The trouble with the Scouring stuff is you'd be essentially tagging on an extra subplot after the main villain has been vanquished and the big climax at Mount Doom, and that just doesn't really work in a film.
And as Miriel says, the editing at the end of ROTK is terrible - just do a jump cut to the next scene Peter, what's with all the fade outs!
"Excuse me Miss, do you like pineapple?"
Not to mention Glorfindel. Arwen is EVERYONE.Originally Posted by fire_of_avalon
Leaving out the final chapters regarding the corruption of the Shire and their roles as saviors redeeming the land and the people really, really bothers me. I felt that one of the most important metaphors of the series is the fact that exposure to evil is never as isolated as it seems to be. Evil has a way of reaching past the people fighting our wars, our personal guards to the places we live.
And that we all have to work to keep that evil from touching us ever again, because it is so pervasive.
Anyway, perhaps I'm wrong. But it bothered me that was left out. And all the Arwen stuff bothers me. Even in the legendarium Arwen bothers me. It was meant to be Eowyn.
Bow before the mighty Javoo!
Am I the only one who liked the movies more than the books? I honestly tried to give the books a good go, and made it most of the way through Two Towers before I stopped reading them. Maybe I'd enjoy them more now than I did when I was reading them 8-9 years ago, but to be honest, there was something about Tolkien's writing that just made it hard for me to get into them.
That said, even not knowing a whole lot about the differences in story between the book and movie aside from what I've read on wikipedia before and in this thread, I will say that I had many of the same issues with the end of Return of the King. I wouldn't say it was my least favourite, but it wasn't as good as Two Towers by a long shot.
I really like the books but I can see why many people don't, Tolkien's prose is so dry you could mop up spills with it.
It's hard for me to say which film I like best of the three - I kind of consider the trilogy as one very long film split into three parts. If pressed I'd say The Two Towers maybe. Either way, it's one of the very small group of great movie trilogies in my opinion.
"Excuse me Miss, do you like pineapple?"
I think it's pretty much known that Tolkein was no professional writer. He took not classes nor obeyed the traditional rules of prose and format. To some that is a reason to stay away, however to mkost it just adds weight to the story. He multitude of characters would normally be something a writer avoids but as Tolkein had a whole world mapped out, traditional story-telling was of no importance to him. There was no love interest, no traditional ending and no attempt to hide the fact that there were more things going on than what he wrote. To me the books are the greatesty works of fantasy fiction ever written, and half of the reason I feel this was is BECAUSE it's not written the way all others were.
Fellowship for me is easily the best.
Bow before the mighty Javoo!
It's the best, it's true
The books are illegible and the pacing is woefully incompetent. I don't understand how anybody likes them. But instead of incessantly ranting I will say that I think the movies are beautiful and the pacing is much more appealing - I understand a few things from talking to my brothers (who have both somehow read all 3 books):
- the fight sequences take a page
- most of the book describes politics and environment
- i fell asleep listening to them
When I spoke to Zach! about this, he sort of agreed with me - I don't think LOTR as it is written translates into a screenplay, which is probably why the animated movie was a billion hours (2) long and still failed to complete (they ran out of budget).
The extended versions are in my opinion the greatest fantasy movies ever made. I haven't read any of the books, so I have nothing to compare them to except the theatrical versions. The amount of dedication, hard work and love put into these movies, will never be matched, and if you have watched all of the extras, you'll know what I mean.
It is impossible to make an exact movie adaptation of a book. The Harry Potter books are my all-time favorite books, but that doesn't mean I cannot enjoy the movies as an added, visual, bonus. The first three movies were almost perfect adaptations of the books, and even though I still love those that followed, they were seriously... with the exception of the Deathly Hallows Part I, which was a return to form.
Nope. Me too.
I was going to read the books before Fellowship (the movie) came out, but didn't get around to it. So right after seeing Fellowship, I picked up the books... and found Fellowship (the book) to be absolute torture. I would force myself through a few pages and put it down and come back a few months later and so on. I JUST managed to finish it before Two Towers (the movie) came out. I'd intended to read Two Towers before seeing it... but had only just finished reading Fellowship, so didn't accomplish that goal. I did, however immediately start in on reading Two Towers after seeing the movie and then finished up with Return of the King way before seeing that one.
The thing is, I can appreciate the books for what they are: a great story, the predecesor to a whole genre of literature and film and videogames that probably would have otherwise never existed... but they're so damn boring. At least Fellowship is. And Two Towers was a bit painful as well.
If they were written today, an editor would have forced so many changes, many of which the films fixed. The beginning, for example: Tedious in the books. Fixed up quite nicely in the movies. I agree with almost ALL of Peter/Fran/Phillipa's changes, espeically insofar as an adaption to a completely different medium (film). (I would have liked Tom Bombadil to be in the movie though :*( )
Anyway, I've only read TLotR once (but have read The Hobbit three times, I think) and I've watched the movies... good lord... twice each in the cinema, and then at least four times each on DVD (because I wanted to listen to ALL three sets of commentaries for each).
I'm disapointed that the bluray version doesn't have any features the DVD Extended Versions don't. I'm not going to bother with the blurays until my DVDs no longer work.
Also, don't we lose a lot of Denethor's character in the movies? I mean, he is given as a crazy overlord dude, but we don't get any of the actual reason for his fall or his decisions, and their were many.
There is nothing at all done to reinforce the importance that Osgiliath holds, and, worse still, no mention made at all of the Palantir of Minas Tirith, which was the single biggest contribution to Denethor's insanity. Since Sauron controlled the Palantir network (up until Aragorn managed to seize control away from him before the battle of the Black Gate), Denethor could only see things which Sauron wanted him to see. Sauron couldn't lie with it (Palantiri were elder tools beyond even his power to make or manipulate that much), but he could dictate what aspects of the truth that Denethor could see, and he did. For example, Sauron showed Denethor the black ships coming, implying them as reinforcements for him, despite the fact that they were now carrying allies of Gondor. Sauron showed him enemies everywhere and hid his views of his allies (hence the whole "Rohan has betrayed me" bit), driving Denethor into despair and insanity. Yet we only get very vague hints to this massive plot device.
I also dislike the lack of the Scouring of the Shire. It drastically changed the message of the films compared to the books. In the books, that section is a clear indication that though a great evil was defeated, more still remains, and that there is more work to do, that the battle against evil was a continual one. While the movies held the much simpler implication that destroying the Ring was the elimination of all evil everywhere.
Still, I have to give the movies credit. They did a wonderful job of converting the books to a new media while keeping the feel the same. I have my gripes, but I am very glad those movies were made, and I am waiting for the Hobbit with eager anticipation.
As a side note, I think the relegation of Gimli into the role of comic relief in the later movies will have a positive effect on the Hobbit. The Hobbit, being a kid's book, had much lighter characters than those in Lord of the Rings, and the dwarves will be a little easier to accept in their lighter roles than if Gimli had been a supreme ultra-tough warrior the entire time.
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I adore the books, but also think the movies are great. As charliepanayi said, the extended cuts are probably the best adaptations that could have been hoped for.
Movies based on books will never ever be the same as the books. Ever. Loads of detail gets lost with every adaptation happening out there.
- some adaptations are worse than the original text, some are better. To me, the feat of creating and developing the world of Lord of the Rings for the screen as was done, is alone enough to be amazed at in my opinion. Books and movies are simply just totally different media, and what works in one doesn't necessarily work in the other. At all. The movies are just movies and an adaptation, and the books will always be the books. It's when people mix the two of them instead of looking at the independently that they become disappointed.
"There's only one 'Return' and it's not of the King, it's of the Jedi."
You're forgetting of the Mack.
"Excuse me Miss, do you like pineapple?"
Tolkien was a Professor of English at about 28. At Oxford, he was part of the Inklings, a literary discussion group that included C.S Lewis. As I don't think they had writing classes back in the day, he probably had a pedigree as good as the best.
However, he was an expert in the old stories from back in the day, like Beowulf and all the Old English epic stories. Lord of the Rings is basically very similar in nature to those stories, which is probably why it didn't follow the rules of contemporary literature.
And The Wheel of Time has many more characters. It probably rivals War & Peace in that regard.
Anyway, there probably will be another Ultimate edition of the trilogy released in a couple years. I agree that Glorfindel is bad-ass and think Bombadil should have been included to. As for the Scouring of the Shire, it was more a winding up of several untied plot elements, such as Saruman and the destruction Sam glimpsed of the Shire. I could live without it. Denethor was badly misconstrued.
But overall, the movies were fairly awesome.
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