Quote:
Originally Posted by alatar
There is only so much time, and even though PJ's films were overly long by today's standards (the more times you show a movie per day, the more money you make, and there's still only 24 hours/day), he still had to leave some scenes and ideas on the floor. And, especially with the experiment that was FotR, PJ had to make sure that the first film was a financial success, as if it weren't, Helm's Deep may not have been as fun to watch (no money = no CG, no refilmed scenes, etc). And though I've been on this roundabout before, PJ thought that (1) having Arwen in the film earlier and more rather that later and little would make the film more successful, (2) adding extra powerful characters not only muddied the waters in the audience's minds but wasn't good storytelling and (3) he had enough plot holes to sham over, and having a powerful character not show up later in the movie would just have too many people stuck wondering.
Plus, with wonderful Tolkienesque dialog like "Give up the halfling, She-Elf!" you just know that he made the right choice.
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i'd be tempted to swap "right" with "wrong" on your final sentence.
It may have been more cost efficient to scrap Glorfindel but thats not really important to us, the viewers, is it? As a result, i just find myself bewildered and devastated one of the best characters is not included. Surely other dodgy scenes could be modified if cost and time were the big n issues...
adding extra powerful characters not only muddied the waters in the audience's minds but wasn't good storytelling and (3) he had enough plot holes to sham over, and having a powerful character not show up later in the movie would just have too many people stuck wondering.
I think this evalution is certainly how the book was, so why not the film? I wondered if the outcome would have been different if Glorfindel ventured with the fellowship. Merry and Pippin substituted the possibility of Glorfindel in the expedition. '"Stuck" wondering' i think is abit exaggorated, it would probably serve as a mere passing thought during the film.
I am still bitter about the utter carnage of PJ on Glorfindel!