Gandalf Vs. The Witch King

[Ibrîniðilpathânezel]

Shock didn't even begin to describe my reaction to that scene in Jackson's movie (I suppose it is very telling that 9 times out of 10, I accidentally type "Hackson" before correcting it. It IS an accident, at least consciously. But ah, I know my subconscious, and accidents like these are seldom really accidents...). What it confirmed to me was that he and his co-writers were intent on making LotR "their own," and they decided to change the story from a cooperative effort among many peoples to a focus on the rising "world of Men." Once we leave Lothlorien in their version of the story, other races are there to provide comic relief (Gimli) or spiffy extra-cool action (Legolas -- and I suspect that if the fan girls hadn't panted over Orlando Bloom, his role would have been downplayed). The point at which it became most painfully obvious to me that they didn't get it was the scene where Gandalf is supposedly comforting Pippin about death -- quoting Frodo's dream of Valinor, and equating it with the passage from life to the afterlife. Funny that Gandalf doesn't even recognize the description of the place he came from, and will go back to!

Oh, I shouldn't go on, my heartburn will never forgive me. But I will say that I'm not speaking as a lover of the books who despised the films from the start. I actually thought they made a reasonably good beginning in FotR (yes, I had some issues with it, but I did see promise in that film), which took a steep nosedive with (if not before) the warg-rider battle in TTT. At that point, it appeared to me that, the fan base for the movies having been established, Jackson and crew stopped making movies for the fans of Tolkien, and began making movies for fans of their own. Very sad. I hate it when something that begins well ends badly. And that bit with the Witch King and cowering Gandalf... cripes, you gave all the poor wizard's best lines to other people, couldn't you at least let him have his moment of glory standing fast at the gate...???

sigh