Split Personality?

[littlemanpoet]

Originally Posted by Sauron the White

People here say I was wrong because I was judging Gimli by human standards in the real world. Okay. Seems that is just what Eomer was doing in proclaiming their achievement as so worthy of being sung about.

Iconoclasm, my friend, is easy.

But mayhap it can be said that Elves, Dwarves, and Dunédain are exceptional. Eomer's exclamation does not necessarily reduce the accomplishment of the Three Hunters, who together can still be said to have done something exceptional by Eomer's standards, as well as by "exceptional Dwarf/Elf/Dunedain" standards.

But back to "mythic unities" and "secondary belief". (I have passed by most of page 3 in order to say this, so if someone feels neglected, apologies).

"Willing suspension of disbelief" is a concept invented by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, to account for the reader's task of setting aside 'real world' doubts in order to accept some 'difficult to believe' things in works of fiction.

"Secondary belief", a concept invented by J.R.R. Tolkien, means that a reader does not merely suspend disbelief, but for the purpose of full enjoyment of the work of fiction, chooses to believe the story, on the whole, on its own merits. Within this understanding, the author's dedication is to realize the world s/he creates as believably and completely as possible.

Tolkien made every attempt to make Secondary Belief possible for his readers. The result is that readers and lovers of LotR "believe in" Middle Earth in a way that they do not necessarily believe in other created settings from fiction.

Enter the movie.

Lovers of Middle Earth watch the movie and find their secondary belief in Middle Earth compromised, countered, and even violated, by images with which they are confronted in the movies, such as the glaringly different character of Faramir (among numerous other examples).

"But such people are not being realistic," one might say. That's not the point. The point is that Tolkien did something that had never been done before by a writer, at least not to the degree that he did it, which makes LotR qualitatively different from any other book out there. It is the most completely realized world of imagination ever created. Therefore, Peter Jackson was dealing with something with which he was completely out of his reckoning. So I think J.R.R. was right: the thing should not have been turned into film. That it was, is a fact. That it did not succeed for lovers of Middle Earth is an undeniable fact. That some of these same lovers of Middle Earth are willing to accept the movies as far as they can (such as myself), such that they enjoy what they can while wincing at other parts, is also - - a fact.

I guess I better show how "mythic unities" has to do with this in another post. I gotta go to bed now. G'night all.

[littlemanpoet]

Here's one additional thought. Due to the completeness of LotR in terms of Secondary belief, perhaps we lovers of Middle Earth are to a certain degree spoiled? Clearly Jackson is not of the same calibre as Tolkien; could we with justification expect better than having to suspend disbelief? I'm not certain; it's a query.

I have a little time for "mythic unity".

Actually, I started a thread with those words in the title, and it might be well for those interested, to take a look at that. I'd link to it here, but this computer (at work) is severely limited in its capabilities.

Suffice it to say that with "mythic unity", one sees a world writ large and whole. In terms of many things that we in the modern era have become used to seeing as distinct, Tolkien achieved a unity. Gollum/Smeagol is one example. He is not psychologically ill, something deeper and more complete is going on. Something more unified. With the movie, only one aspect of this unity was achieved. Could better than that have been done? That's debatable.

Are there any movies that DID achieve mythic unity? Food for thought.

[Sauron the White]

So I think J.R.R. was right: the thing should not have been turned into film.

Ah but it was. And who do we have to thank for that?

JRRT sold the film rights with full knowledge of the process. This is not like some author in 1918 selling film rights to a fledgling film industry and then claiming that they had no idea of what they were getting into. To this day I wince when I read the comments of JRRT in is letters saying that he felt they could not make the film anyways. "Okay, I will sell you this swamp land to build a highrise building on since I know you cannot do it ." That certainly brings up some ethical questions.

There is an obvious relationship between willing suspension of disbelief and secondary belief. Many of us like to think that the things we love are so very different than anything else and their are special rules which only apply to that one thing. "Don't tell me about that other stuff because my love is unique and special." Almost everything is unique and special in its own way but still can have much in common with other things. I think these two concepts are certainly family members and not so different from one another.

[littlemanpoet]

Originally Posted by Sauron the White

JRRT sold the film rights with full knowledge of the process. This is not like some author in 1918 selling film rights to a fledgling film industry and then claiming that they had no idea of what they were getting into. To this day I wince when I read the comments of JRRT in is letters saying that he felt they could not make the film anyways. "Okay, I will sell you this swamp land to build a highrise building on since I know you cannot do it ." That certainly brings up some ethical questions.

If you're going to cast aspersions on J.R.R. Tolkien, at least get your facts straight. It's time for you to do some research, if you care. As in, Tolkien died in 1973. The film rights were sold, when? However, there seems to be a bit of a "mosquito near the ear" ambience to the post, so if you're just trying to get someone's dander up, never mind.

[Sauron the White]

And just what is it that I am suppose to research? Am I mistaken that JRRT sold the film rights to his movies of his free will and with a sound mind? Will research tell me differently? Am I mistaken that JRRT expressed the feeling that the book was unfilmable? Will research tell me otherwise?

Authors had been selling film rights to their books for several decades before JRRT did so. It is not like he was the first to do so and the entire book-to-film territory was virginal and untouched.

What exactly did I have wrong in my facts?

Seems to me one of two things went on here.

Either 1) JRRT sold the film rights to LOTR as a responsible adult with his eyes wide open, of sound mind, and with knowledge of how the entire process worked. He knew that by selling the rights, the purchaser had the right to use the story, make changes to it, leave out portions, add new portions, and basically do anything they wanted to do. JRRT knew that and sold the rights, signed the contracts and cashed the check.

0r 2) JRRT sold the film rights thinking that no producer could make the film, he himself speculated that possibly the LOTR was essentialy unfilmable. Thinking that he would have the best of both worlds - the Hollywood money without the Hollywood movie.

This from Humphrey Carpenter

"Last Friday morning (11 August) Kim Hill of Radio New Zealand interviewed Humphrey Carpenter, the biographer of J.R.R. Tolkien. The interview was on the subject of Humphrey Carpenter's latest work, a biography of playwright Dennis Potter, but towards the end of the interview Ms Hill asked Carpenter what he thought Tolkien's reaction would have been to "The Lord of the Rings" being filmed.
Carpenter's response was interesting. He said that he had known JRRT fairly briefly (unlike Potter, whom he never met), and that he (Carpenter) had staged a production of "The Hobbit". JRRT's reaction to this production was that he considered his works to be unstageable; he simply didn't feel that they could be successfully translated to a dramatic form. Although he had sold the film rights long before this took place, he had no real expectation that "The Lord of the Rings" could be successfully filmed.

In front of me is a volume of THE LETTERS --- #202, the famous line "I have agreed on our policy: Art or Cash. Letter #207 - "But I need, and shall very soon need very much indeed, ,money ..."

And to reenforce the assumption voiced by JRRT's biographer Carpenter, we have Letter #194.... "Here is a book very unsuitable for dramatic or semi-dramatic representation."

Which one was it? What did JRRT opt for? What was his goal in selling the film rights when he did?

[littlemanpoet]

Originally Posted by Sauron the White

JRRT sold the film rights with full knowledge of the process. This is not like some author in 1918 selling film rights to a fledgling film industry and then claiming that they had no idea of what they were getting into. To this day I wince when I read the comments of JRRT in is letters saying that he felt they could not make the film anyways. "Okay, I will sell you this swamp land to build a highrise building on since I know you cannot do it ." That certainly brings up some ethical questions.

My initial reaction to this was, "Surely he has got to be kidding! Is he actually going to try to drag Tolkien's good name through the mud? This is a new low."

Upon further consideration it occurred to me that something else might be happening here:

I admit I am pushing things to force the issue so a little anger now and then is partly my fault.

If this is the case, which I think may well be, I have no desire to be involved in such a (in my opinion) useless debate as Tolkien's personal character, which simply should not be in question; the facts are already well laid out in Carpenter's biography and Tolkien's Letters (despite the above attempt to create "a seeming" of what's not really there). Tolkien's character is not the issue of this thread.

Peter Jackson's character was not an issue in this thread either, until it was raised by the one person most bent on defending the movies, and I don't think it was intentional even if the logical implications of what was said were clear. I still don't think Jackson was intentionally misleading Tolkien fans; I think he really believed he could do what he said he could; he just didn't succeed.

There is an obvious relationship between willing suspension of disbelief and secondary belief. Many of us like to think that the things we love are so very different than anything else and their are special rules which only apply to that one thing. "Don't tell me about that other stuff because my love is unique and special." Almost everything is unique and special in its own way but still can have much in common with other things. I think these two concepts are certainly family members and not so different from one another.

I'm happy to discuss this, but you're beating around the bush. Please come to the point.

However, it's clear enough to me that one of the implications being raised in the above quote is that the distinction between suspension of disbelief and secondary belief are purely subjective. They are not. I will quote Tolkien at length from On Fairy Stories

Children are capable, of course, of literary belief, when the story-maker's art is good enough to produce it. That state of mind has been called "willing suspension of disbelief." But this does not seem to me a good description of what happens. What really happens is that the story-maker proves a successfuly "sub-creator." He makes a Secondary World which your mind can enter. Inside it, what he relates is "true": it accords with the laws of that world. You therefore believe it, while you are, as it were, inside. The moment disbelief arises, the spell is broken; {my underline} the magic, or rather art, has failed. You are then out in the Primary World again, looking at the little abortive Secondary World from outside. If you are obliged, by kindliness or circumstance, to stay, then disbelief must be suspended (or stifled), otherwise listening and looking would become intolerable. But this suspension of disbelief is a substitute for the genuine thing, a subterfuge we use when condescending to games or make-believe, or when trying (more or less willingly) to find what virtue we can in the work of an art that has for us failed.

This is precisely what many lovers (from the books) of Middle Earth experience when confronted with the failures in the movies. The spell is broken when Aragorn and Farmair lack in nobility; when Gollum is portrayed as a psychologically ill victim instead of as evil; when the Elves arrive at Helm's Deep where they cannot logically be (that is, within the logic of the Middle Earth created by the master). And so forth.

Again, let me stress that I do not consider Jackson to be a "shyster" who "faked us out"; rather, he believed he could do it and was wrong. Therefore we lovers of Middle Earth must, of necessity, willingly suspend our disbelief because too often the spell is broken. Mind you, there are many points in the movie at which Middle Earth is beautifully realized, and Secondary Belief happens, but it is a hit-and-miss game such that the spell is too often broken and we hang in there until and unless the experience becomes "intolerable", as Tolkien has described it.

One more point: there is a "for us" in the last sentence of the text I've quoted from Tolkien. This would be wrongly construed to render the entire quote "subjective". The distinction between "willing suspension of disbelief" and "secondary belief" remains an objective distinction which readers and viewers, as group of "subjects," experience. The distinction remains an objective reality.

[Sauron the White]

Okay -- here is what I think you are attempting to do. Over the past couple of weeks, I have said repeatedly that I see a double standard in use by some members of this board, a type of hypocrisy if you will. They have a deep love for the writings of JRRT. As is necessary in this type of fiction, they employ willing suspension of disbelief to get past various flaws, holes, internal conflicts or other things that may get in the way of enjoying the stories. That is fine and we all do it. I mentioned that when it comes to the films, the same people who can go through all manner of intellectual gymnastics to explain away any problem, cannot or will not extend that same spirit to Jackson. Instead, they relish and rather enjoy attempting to poke holes throught the Jackson movies. I use the examples in both the Denethors Plunge and the whole "Gimli running 140 miles" debate.

I asked for fairness -- please use that same willing suspension of disbelief in discussing the movies.

But now you introduce something different. This entire line of SECONDARY BELIEF that Tolkien talks about. To be frank, I think you are taking willing suspension of disbelief, dressing it up in a more expensive gown, attempting to put some lipstick and make-up on it and declaring it something unique and special that covers only the writings of Tolkien. I think you are doing this to have another trump card ready. I really do not buy it.

Regarding JRRT's character in the film rights. All I have done is to use the historical record as laid out by JRRT in his Letters and the comments from his official biographer. It is clear to me that, at various stages of chronology, JRRT
a) did not want a film made of LOTR and felt it could not be made
b) was interested in the idea of a film but wanted to be involved and his suggestions implemented to get the type of film he wanted to be made
c) was faced with the choice of "art or cash"
d) decided in favor of cash knowing full well what went with that

That much has been established both in the Letters and through historical developments.

[Formendacil]

Originally Posted by Sauron the White

Regarding JRRT's character in the film rights. All I have done is to use the historical record as laid out by JRRT in his Letters and the comments from his official biographer. It is clear to me that, at various stages of chronology, JRRT
a) did not want a film made of LOTR and felt it could not be made
b) was interested in the idea of a film but wanted to be involved and his suggestions implemented to get the type of film he wanted to be made
c) was faced with the choice of "art or cash"
d) decided in favor of cash knowing full well what went with that

That much has been established both in the Letters and through historical developments.

And I don't think anyone is disputing those facts, exactly. The disputation I'm seeing has more to do with the interpretation of what those facts mean.

On that note, I'm woefully unclear: what exactly ARE you interpreting those facts to mean?

[Sauron the White]

JRRT was a responsible adult who willingly entered into a binding legal contract to sell LOTR to a third party for the purposes of dramatic or film rights. He willingly did so knowing full well what this process entailed and involved. He could have
a- not sold the rights at all, or
b - negotiated a sale for possibly less money but retaining some type of artistic control over the result.
But he did neither of these.

At the same time, JRRT believed that the book would not lend itself to a film or stage presentation. He believed that such a transition to another medium would not be successful.

I think rather than me tell you what these facts may mean, I ask others here what they mean to you?

Why would you sell someone somthing when you were on record as believing that the purchasing party would not be able to realize the value in their part of the bargain?

[littlemanpoet]

Originally Posted by Sauron the White

But now you introduce something different. This entire line of SECONDARY BELIEF that Tolkien talks about. To be frank, I think you are taking willing suspension of disbelief, dressing it up in a more expensive gown, attempting to put some lipstick and make-up on it and declaring it something unique and special that covers only the writings of Tolkien. I think you are doing this to have another trump card ready. I really do not buy it.

If this is what you think, then you misunderstand. I'm not ingenious enough to trot out something new and different as some special trump card. Secondary Belief has been discussed by me and others over the years quite often in other threads, notably in Books discussions.

I have experienced Secondary Belief in my reading of the works of J.K. Rowling, Orson Scott Card, C.S. Lewis, and other authors. I have experienced Secondary Belief watching the first three Star Wars movies, the Harry Potter movies, and most of the Indiana Jones movies.

But the Indiana Jones movies offer an example of the spell being broken. In the 2nd movie, Indiana and another character are in a mine car rolling down the track at breakneck speed, careening nearly out of control. Suddenly the track stops at a gorge, and the cart is careering wildly in mid-air - - and lands perfectly on the tracks again on the other side of the gorge. I grinned and said, "Uh uh! No way!" And suddenly I experienced myself looking at the movie screen, in which the action was occurring, rather than being inside the movie with the hero. The spell had been broken. I was able to get back into the movie and experience secondary belief again, but it took an effort of willingly suspending my disbelief.

I have also experienced secondary belief watching the LotR movies. But the spell is often broken by something that just doesn't work for me. Now this is important: if I had never read the books, these problems would not have occured. I understand that. The reason the problems occur is because the books kept me at Secondary Belief the entire way through. I believed it, writ whole. I had been in Middle Earth while I read the books. So every instance ~ yes, every instance ~ at which the movies alter from the book, the spell is broken.

At such points I am faced with the task of evaluating whether the instance must be overlooked as something necessary to make the movie work. I try to overlook these instances, for this 'moviemaking' reason, as often as possible; but sometimes it just simply cannot be done because the instance violates something deeply written into the book, and it violates my Secondary Belief. Such as the consistently noble character of Aragorn. Such as the character of Faramir. Such as the evil of Gollum. Such as the heroic suffering ~ not gollumization ~ of Frodo. Such as the unswerving loyalty ~ not rivalry with Gollum ~ of Samwise. Such as the unity of purpose between Gandalf, Theoden, Aragorn, and Legolas as opposed to the needless bickering that occurs in the movie.

But I'll end this post on a positive note. Secondary belief occurs in the movie, for me, when Eowyn and Merry overcome the Witch King. When the Rohirrim ride into battle at the Pelennor Fields. When Gandalf and the Balrog fall and fall into the deeps of the mountain. On Weathertop. Viewing Hobbiton. Watching the Seven Beacons in the White Mountains lit one by one. This is some gorgeous stuff, and I loved the realization on the cinema screen of something that had been inscribed upon my imagination by a great story from the books. I just wish more of the movie could have been that way.

[davem]

I suppose that the things that broke my 'Secondary belief' in the movie had more to do with the illogicalities than anything else - I could list Boromir being hurled a good twenty feet across the Chamber of Mazarbul into a stone wall & just being mildly stunned, Frodo falling from the Seat of Seeing on Amon Hen the equivalent (given his size) of about thirty feet for a man onto his back & just getting up & shaking his head, the Rohirrim charging down a 45 degree scree slope into pike (or the same suicidal manouvre carried out on the Pelennor Fields - Tolkien was well enough informed to know that cavalry never, ever, charge pike & so has the Rohirrim smash into the enemy flank without warning). I won't even go into Denethor's 3 mile run from the Hallows to the precipice while aflame (or the silliness of having no wall there - the Gondorian Health & Safety executive would have had apoplexy!) I could go on....

I think that that kind of thing, far more than the character changes, was what really made it impossible for me to accept the movies.