Dumbing it down

[the phantom]

I should add (in references to the phantom’s point) that individual experiences provide little evidence of a film’s popularity (and therefore, relevance and accessibility). Critics’ reviews, awards and, most important of all, audience figures, provide much better evidence.

You do realize I was never trying to say that the movie would've been more popular? My whole point was that had they been faithful to the book it would've done next to nothing to popularity. It would've done next to nothing to awards and critics.

Almost every last thing that was good about the movie (what made it popular) was all Tolkien. The experiences of my friends watching the movie were included to demonstrate that much of what Jackson added got in the way.

Making the movie "right" would've cleared up the PJ problems, made us happier, and likely not done a thing to popularity.

And also, considering that every person I have watched the film with has been confused by at least one of Jackson's add-ons, I think that my "individual experience" does matter. My individual experience is a testament to PJ not making the movie easier to understand.

And if he didn't make it easier to understand then how was he making it more accessible for the masses? Yes, Saucepan Man, it was very popular and accessible, but you don't seem to get that it does not mean the same thing as more popular and accessible.

(Plus, if "individual experience" doesn't matter then why the heck are we posting? Why are we giving opinions on anything? We should just say "LOTR sold a lot of tickets and won a lot of awards so we can't say anything about it. We can't talk about making changes. It was obviously popular so there's no way we can make it any better.")