N.J. Mystery Isn't Lost In French Translation

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MELISSA BLOCK, host:

Making movies is a complicated business. A film may originate in one form and then travel mysterious and shifting channels until it reaches the screen in nearly unrecognizable form. That's what NPR's Art Silverman discovered with a book and then movie called �Tell No One.�

ART SILVERMAN: The book �Tell No One� was the sort of quick, lively read I like when I travel or have time to kill: lots of mystery, some contemporary humor and a story set in a locale I could instantly relate to.

Mr. HARLAN COBEN (Author, �Tell No One�): My novels are very specific, for the most part, about suburban New Jersey.

SILVERMAN: That's author Harlan Coben. What attracted me to his work is that Coben grew up in the very same town I did, Livingston, New Jersey. I regard the township as pleasant, quiet, stable, and well, a little boring. Fortunately for readers, Harlan Coben doesn't see it that way.

Mr. COBEN: Suburban New Jersey is really the bastion of the American dream, the battleground of the American dream. You know, it's where people go when they try to live their lives and do right and have the backyard and the fence and the basketball court in the yard and raise kids and where the dream comes true. It's also a great place to explore where it can ripen and darken and die.

SILVERMAN: That was especially true for �Tell No One.� The novel involved a character who vanishes early on then reappears years later. Then, I heard �Tell No One� had been turned into a movie, and this spring, it came out on DVD. The title was the same, the plot follows the same course, but nothing sounded the way I expected.

(Soundbite of film, �Tell No One�)

(Soundbite of siren)

SILVERMAN: That's definitely not the New Jersey State Police. That's because Coben's wonderful Garden State tale became a French movie.

(Soundbite of film, �Tell No One�)

Unidentified Man #1 (Actor): (As character) (Speaking foreign language)

SILVERMAN: With subtitles, with outdoor dinner parties where wine was served. Instead of the turnpike, there were boulevards. Instead of rest stops, there was the French countryside.

Despite the shift of scenery, it was a darn good movie, which flies in the face of Harlan Coben's determination to stick to the terrain he knows best in print.

Mr. COBEN: There's something very universal in the specific. And the more you say to yourself, you know, it would sell better if I made it Everycity, USA, because that way the people in Illinois will get it better, you're dead as a writer.

SILVERMAN: But he's very much alive. The successful leap of �Tell No One� to the screen did soften Harlan Coben's resolve to keep his feet planted on New Jersey soil. In his most recent novel, �Long Lost,� Coben allows his hero to leap across the Atlantic mid-story to visit Paris. And get this, now Hollywood wants to remake �Tell No One,� and they will, of course, move the story back to the USA.

Mr. COBEN: Think about that for a moment. It was an American book turned into a French film, which will now be turned into an American film.

SILVERMAN: And with a little luck, maybe even a New Jersey film.

Art Silverman, NPR News.

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