Distances

[Lily Bracegirdle]

Saucy, I think part of the reason everything looked close in the movies was because it's not possible to make a miniature with the correct proportions that will fit into a studio. For example, on my map it appears that Osgiliath was about 20 kilometers from Minas Tirith. If the models were 1:200th scale, they would have to be built 100 meters apart. Of course, the models weren't built that way; the FX people inserted the images in relation to each other, but they apparently miscalculated. Maybe they thought a pretty image would be better than a realistic one.<P>I do feel that time was warped in a distracting way. It seems that it took five minutes to get from Cirith Ungol to Mount Doom because (if I remember correctly) Aragorn was already at the Black Gate when Frodo and Sam saw the plains covered with Orcs. That only left the time it took for Aragorn to challenge Sauron and give a speech for them to cross the plain and climb mount Doom. I'm not suggestion everything be shown in real-time, but the cuts between scenes should leave a reasonable gap of time accounted for. If orc scouts had seen Aragorn leaving Minas Tirith and that prompted the army of Mordor to troop off to the Black Gate, that would be fine, because all that troop movement could be assumed to take several days. Several days in which Frodo could realistically get to Mount Doom.<P>-Lily