The first example is The Road, by Cormac McCarthy. I do know that story, though I haven't read it. It's about an apocalyptic future and a father and son are traveling along a road, trying to make it to the south where it's safer. Along the way they encounter trials and tribulations and there are tragic events, although the book ends on a comforting note, well, as comforting as McCarthy can muster. But as far as the cover, I feel like the movie version is compelling and does make me want to read the book even though I know that it's based on a movie. It doesn't make it seem hokey, overly dramatic or is just trying to sell the book based on the actors. It feels me with emotion and makes me wonder what this story is about...a good selling point, I think. And I also really like what they did with the typography on the movie tie-in edition of the book.
This second example I don't love, but I also don't hate. It's just kind of there. I like that they used the detailed typography design from the original book cover. But then they just add the cast of characters to the cover in order to sell the book as a movie tie-in. I do really like the typography. I think it's intricate and lovely, but I don't love the bottom of the design. It's not totally terrible for a movie version of a book though. I do also miss the tagline on the book version that didn't make it to the movie version.
A lot of the mystery and eeriness of the original cover is gone too.
This third example, Cloud Atlas, I think is terrible. It's just slapping the movie poster on the book cover and calling it a day. Blatantly using the actors to sell the book is obviously going on here. The design of the book is so cool and interesting and everything about the is gone from the movie tie-in version. They tried to do something interesting with the typography, which sort of works, but it's not really compelling with the montage of characters/actors they are showcasing. Jessica pointed out with The Help, that the designers at least stuck with the same color palette for the movie tie-in version, and maybe that would have helped here as well. I don't know what the book is about. I think it's a bit of a fantasy, epic adventure type of read, and that people that loved it REALLY loved it. Maybe some of the original elements would have helped readers of the original book want to go and see the movie, but you don't have any of that going on here.
