[HCIsland]

Just as a test, my wife went over to a friend's house and asked her, "what happened to Saruman at the end of the last movie?"<P>"Didn't he die?"<P>If they show Saruman's corpse at the foot of Orthanc, especially with the palantir nearby, folks will assume he leeped to his death in despair. I know this is a gross simplification of what is supposed to happen, but I doubt it will cause confusion with anyone who hasn't read the book. 90% of the audience will swallow this and move on.<P>As for the secret party scene, don't you think it's a bit of a stretch that a pick-up shot last July means that Saruman's death will now take place at the Shire? Talk about clutching at straws. <P>Likely the party scene has more to do with showing the detachment of Frodo than with anything else. It actually will form a nice contrast with Bilbo's party at the beginning of Fellowship where Frodo was in the middle of it enjoying himself.<P>Editted to add: The removal of a great scene in order to improve the flow of a film is not that uncommon, it's just most of the time we never hear of it. There is a great discussion with Ron Shelton on the director's commentary on the Bull Durham DVD where he describes what he felt was the best scene in the movie. He said that Susan Sarandon was absolutely brilliant and that it was a real show stopper. He cut it because of the fact that it was so strong that it disrupted the flow of the rest of the film which ultimately wasn't about Sarandon's character but Costner's.<P>The truly sad thing is the scene is gone. Once it hit the cutting room floor it was never to be seen again. I think perhaps we should be thankful for the presence of this extended edition format.<P>A film is not simply a sum of it's parts and often it is made stronger through deletion, even of a strong scene. PJ is the one with the rough cut infront of him, not us. If he feels the film is stronger with the scene out, then I for one am not in a position to doubt that.<P>H.C.<p>[ November 09, 2003: Message edited by: HCIsland ]