The Road, opening this week, might well be the big Academy Award winner of 2009. It’s based on a novel by Cormac McCarthy, who also wrote No Country for Old Men, which became the major winner in 2007. The novel was recently named “book of the decade” by the Times magazine. Starring acclaimed Oscar-nominee Viggo Mortensen and 2004 Oscar winner Charlize Theron, The Road deals with compelling themes of survival, human nature and parenthood in a dystopian futuristic world.

We’ll have to wait a few more months to know whether this film will be an award winner. But either way, it’s already gaining attention, mainly because it’s based on such an acclaimed novel.

And that made me wonder: Does a good or popular book increase the chances that the movie will also be acclaimed or successful? To try to answer the question, here are 10 novels from the past decade and the movies that adapted them.

10. The Kite Runner

The highly acclaimed novel by Khaled Hosseini was the #1 bestseller in the United States in 2005 according to Nielsen BookScan. It also received the Boeke prize (2004).

The film was expected to gain the same success. Financially, it turned a nice profit. But critics and viewers gave it a lukewarm reception, and it won no important awards.

9. Atonement

Atonement won several prestigious fiction prizes, and was shortlisted in many others, including the 2001 Booker prize. Time magazine named it the best fiction novel of the year and included it in the all-time list of 100 greatest novels. So it’s obvious why expectations for the movie were high.

While the movie did not gain instant classic status like the novel, critics and viewers considered it very good, and like the novel, it won numerous awards, including at the Oscars and Golden Globes. And it’s the third most profitable film in this list, which is quite an achievement considering it’s a slow-paced period drama.

8. Slumdog Millionaire / Q & A

The rise-to-the-top story echoes the trajectory of the novel itself. Vikas Swarup was a low-profile diplomat when he published Q & A, his first novel. At first the novel gained modest recognition – although it won several awards it did not become a huge bestseller.

Then came the sleeper cinematic adaptation by Danny Boyle, the big winner of the 2008 Oscars with astonishing profits worldwide. The novel reentered bestseller lists and was translated into 40 languages.

I think it’s safe to say that in this case the movie outdid the novel.

7. The Da Vinci Code

Is there any point in talking about critical reaction or awards around this novel? Any reaction, good or bad, is dwarfed by the massive popularity of this novel. Spending over years at the top of bestsellers lists, with more than 80 million copies sold, translated into 44 languages and the focal point of countless parodies and imitations – The Da Vinci Code is a phenomenon and one of the most successful novels of all time.

What could possibly go wrong with the movie adaptation? Just about everything. The well-known stars and the blockbuster status didn’t save it from getting slashed by critics, gaining an embarrassing 24% fresh reviews at Rotten Tomatoes. The price was paid by the sequel Angels and Demons, which grossed far less despite the fact that the film was significantly better.

6. Hannibal Rising

The prequel to the Hannibal Lecter adventures was written reluctantly by author Thomas Harris, mainly because the producer who owned the franchise rights threatened that if he didn’t, someone else would be asked to do it.

So this unwanted novel was born, gained a mixed critical response… but still had enough of the cannibal’s endless charm to make it a bestseller.

Yet what is done unwillingly cannot be as good as what is done willingly, and the movie suffered from that too. It got terrible reviews and while somewhat profitable, was far from a blockbuster.

5. The Nanny Diaries

The Nanny Diaries’ rise on bestsellers charts was a surprise. The writers were students in NYU when they wrote the book. But the book captured new audiences of young, urban women, and the decision to produce a film - and try repeat the success of Bridget Jones Diary - was unavoidable.

But Scarlet Johansson’s star power combined with that of Laura Linney, Paul Giamatti and Alicia Keys was not enough. The film failed to capture the novel’s fresh, satirical tone, and didn’t match up to the book.

4. The Time Traveler’s Wife

The Time Traveler’s wife became a sensation when an extensive marketing campaign pushed the book into 9th place on the New York Times bestseller list in its first week: Very rare for an unknown author (Audrey Niffenegger)’s debut novel, and one with fantastic elements at that. The book was named Amazon.com’s book of the year in 2003.

The romantic premise called out for a movie adaptation. But something got lost on the way - the character depth and psychological complexity. Viewers were left with a kitschy love story, and voted with their feet.

3. Dreamcatcher

Stephen King is all over blockbuster lists: The Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile, The Shining, Misery… I guess there’s something very cinematic about his stories. But not all of them were successful.

Like most of King’s novels, Dreamcatcher also became an immediate bestseller. Producers were quick to buy the rights, and not even two years passed before the film was released. Unfortunately, this proved too hasty. It was one of the least successful King adaptations, both artistically and financially. The movie broke even worldwide, but that is the same as saying it flopped, barely avoiding disaster.

2. My Sister’s Keeper

My Sister’s Keeper is another example of a novel whose film adaptation emphasized its worst features and almost eliminated the good ones. So the book will be remembered on its own, despite the high profile adaptation.

The novel features an interesting moral dilemma that created public debate. It won several awards and became a readers’ favorite. But as a movie, the story became too sentimental and kitschy, the moral dilemma was flattened and even the big names like Cameron Diaz, Alec Baldwin and Abigail Breslin couldn’t save it. And to top it all off, the ending was altered, causing a massive protest among book fans.

1. Marley & Me

Unlike any of the previous titles, Marley & Me is an autobiographical book, based on a newspaper column by journalist John Grogan. Grogan stated that more people commented on the column he wrote after Marley’s death than on any other column.

It seemed almost impossible to fail with this movie. A cute puppy always steals the show, and so does Owen Wilson and Jennifer Aniston’s star power.

Financially the film did well, with over $400 million worldwide gross. The critical reception was not as great, but to be honest – the book was not the new Catcher in the Rye, and so the movie does not aim to be the new Citizen Kane.

In my sample, the novels were generally superior to their cinematic adaptations. In other words, a successful novel does not guarantee box office success, let alone critical acclaim - though many adaptations do have their day at the box office.

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