[BradyLS]

Osgiliath certainly had the smell of Roman or Byzantine ruins - but we'll have to see what ROTk has in store for the living Gondor.

Gondor seemed very much like the Byzantine Empire with Minas Tirith representing Constantinople, IMO.

[The Iguana]

Gondor seemed very much like the Byzantine Empire with Minas Tirith representing Constantinople, IMO.

Tolkien himself once made a similar observation.

If I have time I'll look it up.

From what I've seen of Gondor I can't complain at all about Jackson's vision. It's about what I imagined - if not better.

[Vast Buffalo Wing Conspiracy]

In the extended version of the FOTR DVD, somewhere (it might have been in the commentary tracks) one of the techies remarks, during the scene where Gandalf arrives at Minas Tirith to research the archives regarding the One Ring, that Peter Jackson wanted them to make Minas Tirith look like "Constantinople in the morning".