Confused about Quotations!!

[Bombadil]

I have this anger, this real anger! As I re-read the Lord of the Rings, I come across some quotes that Jackson picked for his movie. I don't kow why it annoys me so - but WHY does he have to change around every quote one or two words!!! Why couldn't he use the exact words of Tolkien? Were there copyright issues? I don't think so, considering he uses some lines dead on, in particular:

I will not say do not weep, for not all tears are an evil.

And I'm sure (or i hope) there are some more. Is he exercising poetic license? If anyone knows why please reply!

Another side question- perhaps better for discussion purposes: Why do you think PJ went into such detail in certain clips than others? You have clips like when Frodo is leaving the Shire, and there's so much detail skipped over - but for some reason Jackson made his clip for Smeagol and Deagol in the beginning of ROTK almost word for word with the description! You may now...discuss!

[Son of Númenor]

Obviously, there were no copyright issues for the Lord of the Rings film trilogy. Jackson, Walsh and Boyens certainly did exercise a good deal of "poetic license" - or perhaps a better term is creative license - in writing the movies' scripts. I think much of this has to do with 'streamlining' the dialogue so that modern audiences feel comfortable with their understanding of the plot. Whether it worked or not is arguable, but I would be interested in seeing a few examples where the quotes are slightly changed for seemingly no reason. I cannot recall any off the top of my head.

[Elianna]

I can easily recall two slightly misquotes:

Movie: In Lothlórien, Lego explans about the Lament for Gandalf "I have not the heart to tell you, for me the grief is still too near."

Book: It's paraphrazed and say that Legolas' reason for not translating the Lament was "he had not the skill nor the heart to tell them, for him the grief was still too near; a matter still for tears, not yet for song."

(1,2,3...) Awwwwwwwww, that would've been so great in the movie. I can understand leaving out the skill part, but why the matter still for tears part?

Movie: When Éomer meets with Aragorn and Co., "I would cut off your head, Dwarf, if it stood a little higher from the ground."

Book: "I would cut off your head, Master Dwarf, beard and all, if it stood a little higher from the ground."

Leaving out Master...okay...to make modern movie-goers not feel out of place, but why leave out the 'beard and all'? They already have the "Not the beard!" that everyone would remember.

And then of course, Celeborn steals Legolas' line (that should be used in the next movie) about the Uruks traveling in the sunlight. That I understand, it works. And Arwen says the "Isildur's heir, not Isildur himself" line that is actually Aragorn's from the Counsil, but that too is understandable.

One thing of switching lines around that really gets me is in RotK:

Movie: Aragorn and Gandalf are talking in Edoras about Frodo's quest. Aragorn: "What does your heart tell you?"

Book: Gandalf is talking to Pippin and asks him the same question. Let me say that again: he's talking with Pippin!! They change around the lines so that Gandalf's words of comfort and wisdom are said to him, when they were supposed to be said to Pippin, the Tom-fool of a Took!

Oh yeah, and another reassigning of lines that I hate: "So fair, fair and cold, like a morning of pale spring still clinging to winter's chill." (I know even that is slightly changed from the book, but I actually like the change.) In the book, this is thought by Aragorn, and who gets this line, the line gorgeous beyond reason, in the movie? Gríma! So you're like "Oh that's so gorgeous, but you can't like it because Mr. Slime-ball is saying it." I say change Aragorn's "daughter of Kings" to "fair and cold...." and make up something cool, but when you think about it: perverted, for Gríma to say.

Oh, and slightly on topic: "The very warmth of my blood seems stolen away." I think they just thought this line was really cool and from the books, and so stuck it rather crudely as Aragorn and Co. are approaching the Door of the Dead. Listen to it the next time you watch it: Nothing is said leading up to that, and nothing is said afterwards. And actually, the line is Beregond's when the Nazgûl's shadow falls on Minas Tirith. Gimli, at the Door of the Dead, says "My blood runs chill." Close, but not in the gold. Yes, "the very warmth of my blood seems stolen away" is as Tolkien-quese a line as you could ask for, but when it's so haphazardly stuck into the movie, it's distracting.

But all of that's just ranting. As to why they did this? I have no idea...

[The Only Real Estel]

The main reason that I can think of right off, Bombadil, is that PJ slightly changed some of the quote to make them more understandable/fit better.

For instance: When Aragorn tells the fellowship that they must move on because "By nightfall these hills will be swarming with orcs." the original line ( I'm guessing that means what PJ was going to put in, perhaps it's straight from the book? I don't have the time to look it up now :/ ) was "By nightfall these hills will be fair teeming with orcs.". I've gotta admit, I like the 1st better. I thought PJ did a great job with even using quotes from the books (although maybe adjusted slightly), but everyone has a thing that bugs them more than others.

[Bombadil]

Yeah, I would agree that in some cases it was better for viewers, but the real annoying quotes are ones he needlessly changes one word or two, or gives them to other characters. One in particular that annoys me is in the midgewater marshes when pippin says

what do they eat when they can't get hobbit?

this is said in the books, slightly different context, by Sam Gamgee. Those small changes are confusing to me.

[Firefoot]

I don't really mind that he changed the quotes around. What does bother me is when I am trying to remember a specific quote and I cannot remember exactly how it goes because the movie switched it up. That does bother me. The most specific one that I can think of right now is actually a very small one, but one of my favorite book quotes nonetheless: the movie says something like "I am glad that you are with me, Sam, here at the end of all things" whereas the book is "I am glad that you are here with me. Here at the end of all things, Sam." The part about Éomer talking about chopping off Gimli's head is another that bugs me a bit.

As to why, sometimes I think that the book uses 'higher' language (which I like very much) and like Estel said switching it around would make it flow better, and sound more 'common' so that people could better understand.

Edit: cross-posting with Bombadil...

[Lathriel]

For us who have read the books it is a loss but think of all those people who tried reading the books and never got past the first few chapters all this could be very confusing. Besides sometimes the exact quotes can be longwindede and for all those people who have such a short attention span, they could never handle it.

What I did like was that PJ took some of Tom Bombadil's quotes and made the other charcters say them. This way Tom Bombadil is still kinda in the movie.

[Gorwingel]

Yeah, normal people already thought that there was too much "Old English" language in the film anyway (even though there wasn't any at all). What happened was just basically a moderization of the languague used in the books. Though I understand why this would concern book readers. I remember when this caused the most trouble for me. About two years ago I was trying to find Gandalf's quote where he says: "So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide..." (a very familiar quote). I knew for a fact that the quote was in the book not where it was in the film. But I had forgotten where it was since the first few times I had read the book, so I went on a very detailed search, eventually finding it many, many, many chapters before Moria, even though I do think it did fit very much into the Moria scene. But the fact that the actual location was so far from the movie location did bother me a little.

[Essex]

I did some work on the quotes for the fellowship film a couple of years ago but never 'published' it on the web. (and I wouldn't have a cluse how to!) I took every line from the film and pointed to where it was taken from in the books.

It's surprising where Jackson gets the lines from. most were from FOTR, but he also get a smattering from the other lotr books, and in one case the silmarillion.

e.g. Frodo's last line in FOTR "I'm glad you're with me, Sam" was taking from his words to Sam after the Ring was destroyed on Mount Doom.

"Let us hunt some orc" was loosely taken from "We are hunting orc" Aragorn says to eomer in TT

Aragorn's "Sauron the Deceiver" was taken from the Silmarillion.

Also, different lines were given to different characters. ie, "Smoke rises from Mordor" was spoken by Boromir in the CoE rather than Saruman.

And Sam uses the word "Longshanks" for Aragorn, where it is Bill Ferny who says this in the book.

[Bombadil]

...but he also get a smattering from the other lotr books, and in one case the silmarillion.

Good observation Essex, and that would have to be something I like. Perhaps it's hippocracy to say so- but I do. One of my favorites is when he uses lines from The tale of Aragorn and Arwen in the Appendices. That was a very nice touch.

[Encaitare]

I'm not really bothered by this; in fact I get dorkily excited when I come across a line in the book that's identical/nearly identical to the movie. One line I wish PJ hadn't changed, though, is Gimli's line to Éomer:

Movie-version: "Give me your name, horse-master, and I shall give you mine."

Book-version: "Give me your name, horse-master, and I shall give you mine, and more besides." (I believe this is it, I haven't got TTT with me right now.)

I like the book version better, because it gives Eomer a reason to get all ****ed off at Gimli. In the movie it's more like, "hey, before I tell you who I am you'd better tell me first," and then it just makes Eomer look like a generally angry guy.

Oh, and in response to Elianna: I like the fact that Grima uses that line. His use of it characterizes him quite well, I think. True though, the line has totally different connotations depending on who says it. Aragorn thinks that part, except it's something like "A morning of pale spring not yet sprung to womanhood" or something of that ilk, which I think makes her sound too young. So I definitely prefer the movie version. But then Gandalf says the other part, "Who knows what she has spoken to the darkness..." which is spiffy as well.

Just my blathering thoughts.

[Tuor of Gondolin]

It's clear why some lines were changed or used by different speakers. I am irritated when "some fool of a scriptwriter" makes pointless changes. The worst may be "Let us hunt some orc" when it could have been:

Gimli or Leggy: "Can we catch up to the orcs?"
Aragorn: "Come. We will make such a chase as shall be accounted a marvel among the Three Kindreds: Elves, Dwarves, and Men. Forth the Three Hunters."

Or even just: "Let's hunt Orc. Forth the Three Hunters!"

[Reg Pither]

The two that really stuck out for me when watching the films were Gandalf's plea to Frodo to 'keep it safe, and keep it secret', which PJ changed to 'keep it secret, and keep it safe' - thus destroying the emphasis on the secrecy.

The other one was the missing out of the word 'altogether' twice in Treebeard's explanation that he is 'not altogether on anyone's side, as nobody is altogether on my side'. Again, nuance, depth and characterization are lost.

If PJ had been just a bit braver with taking more lines directly from the book, it would have helped the films feel immeasurably more 'Tolkien-esque', rather than the strange, clumsy hybrid of old and new dialogue that we hear so often.

[Elianna]

To Encaitare: (We seem to be spreading Gríma posts everywhere! )

You're right, it does give him character development, and I'm happy that somebody says it. In context, Aragorn thinks that she is "fair, fair and cold, like a morning of pale spring, not yet come to womanhood." If you think about it, to Aragorn, that's what it would seem like: He is four times her age! Still, I wish Aragorn had gotten to say it...


Another mangled line is when Pip and Treebread are talking about the Entwives:
Treebeard: We lost the Entwives.
Pip: Oh, I'm sorry. How did they die?
Movie-Treebeard: Die! No, we lost them and now we cannot find them.
Book-Treebeard: They did not die. I never said that they died. We lost them...

I think the only reason why I care about that is because I thought it was really funny, and memorized it before the EE came out without two of the sentences I had memorized. Still, it's more characteristic of Treebeard to say those two sentences...

Yeah, I'm just a whiny nit-picker.