I haven't been here for a while, and this'll have to be short, but hopefully meaningful.
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Originally Posted by alatar
Aragorn's speech is fine; it's just that I hear echoes of Braveheart and was hoping for something more Tolkien
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Just to play devil's advocate (this is the right scene, after all
), I see a lot of thematic similarities between Aragorn's speech and Gandalf's speech in the book:
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Originally Posted by Aragorn in the movie, before the fighting at the Black Gate
A day may come when the courage of men fails, when we forsake our friends and break all bonds of fellowship, but it is not this day. An hour of wolves and shattered shields, when the age of men comes crashing down, but it is not this day. This day, we fight! By all that you hold dear, on this good Earth, I bid you stand, Men of the West!
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Gandalf in the book, during the planning of the attack on the Black Gate
Other evils there are that may come; for Sauron is himself but a servant or emissary. Yet it is not our part to master all the tides of the world, but to do what is in us for the succour of those years wherein we are set, uprooting the evil in the fields that we know, so that those who live after may have clean earth to till. What weather they shall have is not ours to rule.
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Both times, they're giving messages of both hope and realism, saying that although there'll always be trouble in the world, we shouldn't think about what to do for the trouble in the future, but to think about what we can do to help now, and by doing so, we can make sure that those who come in the future will have a fair chance of doing the same. Whilst we can never hope to win completely, we can still give our best effort to win for the present; to show defiance against defeat and failure. Basically, to use a beautiful line from both book and movie...
All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.