Giving Justice to the Original:
Smooth Talk and Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been? Ideas for the story lines of many motion pictures get their inspiration from other works of writing often. Books are usually a main source of inspiration for movies, for instance, the movie Smooth Talk was based off of Joyce Carol Oates’ short story Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?. Most of the time however, you hear that the movie did not give justice to the book. Smooth Talk is an exception to this common conception. By keeping the main thematic issues of teenage ignorance and arrogance, and same symbiotic relevance throughout the movie gives the movie the same impact as the book, even though it has additional occurrences.
Also his supernatural knowing of what Connie’s family is doing is another similarity that is shown in both the movie and book that creates an eerie mood. Though in the book A. Friend is more heavily described as creepy, old, and heavily disguised the movie creates that same interpretation with use of eerie music that also gives you a speculative mood of Arnold Friend without the giveaway as the book shows. Joyce Carol Oates also shares views that Smooth Talk was a great interpretation of her own work. She even agrees that the different ending that the movie includes is completely justified in her own review on the movie. The ending is justified due to the fact that is still gives the audience a chance to interpretation on what situation Connie ends up with. Though in the story you don’t know if she ever returns to her home, if she’s kidnapped, killed, raped, and any other reasoning the viewer ends up having, you end up with that same feeling of unknown in the movie. In Smooth Talk when she returns home from the car ride with Arnold Friend you don’t know what’s in store for Connie’s future either. She could’ve also been raped in the field, you can also imply the foreshadowing that there was sexual encounters in the field and Connie could end up pregnant like the girl her mother asked Connie about previously in both the movie and story. You may also wonder if Connie changes after this experience and her relationship with her family