2JM, what you said, exactly. Look at the Bakshi and tell me it was easy to adapt LotR as well as Jackson did. Now find me the rabid ABM book fans who would tear the screenwriters limb from limb if it varied too far from their imagined ideal. Obviously LotR was the harder screenplay to adapt, after all, ABM is set in the real world, and there are no Elves, Dwarves, or Hobbits. Actually that's most of the problem I have with it, right there....