Bingowings said:
Water for Elephants (2011)
.
Quite a fun film, but definitely a better book. The character of August is not in fact the ringmaster - that would be Uncle Al. They merged the two, possibly in order to create an easier narrative and strengthen the love interest conflict; effective enough I suppose. My problem is a really trivial matter, but spoilers abound past this point.
*MILD SPOILER*
I was really mad that they chose to sanitize the movie a bit. In the book, the reason she had nobody was because her family disowned her after marrying a Jew. Seems characteristic of the time period. But, to soothe the right people, they made it so that she was an orphan in order to not have to bother anyone. It's silly, really. And it's a tiny detail but I can't help but be bothered with it.
*END SPOILER*
The Help suffers from this same simplification (to a much higher degree) which is a real shame because that was a phenomenal book that turned into an okay movie.