Smell this, I think it's expired...

[mormegil]

Davem if I may interject here it seems that you apply different standards of what art is to different mediums. The movies failed in your mind because of obvious primary world ideas you had of them, however you are very vocal against doing that when reading a book. You further say that if anybody is pulled out of the book enchantment than it is his own fault. You suggest that PJ failed--while the film appealed to many--and yet the book didn't because you weren't pulled out and those who were "well there just not reading it correctly".

There is a great inconsistency in the way you are judging the two. Admittedly I love the books far more than I do the movies. However I think the movies are more or less great in their own medium. Sadly we tend to compare the movies to the books too much (I am guilty of this at times) but the book cannot be translated perfectly into film. It is too deep, too powerful, and too well written to do such a feat. Not if we had 6 films could it even be done.

The difference being that books have a way of evoking our imagination and we are able to see, in a way, what we want. Whereas with the movie we are shown what we are seeing and little imagination is left. It's not that PJ per se but that he is operating under a different medium.

[davem]

Originally Posted by Mormegil

Davem if I may interject here it seems that you apply different standards of what art is to different mediums. The movies failed in your mind because of obvious primary world ideas you had of them, however you are very vocal against doing that when reading a book. You further say that if anybody is pulled out of the book enchantment than it is his own fault. You suggest that PJ failed--while the film appealed to many--and yet the book didn't because you weren't pulled out and those who were "well there just not reading it correctly". .

Maybe you're right, but....

I can't see the films as things in their own right, only as attempts at telling a pre-existing story, so what I'm referring to here is where & how (for me) the films fail to communicate the story, where they stop making sense in terms of Middle earth. The films are not an equal but different ways of telling the same story - what I mean by that is that we're not dealing with a pre existing myth or legend that Tolkien wrote a version of & PJ filmed a version of. LotR is Tolkien's story, as Tolkien told it. Any adaptation should be judged on whether it communicates the spirit & essence of the story well or badly. It doesn't have to put everything on screen exactly as it is in the book, but it must remain true to the source. If you're not going to do that, why adapt at all - why not write & tell your own story?

In essence this is my chief quibble. They didn't have to make these movies.

You are absolutely right as regards anyone watching the movies as movies - either because they don't know the books or because they are able to leave that 'baggage at the door. So, as I say, I am probably guilty of double standards in my criticism. I can only say though, that what the movie makers have done is to tell their own story not Tolkien's but by using so many of Tolkien's names & his basic storyline they make it inevitable that anyone who knows the original will be forced, whether they want to or not, to make comparisons between the book & the films. This is the risk all adaptors take.

Originally Posted by SPM

For someone who dislikes, or at least is ambivalent towards the films, you seem to have watched them (FotR at least) many more times than me.

Well, as I said, I wanted to love them. I also wanted to give them a chance to grow on me - which is why I spent that whole Sunday watching them. I've had to accept now, with some regret, that they do nothing much for me

Davem, I disagree with you profoundly when you seek to devalue your early reading experience (or so it seems to me), but that is to be expected given our differing views on the reader v author debate.

I don't so much 'devalue' it as recognise that while it was the starting point I've moved on in my capacity to appreciate & understand the work. In some ways that saddens me, because there is a loss of innocent 'wonder' which I struggle to recapture when re-reading. But that's been replaced with something else, which in this context I suppose would be have to be called 'informed' wonder - just as deep, if not deeper, but at the same time more 'profound', or so I like to think.

[Feanor of the Peredhil]

I think that I can explain the lapse in "flowiness". In The Fellowship of the Ring (book), it truly does flow. You begin with a few characters, and as the story continues, you meet more, but they are continually working together, doing new things, and headed off to save the world. That sort of thing. It's one group (growing, though it may be), that's got one agenda. And so, easily enough, the movie can follow that same idea.

I'll post more later (my ride just got here early) but it'll be along the lines of "and then in book/movie two, the plot lines split which makes for inevitable choppiness in the flow of the film". You can't expect flow when you have two separate plots going on.

[Kath]

Going back to a much earlier point of davem's, I just wanted to disagree slightly.

when Frodo falls off the High Seat on Amon Hen he falls, given his size, the equivalent of about 18-20 feet onto his back

davem said that this destroyed the image of a secondary world, or at least pulled him out of it, but in this instance I found that it fit in. Smaller creatures can fall larger distances while sustaining less damage than bigger creatures. For example a cat can fall out of a 4th floor window and land without a scratch, whereas a human would break a good many bones. This fall of Frodo's and the fact that the Seat would be higher to him than a Man suits that theory.

What broke the illusion to me was then Aragorn leaping off the same Seat to face the orcs. Using the previous argument it should not have been possible for him to do this with no ill effect, and for it to look as though it was the same distance for him to 'fall' as it was for Frodo.

Then there was this

Then, as I've pointed out elsewhere, he (or the other writers) give speeches or experiences to one character that belong to another (Eowyn being given Faramir's dream of the Great Wave for instance) which remove the deeper meaning or significance of them.

Which I completely agree with. Tolkien wrote with a whole world and legend and history in his mind, so that what his characters said fit with their past, present and future. Changing this is just not an option if you want to make the film of the story. If this is done the film becomes a different story with the same elements.

[alatar]

Originally Posted by Kath

Smaller creatures can fall larger distances while sustaining less damage than bigger creatures. For example a cat can fall out of a 4th floor window and land without a scratch, whereas a human would break a good many bones. This fall of Frodo's and the fact that the Seat would be higher to him than a Man suits that theory.

What broke the illusion to me was then Aragorn leaping off the same Seat to face the orcs. Using the previous argument it should not have been possible for him to do this with no ill effect, and for it to look as though it was the same distance for him to 'fall' as it was for Frodo.

Really? I will have to check with my physicist friend to be sure, but thought that all objects fall at the same rate. Force = mass x acceleration (or something), and so Frodo would hit the ground with less force than would Aragorn, due to their differing masses, but I think that both would be in for a bit of a jolt.

Have considered testing this out using me and my son, but then figured that it would only land me in the hospital either due to:

• the fall, as I would be the Aragorn-sized control, or

• getting caught by Mrs. alatar, who would not take lightly me indulging in such stupidity...

As long as the world is internally consistent, then I can go along for the ride. As posted elsewhere, inconsistencies like Saruman's fireball took me out of the movie.

In regards to cats, I think that they can 'fall' further due to (1) less mass, (2) instinctively decreasing the rate of descent by cupping their bodies, and (3) having anatomy more suited to such fun. A cat falling on its back will be hurt.

Anyway, on the other hand, ME is a fantasy world, and in a world of magic rings, wizards, incarnate evil, etc, a little fudging of reality can be expected.

Tolkien wrote with a whole world and legend and history in his mind, so that what his characters said fit with their past, present and future. Changing this is just not an option if you want to make the film of the story. If this is done the film becomes a different story with the same elements.

Agreed. 'Seeing' a character 'speak' another character's lines was like experiencing something akin (I assume) to schizophrenia.

[Lathriel]

I have to disagree with the people who say that ROTK has less magic. As soon as I read that I had to think of Gandalf on Shadowfax, leaving Minas Tirith to drive away the ringwraiths from the Gondorian army.
I was also thinking of the lighting of the beacons, Galadriel's phial, the charge of the Rohirrim, the Ring's destruction, and the grey havens. Those moments all had a magical feel for me.

[alatar]

Originally Posted by Lathriel

I was also thinking of the lighting of the beacons... Those moments all had a magical feel for me.

I would agree that the scenes/shots of the beacons blazing on the mountain tops etc were magical, yet this was just after the 'Pippin had to light the first one' stupidity, for which I've still never figured out the reasoning.