Posted on 12/15/2004 8:31:01 PM PST by goldstategop
I was a little diappointed with the EE. Maybe my expectations were too high but I couldn't wait to see the Legolas/Gimli drinking game and it fell completely flat with me. The two things I REALLY liked were the Eomer/Eowyn scene and the Mouth of Sauron. I think that scene with MoS was a good example of psychological warfare and if nothing else gave us a glimpse of just how evil Sauron is.
Thanks for the ping. I'll have to check out the EV next week (I've a million things to do now -- can't believe Christmas is next week already!).
Everything I didnt like about the origional length I feel better about.
The mouth of Sauron however was a man in the books who was corrupt and i liked the irony of that.
I also disliked the way they did the encounter with sauramon. In the books I like how he starts messing with king Theodens men. Its a victory for Teoden because he isnt charmed by Sauramons voice as he was before.
If you gotta put a book as big as Lord of the Rings into three movies there are gonna be some changes that must be made. Books and movies flow in a different manner.
Thanks Peter Jackson and all involved. I smiled alot for four hours!
Point taken. I was, of course, thinking of civilized kings.
I, too enjoyed the EE's-I was lucky enough to view it with hobbits, elves, and wizards in both AL and TX-first on Tuesday night, then Saturday night.
On Saturday night, we waxed nostalgic that a year ago, we were in the midst of Trilogy Tuesday bliss.
I felt with the first two films that the extra footage almost uniformly made them much better films (and they were outstanding to begin with). I am not so clear on that verdict with ROTK.
1) Getting the "Voice of Saruman" scene back in was obviously a must and up until the conclusion a reasonable telescoping of it down into a couple minutes. I still have mixed feelings on Saruman's death. On the upside it was an analogue of his actual death in the book, being at the hands of a defiant Wormtongue with Wormtongue in turn slain by an arrow. On the other it seemed over the top, with Saruman perched at the top of Orthanc rather than the balcony solely to make his fall more spectacular. On the whole I would rather it had finished up as in the book, with Grima tossing the palantir at Gandalf, and Saruman left to rot in the Tower. But it's not fatal to the film.
2) The drinking contest was - by pretty much everyone's assessment - something of a miss. Perhaps it goes over well with the very casual audience. It is jarring seeing Legolas take part in a drinking contest, although now that I think about it the Wood Elves of Mirkwood (from whence Legolas hails) do like their drink, as we learned in The Hobbit...
3) I realize Eowyn techincally has Numenorean blood from her grandmother, Morwen of Lossarnach, but it seems odd taking Faramir's Downfall of Numenor dream and giving it to her. I suppose I should be thankful that this most archetypal of Tolkien dreams made it in at all. Since the Numenor backstory has been essentially excised, maybe it makes little difference. The only difficulty is that the Eowyn story has been even more overbuilt, and only minimal resolution is provided for her in the brief Houses of Healing scene.
4) The Paths of the Dead are even more overdone than before. The ghostly hands reaching up for the travelers was actually a nice touch, and I would rather have seen moe of that kind of disembodied menace than the over-the-top "Haunted House" treatment Jackson gave the sequence, let alone the Indiana Jones skull landslide twist he adds on in the EE. In the book the King of the Mountains has but one direct meeting with Aragorn, when he breaks his spear at the end. PJ obviously felt this was too underplayed. But as we have learned, sometimes less is more when you are trying to build a sense of terror. The idea of Araagorn & Co ending up directly at Pelargir on exiting the Paths is an obvious compression which also removes the difficulty posed by the escape of the horses (something I was jarred by in the theatrical release - "Good Lord," I said at the time, "Are they going to run the whole hundred leagues to the Anduin?")...the best I can come up with to harmonize it with the books is that the Corsairs sailed all the way up the River Morthond.
5) Aragorn's confrontation with the palantir was nice to see back in the movie. And beneficial to his character. Except for the Arwen vision (again).
6) So was the Houses of Healing scene. On the whole, Aragorn benefits the most from the new footage, save the beheading of the Mouth of Sauron - a scene nicely done until its conclusion. It's simply out of character. One suspects that Fran and Philippa were out of the room when Jackson added these splatter film touches.
7) Gandalf on the other hand, seems even more diminished. Gandalf's advice at the Last Debate is already transferred to Aragorn, making the wizard seem like a doubting pillar of despair. Now he's defeated, albeit incompletely, by the Witch King.
It's yet another instance of Jackson taking book scenes and ratcheting them up for maximum effect. A scene must end with a powerful and striking climax or not at all. Sometimes there's a wisdom to that because generally that strategy pays off well on screen - but not always.
8) Adding in the extra Mordor footage was a nice touch. Largely from the book. Makes the loss of the orc armor explicable.
9) Too much Arwen. Too much Arwen. Romance is good but virtually every cutaway we see to her in TTT and ROTK seems contrived.
10) Faramir benefits tremendously from the extra footage even more than in the Two Towers, especially in the confrontation with his father (the vision of Boromir coming up from behind was a particularly nice touch) and giving him Gandalf's lines about the Ring worked well enough. Denethor, however, does not, his madness left unexplained even by despair over the death of his son. Had his confrontation with Sauron through the Palantir been left in, it would have rendered his madness at least explicable in some sense. What we get instead is just, well, madness.
11) A plot hole I just remembered: Saruman is depicted as knowing about Frodo's mission to destroy the Ring. This presents a tremendous difficulty, given that Sauron is able to pick Saruman's mind clean every time they converse through the palantir. And if Sauron knows, the game is over.
12) The Crossroads was a nice "book touch" I welcomed.
Were it up to me, I would have added in the confrontation with the corsairs, the Houses of Healing scenes with Aragorn and Faramir (Mrs. Iguana quite enjoyed the first: "Aragorn can come heal ME anytime!") to wrap up Eowyn's storyline, and perhaps the debate between Denethor and Faramir, easily the most powerful scene in the new footage. In all: perhaps just an extra 5 minutes of screentime that would have significantly improved the movie. The rest was best left for the extended DVD.
So Jackson gets more nicks for questionable choices inthis final installment, as Jonathan Last noted over at the Weekly Standard. Still, it's hard not to be unimpressed with what he has achieved. He filmed the unfilmable and made what now seems to be the best fantasy epic ever brought to the screen - Star Wars included.
Where can you do that?
There's a card explaining how that comes with the ROTK Extended Edition package. Costs $3.00 in shipping.
Agreed! I found myself with tears in my eyes. I don't think that the LOTR movie experience will be matched for a long, long time.
I have some questions for LOTR fans.
1. If Sauron made the one ring, who made all the others? Why did Gandalf have one of the elven rings when he is not an elf?
Was Gollum ever good during the Two Towers or was he always scheming.
2. When Frodo returns to the shire, he is obviously ill because of the ring, but is he dying?
Bilbo had the ring for a long time, Frodo had it for a year and it made him so ill. Why didn't bilbo get sick?
3. The gray havens, what exactly happens to them i.e. Frodo, Bilbo and Gandalf?
4. Does Legolas go the gray havens?
5. What happens to Gimli?
Thats it for now, I know I will think of some more.
Thanks everybody.
Oh I think through the extended editions for the TT and ROTK they did. Faramir comes across now as much more sympathetic and noble figure - but certainly more conflicted than he appears in the book. Not mutilated any longer - or if you apply that epithet you would also have to apply it to Aragorn who is also more conflicted than he appears in the book.
Sauron made several rings, giving 9 to mortal men and 7 to the dwarf lords. There may have been others. The 9 mortal men became the ringwraiths, the 7 dwarf rings were used by the dwarfs to discover treasure, but by the time of the story all 7 dwarf rings are presumed to be destroyed.
The three Elven rings were made by the elves. One was given to Elrond, one to Galadriel, and the third to Cirdan (a shipwright at the Grey Havens). When the wizards show up in Middle Earth, Cirdan gives his to Gandalf to aid him in his labors.
Was Gollum ever good during the Two Towers or was he always scheming.
Gollum/Smeagol almost turns away from evil. Just before he leads Frodo and Sam to the tunnel, he watches Frodo sleeping and feels a sense of pity or remorse. However Sam wakes up and see's him and accuses him of sneaking about. Gollum reacts angrily to the accusation and from that moment forward there was no further indication that he was to be redeemed.
2. When Frodo returns to the shire, he is obviously ill because of the ring, but is he dying?
Not in the sense of immenent mortality, but he has grown weary of the world and still cares the physical pain of his journey. Because he carried something so fundamentally evil and which was not part of the naturual world, he could never have had peace in Middle Earth. His only hope for a peaceful end to his days was in the Lands beyond the sea (where the elves and Gandalf return to.)
Bilbo had the ring for a long time, Frodo had it for a year and it made him so ill. Why didn't bilbo get sick?
This is a bit of plot hole in both the book and the movie. Essentially one could say that as Saruon awakes, the power of the ring also awakes. Also as Frodo takes the ring closer to Mordor, the power of the ring to do evil increases.
3. The gray havens, what exactly happens to them i.e. Frodo, Bilbo and Gandalf?
The ship leaves for the Undying Lands. This is the land where angelic beings and the powers that made the world reside. The elves leave the Undying Lands as told in book, "The Silmarillion" in rebellion. Gandalf is actually an angelic being called a Maia but he has taken human form (and is limited by his human form) to help the free peoples of Middle Earth to battle against Sauron (who is also a Maia.)
So imagine that Gandalf would shed his human appearance when he returns to the Undying Lands. However Bilbo and Frodo, being mortal, would live out the span of their years in peace.
4. Does Legolas go the gray havens?
Yes but not until many years have passed (he leaves after Aragorn dies of old age).
5. What happens to Gimli?
He goes either Legolas having received a special dispensation from Galadriel to go to the Undying Lands.
If these questions interest you, I HIGHLY recommend "The Silmarrilion", which is told in a completely different style from TLOTR (as the TLOTR is told in a completely different style from "The Hobbit"). TS is written like Greek mythology, so that may be off-putting to you, but the stories are truly beautiful.
Wow, thanks for the detailed response! I really enjoyed reading it.
I posted the same questions on another Hobbit thread and received a somewhat different answer concerning the Gray Havens. Others have said that Frodo and Bilbo would actually have to die to go the the Havens since they are mortal and the Havens symbolizes Heaven. Is that what Tolkien meant?
On question 2 part 2 don't forget that Frodo was also stabbed by a Ringwraith, which poisoned his soul to some extent. That probably made him a lot more susceptible to the ring's effect, and left him with permanent damage to body and soul.
"Lying" about Faramir's immediate and consistent despising of Sauron's ring does great harm to a key element in the entire story, as well as to the depiction of this character. I.e., a human can and actually did outright and utterly refuse the allure of corrupt power over others. After to this, it was he that was blessed, far beyond his original birthright, where his elder brother was cursed, and lost his birthright and even his life.
Hear any echoes from Scripture, here, BTW? ;-`
Well, Tolkien HATED allegory, so you have to be careful about setting one-to-one correspondence between things in the book and things in real life (such as saying the Undying Lands = Heaven). Tolkien would say that certain features of his book echo aspects of Christianity and the Ring Cycle of Norse mythology, but his creation is an independent work. The Undying Lands and the Grey Havens are what they are and should not be considered "replacements" for something else. The Undying Lands are called that because it is the home of the elves and the angelic beings who, by their nature, are immortal. The land itself that doesn't convey immortality.
That said, Tolkien was pretty clear in his letters that Frodo and Bilbo go to the Undying Lands and live out the rest of their lives there. In fact the closing passage of the book is Frodo looking on the Undying Lands from the ship (Gandalf quotes this passage to Pippin in the movie when speaking of death.) So one could say that Frodo dies when he leaves the Grey Havens, but only in the sense that he can't return to Middle Earth. Physically he spends his remaining days in that Blessed Realm (as it's called by the Elves).
The subject of death is an important one in Tolkien's mythology. The elves are immortal but can experience a kind of death. When they "die" they're sent to the Halls of Mandos for a time of waiting and then are returned to Middle Earth or the Blessed Realm. When men die however, they are completely lost to the world and do not return. Death is called Illuvatar's (God's) gift to man, but the other races do not understand it and men perceive it to be a curse. Actually, the ultimate fate of death is not to be revealed until the ending of the world and thus to fear death is to distrust in the goodness of Illuvatar's plan for the world.
To come full circle: a group of men (the Numenorians) sought once to go to the Undying Lands in order to claim immortality, but were utterly destroyed. The only survivor's of the wreckage were Elendil and his sons (one of which is Isildur) who make their way back to Middle Earth and then -- well you know what happens to them.
Sorry for the lengthy response, but when people say that Tolkien created this mythic world, they weren't kidding. The detail given to the mythology, history, geneology, and language is nothing less than astounding.
Oh thanks. Actually, I love lengthy responses because I find the story so fascinating.
May I ask you another question. In the movie, Frodo remained in Middle Earth for another three years (?). What was Gandalf, Galadriel, Elrond doing during that time because they sailed with Frodo at the end. I obviously didn't read the book so I don't know if Jackson tweeked the end.
The book is more leisurely about such things than the movie is. Nothing dramatic really; they're just getting their affairs in order. Saying goodbye to old friends. Gandalf goes to spend time with Tom Bombadill (a character who did not make it into the movie.) I'm sure that Elrond is busy packing up all of this things from Rivendell and Galadriel has to tidy up Lothlorien. BTW though the movie only briefly alludes to this Galadriel is Arwen's grandmother (on her mother's side) and Arwen and Aragorn are actually cousins - about a hundred times removed. All of that comes from the tale of Beren and Luthien which Aragorn briefly references in the first movie and is the central story in "The Silmarillion".
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