Posted on 05/19/2002 5:01:59 PM PDT by HairOfTheDog
I volunteer!
"...some changes from the book have to be predicted, for example Elrond and Galadriel's participation to the battle of Helm's Deep, and the demise of the wizard Saruman...."
From Premiere Magazine/TORN.
somehow I doubt she makes sandwiches....
But it would bring some interesting comic relief!
Well, you can believe this if you want, I'm still undecided. I got this from a...place...anyway, this guy claims to be a friend of somebody who has seen the most recent 'rough cut' of the Two Towers, seemingly the version seen by the MPAA. It "is running at a little over three hours and is about ten days from being locked."
Anyway, some of the key points he mentioned are below. I'm not totally convinced about this yet because some of the information seems to contradict what we've been led to believe recently. I do not know who wrote this, so I can't really vouche for him. Decide for yourselves:
We only had a quick chat about things but he said that, in his opinion, TTT was a better film than FoTR - in his words, much better.He said the film had time to breathe and some of the character development was very interesting. Apparently Woods' potrayal of Frodo by the end of TTT is harrowing and makes him wonder just how dark this portion of the tale will become in RoTK.
He felt the Battle of Helm's Deep was slightly too long and might be snipped a bit before the lock. He was concerned that showing so much violence but trying to keep that violence within PG13 boundaries sort of made things a bit numbing and repetitive. Although he admitted that some aspects of the siege and especially the incursions of the Uruks were spectacular. He really liked the Uruks who burst into the caves and the action which followed.
He also thought the charge of Gandalf the White into the massed ranks of Saruman's force was very impressive. Treebeard was excellent when relatively static, but needs work when he moves. The Wargs are undergoing plenty of work and, he assures me, look much more wolf-like than like giant Guinea pigs.
He said the Fell beasts( Maq - Nazgul's creatures ) were particularly good, looking ancient, evil and serpentine. There is one set of scenes involving one of these, Frodo, Sam and Gollum which he says is more spine chilling than all of the black rider material in FoTR.
He didn't like the Morannon, but he isn't a fan of the angular look to Sauron and his works. He thought the Oliphaunts were very good indeed, and the rampaging beast particularly impressive.
Arwen apparently recieves more screen time than in FoTR and is more than likely now to be in several scenes which contain Eowyn.
Saruman does not die in TTT - he could easily, as scenes were shot depicting this, but not on the spiked wheel of death.
The Ents attack on Isengard was in place but was still in a relatively crude and unfinished condition when my source saw the footage.
Gollum was said to be the best CGi character my guy has ever seen, both in terms of interaction with the other characters as well as in rendering. There were still some problems with his positioning in respect of scenery and slightly floating above it, but this will be ironed out.
Faramir was supposed to be really quite good, which surprised me, but I didn't hold with the idea of going to Osgiliath. Although they do capture Gollum here, slinking in the river.
There was no mention at all of the score but he did say that a lot of sound FX were missing or partial.
LOL! Very mysterious! Hanging out in shady places Maq? I don't know, some of it sounds plausible.... But yet, some not compared to some of the other rumors.! Good grist for the mill anyway!
Hunh?! Saruman dies at the hand of Wormtongue in ROTK, right?!
FReegards...MUD
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