe & Buchta 143); its Edgar’s own overconfidence that eventually leads to his downfall when he gets into frenzy and convinced that the policemen knew everything. He ends up confessing to the murder and shows the policemen where he had hidden the remains of his victim. Dray states “In this final scene, the original version of The Tell-Tale Heart points out every detail comprehensively unlike the film version that hardly portrays this scene exhaustively”.
Conclusion
The Tell Tale-Heart has so many versions that are totally different from the original version of the story. However, whichever the version, the story does involve two main characters. The narrator who is psychologically unstable eventually kills the old man merely because of his bad eye as depicted in the original written version. In the film version the killing motive is Betty who eventually falls in love with Edgar’s friend. This made Edgar kill his own friend for him to be able to keep Betty. Though the versions are different but the plot is somewhat alike despite the fact that several aspects of the film version are left wanting unlike the original version of the story that is well written.
Works Cited
Dray, Colin. Death of the ‘I’: Double-Suicide in ‘The Tell-Tale Heart’. Sydney: Sydney University Press, 2008. Web.
Edgar Allan Poe, Wolfgang Buchta. The tell-tale heart. New York: Hayes Barton Press, 2002.
Edgar Allan Poe. The tell-tale heart. 2008, Web.
Home Review Films. The tell-tale. 2008, Web.
The tell-tale heart 1960. Edgar Allan Poe’s Classic of terror, Web.