The 2014 film adaptation of The Fault in Our Stars gives teachers a chance to add media analysis to a novel unit. Students can compare how the book and the movie handle the same scenes, and consider what each medium can and cannot do. The assignment tends to be popular because students already have opinions about adaptations. The challenge for teachers is turning those opinions into analytical writing.

The best prompts ask students to focus on a specific scene or choice rather than the whole film. For example, students might compare how the book and the movie present the dinner at Oranjee in Amsterdam, or how each handles Hazel's narration. A narrow focus allows for close analysis of language, camera work, and pacing. Broad prompts that ask which version is better usually produce unsupported opinions.

Students need vocabulary to write about film with precision. Terms like framing, music, editing, and performance give them ways to describe how the movie creates meaning, just as diction and imagery do for the novel. Teachers can provide a short glossary and model a paragraph that compares a page with a scene. Without that support, essays often slip into plot summary or vague claims that the movie left things out.

What Good Adaptation Analysis Looks Like

Strong essays make an argument about what a change accomplishes. If a scene is shortened or a line of narration is cut, the student explains how that alters the audience's understanding of a character or theme. They avoid judging the adaptation solely by fidelity to the book. Instead, they consider whether the new version creates a different but coherent effect.

• A claim about how a specific change affects meaning or audience response
• Evidence from both the book and the film, cited with accuracy
• Analysis of medium-specific techniques such as narration, music, or camera framing
• Recognition of what each version can do that the other cannot
• A conclusion that goes beyond preference to explain the significance of the difference

Common Pitfalls in Book and Film Essays

One frequent weakness is relying on memory of the movie. Students may not rewatch the scene they are discussing and end up describing it inaccurately. Requiring timestamps or specific shot descriptions helps ground the analysis. It also demonstrates that the student engaged with the film as a text rather than as background.

Another pitfall is a purely evaluative stance in which the movie is dismissed as inferior. Teachers can steer students toward analysis by asking what constraints the film faces, such as runtime and the loss of Hazel's interior voice, and how the filmmakers respond to them. That question opens up more nuanced arguments. It also mirrors how film critics and scholars approach adaptations.

Scoring Two Media in One Essay

Rubrics for these essays need a strand for medium-specific analysis, since students are being asked to do something different from a standard literary essay. The descriptors should reward accurate use of film terminology, attention to how techniques create effects, and balanced treatment of both texts. Lower levels describe essays that summarize scenes or compare them only by whether they match. Sharing the rubric in advance helps students understand that they are analyzing craft.

Grading these essays can be slower because the reader may need to recall specific scenes to verify accuracy. AI-assisted feedback can flag claims about the film that lack specifics, such as a missing description of a shot or a moment, and highlight essays that summarize rather than analyze. The teacher then confirms details and adds interpretive comments. This approach maintains accuracy while easing the load of checking every reference.