When Arthur Miller published "The Crucible" in 1953, the play's audience was a nation of Americans caught in the grip of McCarthyism. The communist “witch hunt” has long since ended, but the public's fascination with this shameful part of American history remains. The original play took place in 4 acts composed mainly of dialogue. As a result, the creators of the 1996 film adaptation had a lot of creative latitude to update the narrative for modern audiences. Director Nicholas Hytner used a multitude of cinematic techniques that allowed the moving images to touch the audience's hearts just as effectively as the book had before. Given the time constraints of a film, several scenes were rewritten in order to facilitate easier delineation of the plot. The director also used different camera techniques to control the pacing of the film, making it easier to determine which parts were important. Overall, Hytner's scene edits and unique camera shots resulted in an emotionally compelling film. The director reorganized the tense discussions that took place immediately before Reverend Hale's arrival into different scenes in order to make the film's conflicts easier to understand. Otherwise, the audience might become confused about the identities of the characters and the complex web of disagreements between them. The play condensed a heated discussion between the men in the book into a series of arguments just before the reverend's arrival. In the book, Parris, Putnam, Proctor, and Giles stood in a room discussing the general discontent in Salem. As Giles says: “Why is everyone chasing everyone? I have appeared in court six times this year" (p. 37)....... middle of newspaper ...... falling from the gallows, as the townspeople raised their hands arms to celebrate. Audible drumbeats were played as bodies went limp, emphasizing the finality of death. Whenever a written work is adapted into a film, artistic changes must be made to create an effective film. The play The Crucible relied heavily on complex passages of dialogue and took place in a very small group of settings. Due to time constraints, the film could not include all of the dialogue from the book and still remain entertaining. Thus, the director selected the most important passages, often separating complex scenes into a single setting in order to make the film easier to understand. The director also used a wide range of camera techniques to highlight the parts he wanted viewers to feel emotional about. Overall, I felt the film adaptation of The Crucible was well done..