The good ones, by contrast, succeed through the arrogant assumption that a great novel is not a iii) ______ artifact but rather a lump of interesting material to be shaped according to the filmmaker's will.

So the (iii) blank is malleable

regards

I am still not convinced that malleable is the best fit here.

I think the ideas contrasted here are - some rigid artifact with lump of malleable material "which can be shaped according to filmmaker's will"

Can some one explain this further? Thanks.

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When film adaptations of literary classics are lackluster it is often because they i)______ a certain ii) ______ to the cultural prestige of literature.


When the movies are not so brilliant is because they show (display) a certain adoration to the literature


The good ones, by contrast, succeed through the arrogant assumption that a great novel is not a iii) ______ artifact but rather a lump of interesting material to be shaped according to the filmmaker's will.

However, the positive thing is that those movies that are good is because after all they are suitable to make a movie itself. In the end, they are a good subject for a script

Hope this helps

for the third blank, the assumption is that a great novel is NOT a ______ artifact but rather a lump of interesting material to be shaped according to the filmmaker's will. so the novel is something which is malleable or changeable. then the "not" signals the opposite of malleable- sacred!. Sacred book is not allowed to be changed. so the statement will be " the assumption is that a great novel is not a "sacred" artifact but a lump of interesting material to be shaped according to the filmmaker's will. if we use the word malleable, the sentence will be "the assumption is that a great novel is NOT A MALLEABLE artifact but rather a lump of interesting material to be shaped according to the filmmaker's will. this sounds like a paradox!