Fans of Audrey Niffenger’s original novel, “The Time Traveler’s Wife” may be disappointed when they see the upcoming and eagerly anticipated big-screen version of the story.
The disappointment could come from the fact that screenwriter Bruce Joel Rubin and director Robert Schwentke changed the ending after receiving some negative feedback from a test-screen audience.
The new ending is very different from the one initially intended to close the movie. In the film, Eric Bana and Rachel McAdams play Henry and Clare, a loving couple whose relationship has been complicated tremendously by the fact that Henry is a time traveler prone to vanishing any time, anywhere and without warning.
“Yes, there was an ending in which you see [Clare] as an 80-year-old woman,” Rubin said in a group interview this past weekend. “The audience said, ‘Who’s that? What’s that about? Same actor, in makeup. I was told [about the negative reaction]. I wasn’t there. It was a test screening, and a test-screening audience hated that. So we went back to what was the biggest emotional moment in the movie, which happened a few scenes before that, which is their coming together, and it’s very emotional.” (Readers of the book know that the novel’s final scene also features an octogenarian Clare.)
During a separate conversation, Schwentke confirmed Rubin’s comments. He also provided details about the ramifications of the decision to go with a different denouement.
“We chose to turn the penultimate scene of the film into the final scene,” he said. “We got rid of the final scene. That, unfortunately, meant we had to go back and replicate what we’d done already. We were in a big meadow, and we needed the same light, time of day. We needed the same season. We needed it all the same. We also knew we were going to shoot quite a few close-ups, so wigs in terms of hair wouldn’t have worked.”
Schwentke added, “So we made the choice to say, ‘OK, we know what we need to do. We’re smarter now.’ It’s a process when you make a film. We hadn’t been dated or anything, so we felt like, ‘OK, let’s do the right thing. Let’s finish the movie properly.'”
Fans can see the movie and decide for themselves if the change is good or bad when the movie opens in theaters August 14.
Arkle says
The moral of this story? Test audiences are morons.
Example: I Am Legend.
Mikey M says
Though some people might think the book ending is a downer it is still the original ending.
Changing the ending is a disgrace.
M Talon says
Ugh. That has the potential to be a bad change. Without spoilers, there was a reason the author wrote it that way. You could lose part of the soul of the story by eliminating it.
They could have added something to clue people in. Instead, they took the short way out and possibly butchered the story. That’s what happens when you try to please everyone to make a buck instead of creating a good work of art.
Joe in Denver says
I’ll probably still see it, which only feeds the “Hollywood crappy adaptation of a great novel monster” I so despise…
Eric O. says
Spoiler Alert: Here’s how they could have gotten away with the ending: Clare is reading the letter from Henry, we cut to him writing the letter, probably looking at her picture, as he mentions seeing her as an old lady, we cut to the beach house, a slightly recognizable Claire sitting on the patio. He materializes close to her as the letter ends. She smiles, he smiles and says “Hi Clare.” I know a bit cheesy but not a dry eye in house, I guarantee.
They just better have kept Henry’s run-ins with Alba. That was what got to me in the ending.
emily says
I was really excited about seeing movie, after hearing about the ending change not so much. There is something powerful and necissary to the story the Clare has waited for Henry all these years knowing that she was only going to be able see him one more time. There was away around the “confusion” although I think only idiots would be confused, and the studio took the easy way out. I am tierd of seeing great books ruined by hollywood and fear this will happen again…..I guess we will to wait and see.
Jordyn says
I liked the new ending, but it would have been sublimely better had they kept the original ending.