Sad or Elated now the Movies are at an End?

[Mister Underhill]

Personally I have tried to embrace this era of cinematic super-people (arguably P.J.'s adaptations, especially his elvish shenanigans, are influenced by them), but mostly they leave me cold. I enjoyed Avengers through the lens of being an old Whedon fan, but even the latest one just sort of clanked away by the end of its busy CGI climax. I sort of miss the frail human-sized (and hobbit-sized) heroes of yesteryear. Which only goes to show, different strokes for different folks.

To the point of the thread: I am, elf-like, both sad and -- well, I can't say elated, maybe relieved is a better word -- that the films are now complete. Yes, it was basically all down hill after the (arguably!) middling watermark set by FotR EE, but even so. For a while there practically the whole world dreamed a dream of Middle-earth, and it was kind of beautiful. If truly irredeemable Hobbit films are the price I had to pay for the years of friendships and fun I've been able to enjoy here, then I came out on the rich end of that exchange for sure.

[Inziladun]

Originally Posted by alatar

Well, if not Marvel, then what about the Harry Potter movies? Surely there are those who would argue (both for and against) about whether each HP movie was true to its book or not.

Regardless, the HP movies are highly rewatchable and curiously focus on the title character, unlike those in the Hobbit trilogy. Wonder if that has something to do with the movies' watchabilities?

That's a good point about the HP not really losing focus.
Also, I can't at the moment recall any characters receiving major re-writes in contradiction to the books, or characters added that never appeared in the books.

Originally Posted by Mister Underhill

Personally I have tried to embrace this era of cinematic super-people (arguably P.J.'s adaptations, especially his elvish shenanigans, are influenced by them), but mostly they leave me cold. I enjoyed Avengers through the lens of being an old Whedon fan, but even the latest one just sort of clanked away by the end of its busy CGI climax. I sort of miss the frail human-sized (and hobbit-sized) heroes of yesteryear. Which only goes to show, different strokes for different folks.

I'm not a big fan of CGI myself. I think it's come to be an attraction in itself, with filmmakers vying to see how pretty they can make things look, at the expense of meaningful character and story development.

Originally Posted by Mister Underhill

To the point of the thread: I am, elf-like, both sad and -- well, I can't say elated, maybe relieved is a better word -- that the films are now complete. Yes, it was basically all down hill after the (arguably!) middling watermark set by FotR EE, but even so. For a while there practically the whole world dreamed a dream of Middle-earth, and it was kind of beautiful. If truly irredeemable Hobbit films are the price I had to pay for the years of friendships and fun I've been able to enjoy here, then I came out on the rich end of that exchange for sure.

Though I will never embrace Jackson's Tolkien efforts, I agree that at least the FOTR films, like I said earlier, were good for some rip-roarin', fun debates. I remember those days with fondness, Mister U.
It's that much more unfortunate that the Hobbit movies can't even seem to manage that.

[alatar]

Mr. Underhill, if I'm reading you right, I too started getting tired of the smashing robotfest that was Avengers II. Thankfully it was cut short, and the movie got back to other business.

Another mark against the Hobbit movies is that the LotR trilogy not only inspired me to join a Tolkien internet forum, but also to post weekly about groups of scenes where I carped about PJ's every misstep.

Not so here.

[Lotrelf]

"Obviously The Hobbit is the story of Thorin Oakenshield¡¯s quest for the Lonely Mountain, and Lord of the Rings is the story of Frodo¡¯s journey to try to destroy the ring. But they are nonetheless connected and they feed into each other and are in the same world."

Wow! This is weird.
And did the movie makers really read the book? I have nothing much to say on this but can someone gift a bunch of TH books to PJ & co. as they literally took the different meaning of the narrative? Perhaps this is the reason the movies are full of war stuff? The story of a king, his quest to get back his kingdom and wealth seem to have affected them a lot.

[Zigûr]

Yes I think it's interesting that the way PJ sees it is that he adapted "The Lord of the Rings" to be the story of a hobbit, but didn't adapt "The Hobbit" to be the story of a hobbit.

As for superhero films, of the recent (2008 onwards) batch I've enjoyed the first Iron Man, Thor and Captain America films (particularly Captain America) but I'm a bit bored of them now. At the same time, I am something of a comic book reader, but I mostly like old Fantastic Four and Captain America comics, at least as far as Marvel is concerned. I haven't read DC comics in a while. The changes they make for the films generally don't bother me too much because comic book stories are always changing, and they're collaborations of authors and artists with creative teams which change over time. For me there's a difference between, say, Marvel studios coming up with their own version of the Captain America story, which has already been through several iterations, and New Line adapting The Hobbit.

That being said, when they're adapting a specific comic, as they did with Captain America: The Winter Soldier, for instance, I do think they sometimes err when they diverge too heavily from the source material.

One of the things I think they missed was an opportunity to focus on the idea of the small person, Bilbo, among the events of history. By showing us too much, like Gandalf at Dol Guldur and the War of the Dwarves and Orcs, not only do we lose focus on Bilbo in general but we lose that sense of history going on around the protagonist just as much as he is involved in shaping it. Bilbo is very important to his own narrative, but I'd argue that it's equally important that he only glimpses the rest of what's been going on: the Necromancer is mentioned, but not seen. The War of the Dwarves and Orcs is mentioned, and Bilbo himself mentions it to Bard and the Elvenking, so evidently he knows or is informed about it at some point (apart from the party at the beginning I mean, in which Azog is mentioned), and the various goings on of the Dwarves and Men and Elves and so forth are all mentioned but the only frame of reference we really have, apart from a few more omniscient narrator moments, are things Bilbo learns, either at the time or after the fact.

That, I would argue, contains that "unexplained vistas" notion of which Professor Tolkien was fond. The films aren't willing to hold back, and disclose too much, which for me at least broke the illusion: perhaps it ought to be left to our imagination regarding what happened at Dol Guldur, for instance. Films are obviously a visual medium, but I often feel as if directors are too reluctant to convey information through dialogue. "The Hobbit" is one of those films where if you watched it with the sound off, you would probably be able to still have a vague idea of what was going on, significantly because of its obsession with cutaways and flashbacks.

[Belegorn]

I think about it in this way, that there will be other adaptations which makes it not the end all be all. Maybe the Hobbit will be one movie too in the future.

[Lotrelf]

Originally Posted by Belegorn

I think about it in this way, that there will be other adaptations which makes it not the end all be all. Maybe the Hobbit will be one movie too in the future.

Do fans make the movies too? If they do I suppose the film will be closer to the book's story as they won't have anything to show-off to earn money except the story and the real substance. Not sure if any big name in Hollywood can do the deserved justice to the book (in present time), but can hope this from fans if there are any adaptations from them.