That said, some classic books should never be turned into films. This has less to do with their “unfilmable” nature. Some stories simply lose their essence as soon as they’re translated to another medium. All prose relies on internal narrative logic, but some use experimental formats or themes that only work well on the page. Take Fyodor Dostoevsky’s White Nights. It's a riveting short story about a young man’s loneliness in Saint Petersburg that loses all of its charm as soon as it’s dramatized. (Many have tried, but none have captured the story's distinct mood.)