Giggles

[Eomer of the Rohirrim]

Why exactly is there so much 'mass-produced' comic relief in the films? When I read the book I do smile quite often, and sometimes I do laugh out loud. But most of the humour is a nice, pleasant sort; the sort that fills you with a warm glow.

The main point here is that it is not a comedy. Yes, it should be funny in places but why are some scenes crammed with pointless or ridiculous humour? The Battle of Helm's Deep is possibly the worst for this, with the well-documented Dwarf jokes.

I think it is just such a shame because the humour really works in places. One of my favourites is Sam's brilliantly delivered line "Rosie Cotton dancin'!" This takes place in one of the saddest, most poignant scenes, and it suggests how well this lovely sort of humour complements the real emotions which the story is getting at.

This is brought down so much by Gimli's boring, unimaginative and above all unfunny brand of humour (to say nothing of the character stabbery). This kind of humour doesn't belong amongst Tolkien's kind of humour. Does anyone disagree with this view? And can anyone supply good reasons for why this humour was added? My initial guess is to do with getting a quick response from the casual cinema-goer, involving a compromise of the overall dramatic quality of the scenes affected.

[Boromir88]

I think I will direct my thoughts towards Gimli, who is the biggest comic relief character in the film.

A lot of things with Gimli I do find funny, like some of his lines. In FOTR I thought he was funny, and an accurate portrayal towards the book. For example, grunting at Aragorn "recover my strength!" Or the small part about Dwarf Women in TTT. A bit of a more stretch, after Legolas' Mumak slide, "that still only counts as one," got a laugh from me after the disgust of the scene. But, I think with Gimli is that Jackson overused him as the "comic relief." This is my biggest complaint with Jackson, was it just seemed like he couldn't let go of something once he started. Ok, we get it, Gimli is funny, but pleast stop, we can see that by now. And it's blatant diversion from the books that get me a little mad. Like making Gimli look like an out of shape dwarf, that was only slowing down Aragorn and Legolas. I don't see why Jackson did this, it just seems like Jackson intentionally deviated from the books.

Some other examples would be the Steward punching bag. Again, this is another thing Jackson beat into our heads. With the scumbag portrayal of Denethor, I can see where Gandalf might hit him a couple times. Especially when he's telling everyone to flee, but I think just one would do the trick, to get Denethor back to his senses. But no, he hits him in the face, jams it in his stomach, and as Denethor bends down whacks it over his head and knocks him out. This and further scenes of Denethor's beating just makes it seem like Gandalf looked for any reason to beat up the guy, and of course this got laughs because everyone saw it as Gandalf beating up the mean, nasty, cherry-spitter. That's another thing I can't understand, why make Denethor a totally rude slob? Again, JACKSON we get the point! Denethor is crazy and shouldn't be in power.

To sort of sum up these rantings...A lot of the comic relief, I found funny, but it's just I think Jackson overused it. Just seemed like he didn't think we would get it, and beat these concepts into our heads.

[Lalwendë]

I think what got to me in the portrayal of Gimli was that at times the humour was just toilet humour, and that doesn't have a place in Tolkien. Gimli is supposed to be a Dwarf, one of a noble race on Middle Earth, not just a butt of jokes. When he belched after Theoden had spoken I found it distasteful - not that I'm squeamish about that kind of humour at all, just that Gimli wouldn't have done that kind of thing as it was disrespectful. I did get a bit fed up with the 'short' jokes, although when they were well delivered they were amusing, such as the "shall I get you a box" line at Helm's Deep, which was very Morecambe & Wise, though again probably not appropriate for the situation.

The humour which was brought out with the Hobbits was well written and as gentle as it ought to have been. I liked how humour was delivered through simply filming different characters pulling faces, laughing or behaving 'hobbity'. This was subtle and gentle. And Merry and Pippin made a good comic pairing, although on occasions when they needed to be serious it was hard to divorce them from their double act routine.

As to why the humour was brought across in the way that we saw it, I think again it was down to the 'need' to pull in a big audience, and for those sections of the audience more used to the "I'll hit you over the head until you laugh, dammit" comedy of the Farrelly Brothers, the more crude gags work a treat.

Having watched TT with a family sat by me, I can say that the 11 year old boy who was in the seat next to mine was guffawing like a donkey at the burping. Yes, it's sad really, they did put this humour in to get a quick response, and I wonder how many people felt like cringing when they saw it?

[Bêthberry]

Lalwendë makes the astute observation that much of PJ's humour seems of the kind to appeal to the 9 to 19 (or is it 99 ) male demographic. This would appear to be the audience group which PJ thought would be most interested in a movie of Tolkien's work and so he appears to have catered to their favoured type of bodily humour.

Also worth considering is the role of humour in George Lucas, whose original Star Wars provided so much of the visual and special effects inspiration for LotR. The original Star Wars blended humour and adventure in a light-hearted way that was consistent with characterisation and action. I think PJ strove to emulate this use of comedy but in the end was not able to integrate it seemlessly. So we get a sort of cleaned up Rablasian hilarity rather than a witty humour, which was Tolkien's forte.

My memory could fail me, too, but I seem to recall that Sam was not often used for humour in the movie, but that Tolkien did often use Sam to occasion the odd joke or two.

[Lalwendë]

Another thought occurred to me this morning. I think that the essential differences in humour between certain characters, such as the differences between humour portrayed by the Hobbits and that portrayed by Gimli, may reveal that different writers may have had control over certain characters or scenes. I noticed that the humour of the Hobbits and the Ents was quite similarly written, gentle in style and delivery, while the humour of Legolas/Gimli is more linked with action scenes and involves more one-liners. After FotR, the groupings of Legolas/Gimli and Merry/Pippin are more or less separate from each other, and the difference is more marked in the humour, so I think it may have been at this point that the scriptwriting diverged.

[Boromir88]

I think the main problem with the humour of the movies, is just that Jackson overused it, and sort of stretched his bounds. In FOTR, there wasn't so much humour, a couple funny parts between the hobbits, some funny lines by Gimli. Boromir swordfighting with Merry and Pip...etc

In TTT, we get a lot of these "one liners" as Lal would refer to them. And the whole scene with him slow, and dragging down Aragorn and Legolas. I do find the dwarf women to be particularly funny, however.

In ROTK, Gimli is established as a soft, emotional, crybaby dwarf, scared of a black cat. This Jackson didn't do to show more personality in Gimli it was solely used for people to laugh at the chubby dwarf whining.

Lal, I don't think it was so much that since the Fellowship broke, and in TTT and ROTK you run into seperate storylines that Jackson decided to change some of the humour as. I tend to give him less credit and just an example of him shoving ideas down our throats. It's sort of like Jackson said "well this made them laugh in FOTR, so if I take it a step farther and do this..." or "A lot of people laughed at Gimli for running so bad, so let's just make him whine at everything." "I know people will laugh at Gandalf hitting Denethor, so let's just not hit him but beat him senseless." It's like Jackson couldn't let go of an idea, once he got it, and he "over-extended" or "overused" it.

I know in the books Gimli does show emotion at times (I believe in Balin's Tomb and at Amon Hen). But, these are extremely sad, moving, and emotional times (especially for Gimli in Balin's tomb), and it adds more depth into Gimli's character. However, PJ just seemed to use Gimli's whining for laughter. Atleast that's how I saw it. (Not so much in FOTR as in TTT and ROTK).

[Morsul the Dark]

I understand your concerns...I do however believe that the humor is there to attract more of an audience we here at the downs understand the minute details and humor and enjoy it imagine however if you will how most of todays population would react to this type of humor....*yawn*.. a movie is made to make money with a limited audience this is more difficult.