If he knew..

[Makar]

Originally Posted by Eruanna

I too had a sense of this. Mainly in the scene when Merry and Pippin greet the others at Orthanc after the Battle of Helm's Deep ('Flotsam and Jetsam') although it's obvious that they have been drinking they seem to put their rather dizzy behaviour down to pipeweed.

Not to mention the extended scene in TT with Merry and Pip in the gate house, laughing hysterically, with smoke pouring out of the door and Treebeard "hmmmming". The same is true in the scene where Gandalf is choking off of his pipe. He's laughing and he keeps hitting it while he cough's. And then there's Saruman's line about the clouding of minds.

[The Saucepan Man]

Originally Posted by Lalwendë

All this time I've been thinking about how pleasantly surprised I was that the references to smoking weren't cut from the films, and it turns out that there were sneaky anti-smoking references in there! I'm genuinely disappointed.

I don't think that these scenes were included as overt "anti-smoking propaganda", but rather as reflections of current attitudes towards smoking.

If the "anti-smoking police" had got their hands on these films, there would have been no pipeweed whatsoever. In the UK, there is a move to take scenes of smoking into account when certifying a film.

Having said that, it may be that it was felt (probably by others than Jackson) that oblique references to the harmful effects of smoking were necessary in a "family" film that otherwise portrays pipe smoking in a positive light (the scene with Gandalf and Bilbo watching over the Party in FotR, for example).

[elronds_daughter]

I don't think that these scenes were included as overt "anti-smoking propaganda", but rather as reflections of current attitudes towards smoking.

I believe one of the LotR cast originally used that phrase.... I was merely quoting.

In the UK, there is a move to take scenes of smoking into account when certifying a film.

There is such a move in the U.S. as well.

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by SpM

I don't think that these scenes were included as overt "anti-smoking propaganda", but rather as reflections of current attitudes towards smoking.

If the "anti-smoking police" had got their hands on these films, there would have been no pipeweed whatsoever. In the UK, there is a move to take scenes of smoking into account when certifying a film.

Given this, and some time to calm down from my shock that there actually were some messages against smoking in the films (I was thinking "Oh, is nothing sacred these days in the face of the health police?"), they were actually quite subtle messages. Given that I didn't even notice them, they must have been!

Considering just how much Tolkien seems to advocate the joys of smoking it must have been quite difficult to reconcile this with the very vocal, and often quite hysterical (put into context with the many other health risks we all face) anti-smoking lobby. Of course, Tolkien lived in a different world, and while smoking had been by then identified as risky behaviour, it was not quite as villified as it is today. His works also include rather a lot of eating and drinking, and I wonder whether such things would be excised entirely from a film version 50 years down the line? I can see the Green Dragon being replaced with the Green Gym, the Hobbits meeting to socialise over a bottle of mineral water and an alfalfa salad, while the Gaffer mutters darkly about his BMI in the background.

But just to play devil's advocate, I was interested to note how drinking was portrayed as a joyous pastime in the films. Where were the associated hangovers? Not to mention injuries caused by drunken horse riding or aggressive young Tooks causing fights?

[The Saucepan Man]

Originally Posted by Lalwendë

I was interested to note how drinking was portrayed as a joyous pastime in the films. Where were the associated hangovers?

Clearly, Pippin's failure to master the Palantir is a direct consequence of his "over-indulgence" during the evening's celebrations.

[Rimbaud]

To answer your question Lal, in part: Tollers was perhaps of an era, or certainly from the background, where a drink was fun, and a few could be very fun, but people, homely respectable people much like Hobbits (even the younger ones), did not feel the contemporary urge to drink as much as possible in order to become paralysingly inebriated, to the point where a kebab seems like a good idea.

One imagines that the beer they are drinking is also fairly natural wholesome stuff, with not much in common with the watery additive-syrups posing as lagers today. A couple of beers from natural ingredients on a full stomach over a few hours of chat, is unlikely to give an adult male a headache.

Add to that that the small folk always drank on exceptionally full stomachs and had plenty of rest and a proper amount of sleep, as well as having healthy outdoor lives much of the time, and you begin to see how they managed to stay pretty sharp.

To be honest, if I had little to do all day but to wake late, rise later and go for walks and plan dinner, I imagine I would become somewhat inured to the 'morning after'.

[Bêthberry]

Well I think it is so typical of Tolkien to turn beer into a philological/mythological thing. Letter no. 75:

I was looking at the Kalevala the other day ... and I came across Runo XX, which I used to like: it deals largely with the origin of beer. When the fermentation was first managed, the beer was only in birch tubs and it foamed all over the place, and of course the heroes came and lapped it up, and got mightily drunk. Drunk was Ahti, drunk was Kauko, drunken was the ruddy rascal, with the ale of Osmo's daughter--Kirby's translation is funnier than the original. It was the bullfinch who then suggested to Osmo's daughter the notion of putting the stuff in oak casks with hoops of copper and storing it in a cellar. Thus was ale at first created... best of drinks for prudent people; Women soon it brings to laughter, Men it warms into good humour, but it brings fools to raving. Sound sentiments. Poor old Finns, and their queer language, they look like being scuppered. I wish I could have visited the Land of Ten Thousand Lakes before this war. Finnish nearly ruined my Hon. Mods, and was the original germ of the Silmarillion.

Now, doesn't that just douse your interest in drink.