book to film – Dancing on the Edge

Dancing on the Edge by Han Nolan

WHAT IS IT

Another unknown book by some unknown author. The main character is a young girl who lives with her grandmother (who runs a spiritual business, contacting dead relatives and such, and actually believes her own garbage) after her prodigy writer father melts. Yes, melts. Her grandmother told her granddaughter that her father melted, and that’s why he’s gone. Not that he got sick of his mom’s shit and left, no. He melted. Well, this poor girl is already kind of fucked up from growing up with this old bat in close proximity (constantly reminded that she’s a miracle because she was born from the body of a dead woman … her mother was hit by a bus crossing the street while pregnant and her little girl was delivered via C-section after the mother was declared dead … thus creating this horrible mindset that she was born from death, is basically a non-entity) and the addition of a melted father – well, you can imagine. The story follows the girl as she follows her grandmother around, moving around to various different houses, until she winds up in the mental ward of a hospital after she receives third degree burns while trying to melt herself to join her father. Thankfully, this is a great wake-up call for her (wait a tick, people don’t melt, we burn. Huh, who’dathunkit?) and we start to see her gain independence from her grandmother and achieve a slightly higher level of sanity in the process.

WHY IT WOULD KICK ASS ON THE BIG SCREEN

With all the movies made of troubled teens, this would make a great addition. It’s got all the great heart-wrenching elements you’ll find in most movies of this type, but it’s got enough of a twist to make it original and interesting.

WHY IT’LL NEVER SEE THE INSIDE OF A THEATER

Again, I doubt anybody’s heard of this young-adult novel. But if it suddenly fell into a screenwriter’s lap, I can’t see why this movie couldn’t get green-lit.