Bridge to Terabithia, by Katherine Paterson is a 1978 Newbery Medal winner written for ages 9 to 11. This book was written in 1977 and was made into a feature film by Walt Disney Productions in 2007. A television production based on the book was also done in 1985 by PBS, but this review will concentrate on the Disney film.
This is the story of Jess Aarons, a ten-year-old boy with four sisters; his second to youngest sister Maybelle worships the ground he runs on. Jess is passionate about running, and competes daily at school against boys in various grades, always victorious. However, one day his new neighbor Leslie Burke (the first girl who ever dared to try to run with the boys who is quite a tomboy herself) enters his heat and wins by a long shot. The two start to become friends and realize they have a lot more in common than they do with any of their other peers, mainly, that they are both lonely. Leslie decides they need a place of their own where they can escape from school, their parents, and their responsibilities. In the woods they create a land called Terabithia, which is entered by swinging on a rope across a creek. Jess is scared of the unknown woodlands at first, but Leslie quickly teaches him how to use his imagination and conquer his fears by transforming them into magical situations that he and Leslie, as rulers of Terabithia, are able to overcome. They develop a strong friendship in their make-believe land, and are able to face their challenging home and school lives because they know Terabithia is waiting for them later. The two even work together and learn to accept the school's biggest bully when she becomes outcast for something embarrassing, and they help her realize she is not alone and others have felt humiliated just like she has. Leslie teaches Jess how to be courageous and happy instead of scared and angry. The end of the story is tragic; while Jess is visiting an art museum with his favorite teacher one Saturday, Leslie evidently tries to go to Terabithia without him. When she tries to swing across the creek, the rope snaps, causing her to fall, hit her head on a rock, and drown. Jesse is devastated when he returns home and learns the news. He is in denial at first, and tries to pretend that she is still in Terabithia and goes to find her. He finally realizes she is dead, and attempts to cope. His sister Maybelle, who has always wanted to go where he and Leslie went, follows him to the woods, and Jess rescues her when she almost falls off a tree branch. He finally decides to build a "bridge to Terabithia" and invites Maybelle to become the new princess of the kingdom. The two walk across the bridge happily admiring Terabithia and Jess smiles as he remembers his best friend who first brought him there. He resolves to keep Leslie's memory alive by crowning the new princess of Terabithia, his little sister Maybelle.
The movie version of this story differs slightly from the book. While it sticks to the plot line for the most part, there are a few things that vary in the movie. In the book the Aarons' major source of income and livelihood is their farm, and Jess's main chore is milking Bessie the cow every morning. In the movie, however, the family maintains a greenhouse. There is even a major event in the movie that is completely added involving the greenhouse, when Jess loses his father's keys to it, which contain his keys to work as well. His father becomes very angry and tells Jess to get his head out of the clouds and out of his drawings and learn to be responsible. This is the way the movie tries to paint the vivid picture that the reader sees in the book of how his father does not accept Jess's love for art and drawing, and how he wishes Jess would do something more productive with his life.
The movie is set in a more modern time, since the teacher makes a statement on the first day of school that students are not to have any electronic devices nor download anything from the Internet. The book, having been written in 1977, obviously does not mention anything like this.
In both the movie and the book, there is a foreshadowing that occurs when Leslie writes an essay about scuba diving that impresses their teacher. She has Leslie read the paper aloud to the class. As she reads, the class, especially Jess, feels as if they are scuba diving along with Leslie, when in fact she has never done this in her life.
A second foreshadowing occurs when Leslie goes to church with Jess and his family one Sunday, and Jess, Leslie and Maybelle have a conversation afterwards about God. Maybelle says that God will damn you to hell if you die and do not believe what the Bible says. Leslie says she does not think that's true and that won't happen. At the end of the book when Jess is crying over Leslie's death in his father's arms, he asks him if Leslie is going to be damned to hell. Jess's father replies that he doesn't know a lot about God and the Bible, but he does know that God wouldn't damn that little girl to hell.
There are several relationships that are not developed as fully in the movie as they are in the book. For example, you do not see as much of Maybelle and how she worships Jess in the movie. There were a lot more details about their relationship and how she looked up to him in the book. Jess is also in love with his music teacher in the book, but this is not evident at all in the movie. There is just one part where he stares at her in the movie and Leslie tells him to "take a picture, it lasts longer," (a line not in the book), but you still don't get the impression that he is in love with her like you do in the book. Finally, P.T., the puppy Jess gives to Leslie for Christmas (and it was not for any particular occasion in the movie, it was just because she said she had always wanted a dog, whereas in the book Jess really wanted to get something for Leslie for Christmas but he didn't have any money and he saw a sign for free puppies so he got one for her), is not given as much attention in the movie as he is in the book.
In the movie special effects are used to bring the creatures in Terabithia to life. In fact, if you had never read the book and saw the movie, I would think you would not realize the creatures and events that happened in Terabithia are not real. It is not completely clear that it is a place the kids created with their imaginations; you might instead conclude it is simply a magical place that only they can see. On the other hand, since I knew these scenes were things they imagined, I thought the film did a fantastic job of painting the pictures the kids saw in Terabithia, especially the giant troll who started out as the enemy but ended up being friendly. This is the differences in movies and books - with movies, you see the story unfold through the eyes of the producer, but in books, your imagination paints the pictures for you - just like Leslie's and Jess's imaginations painted their pictures of Terabithia.
I wanted to read this book and see this movie because my son had. He told me how great they both were, and I totally agree. Though it's definitely a tear jerker, I would recommend this story to anyone. It is a beautiful tale of friendship and imagination, and even of families coming together in times of tragedy. Any child, including myself, who has made their own lands of make believe will reflect on how those lands came to life when they pretended, and will remember how happy it made them to be there. And every person who has had a true best friend who they played with when they were younger will feel a flood of childhood memories when reading this book.
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