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Marileangorifurnimaluim · 03-06-2002, 09:09 PM

"The Onion: Have you been paying attention to the hype over Peter Jackson's new version of Lord Of The Rings?Ralph Bakshi: No, not really."Yeah, right. I'll preface with I loved Ralph Bakshi's work up to American Pop. I was a big fan in high school and truly believed in his cause of bringing animation out of the Disney dumpster.Ralph shows a selective memory in this article. The studios did play those games with him, but there was another side to it. The word in 1978 was he spent his entire budget less than halfway through his LOTR:Part One. This came out months before the movie was released. He was waaaay over, no end in sight, and they cut him off finally, released the movie as is, and decided based on the reviews/$$ if they wanted to pour money down the next two parts. It did poorly, and they said "good, 'cause Ralph's a pain in the tush." Even the people who liked Ralph called him a "perfectionist," others didn't use nice euphemisms and all agreed he was difficult to impossible to work with.When his budget was shut off he screamed bloody murder in every interview, pointed fingers at this person, that person... when asked, his explanation for going over-budget was 'artistic integrity.' But.. he would have been the one to tell them what it would cost in the first place. It always seemed to me he lowballed the budget and figured once they were committed they'd keep shelling it out till it was done. There are pieces of Bakshi's Lord of the Rings that are good (the Black Riders in particular) but there's no sign, no matter how much money they spent on it, he could ever have 'done it.' His characterizations should have stood up, even 1/2-way through. They didn't. He was in over his head. He's willfully blind to the fact. He chooses to ignore that virtually every Tolkien fan creamed his version, the critics panned it, nobody liked it. Not even he. But he can blame the studio.What I really regret about his version was he chose to take out his anger on the movie and anyone who ever sees it: his final shot was an angry bloody image of Gandalf slicing the head off an orc. That's no accident, in animated films you plan every move on storyboards, the movement takes hundreds of frames.

03-06-2002, 09:09 PM	#2
Marileangorifurnimaluim Eerie Forest Spectre Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: Buried in scrolls of fanfiction Posts: 798	"The Onion: Have you been paying attention to the hype over Peter Jackson's new version of Lord Of The Rings?<P>Ralph Bakshi: No, not really."<P>Yeah, right. <P>I'll preface with I loved Ralph Bakshi's work up to American Pop. I was a big fan in high school and truly believed in his cause of bringing animation out of the Disney dumpster.<P>Ralph shows a selective memory in this article. <P>The studios did play those games with him, but there was another side to it. <P>The word in 1978 was he spent his entire budget less than halfway through his LOTR:Part One. This came out months before the movie was released. <P>He was <I>waaaay</I> over, no end in sight, and they cut him off finally, released the movie as is, and decided based on the reviews/$$ if they wanted to pour money down the next two parts. <P>It did poorly, and they said "good, 'cause Ralph's a pain in the tush." <BR>Even the people who liked Ralph called him a "perfectionist," others didn't use nice euphemisms and all agreed he was difficult to impossible to work with.<P>When his budget was shut off he screamed bloody murder in every interview, pointed fingers at this person, that person... when asked, his explanation for going over-budget was 'artistic integrity.' <P>But.. he would have been the one to tell them what it would cost in the first place. <P>It always seemed to me he lowballed the budget and figured once they were committed they'd keep shelling it out till it was done. <P>There are pieces of Bakshi's Lord of the Rings that are good (the Black Riders in particular) but there's no sign, no matter how much money they spent on it, he could ever have 'done it.' <BR>His characterizations should have stood up, even 1/2-way through. They didn't. <P>He was in over his head. <P>He's willfully blind to the fact. He chooses to ignore that virtually every Tolkien fan <I>creamed</I> his version, the critics panned it, nobody liked it. Not even he. But he can blame the studio.<P>What I really regret about his version was he chose to take out his anger on the movie and anyone who ever sees it: his final shot was an angry bloody image of Gandalf slicing the head off an orc. That's no accident, in animated films you plan every move on storyboards, the movement takes hundreds of frames. __________________ Deserves death! I daresay he does... And some die that deserve life. Can you give it to them?