Blade Runner – way better than the book
Red Cliff/Romance of the Three Kingdoms – Red Cliff only covers a couple of weeks leading up to the battle, Romance covers 30 years of civil war but the film is still excellent even with 4 hours (2×2 hours on DVD) of subtitles. Still Romance is possibly the best book I’ve ever read, Red Cliff is in top 10 of films
Flying Scotsman was a pretty good go at the book. Obree’s openness about his demons carried a bit better in the book but film’s still worth a view, especially early life in Ayrshire
EDIT
That Tiger in a lifeboat one.
Oh yeah Life of Pi – skip the first 1/3 of the book, just start on the ship just before it sinks. Book is pretty good from then on, film is tremendous, could not see how it could be made but it was and it’s great, especially big screen 3D
The Caine Mutiny