DVD Review HTF REVIEW: The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (1 Viewer)

[Tony_Ramos]

Silmarillion would never and SHOULD never be made, that's for sure. One reason is that there is no single character that lives throughout the entire saga, so there'd be no emotional core to the story. Second of all, there is no distinct "ending" or climax, unless they picked one of the main storylines and used that, but that would just be an excerpt and not the whole picture, and thus, it serves no purpose other than to make an action film.

Finally, I DO think Chris Tolkien is uptight about this whole thing. These stories were based on popular myths handed down for thousands of years among common ppl. In fact, Tolkien hated the sort of intelligentsia who frowned on the tastes of the common masses, and that's part of the reason he was so proud that his "fantasy" story had mass appeal.

If he hadn't wanted a movie to be made, he wouldn't have sold the rights to Saul Zantz. and so I'm thankful to him for having edited a lot of Tolkiens notes, but Christopher's objections are too much like the sort of literati that Tolkien hated.

 

[Tony_Ramos]

That's pretty good that a lot of ppl rememberd a comment from Glorfindel all the way in the back of Silmarillion, but I stand by the fact that no real "Prophecy" was hinted at in the film.

And I'm pretty sure it just said, "No man," and that everyone here's memory has deceived them. This is more likely than not, as "I am a woman" is what we were all hearing sub-conciously in the theater.

 

[Ricardo C]

Tolkien sold the film rights for money. He was a very practical man, and was no naïve starving artist when it came to collecting it. Read "Letters" to see how savvy he was about money. On the possibility of films being made from his books, he said he felt an "adaptation by abridgement" would be "pleasant" and "worth a great deal in publicity". But he also said he found his works "unsuitable" to visual media. I think he would have been pleased with PJ's films, for the most part, but he would be far more pleased with the royalties they would have brought him.

 

[Haggai]

Neil, after a thread about what color the ROTK EE case will be had gone on for an astonishing 4 pages, Chazz_S came through with this post.

 

[Dan Rudolph]

Anyone have a link to that page with JRR Tolkein's notes to the studio about an early Lord of the Rings script?

 

[Ricardo C]

Gimme a minute

 

[Jonathan Dagmar]

It't not a drop in quality, it's a change in tone, and it is deliberate. The tone changes to mark the transition from Saruman's thoughts to his actual speech. It's the same technique used in countless other movies.

 

[Ricardo C]

I couldn't find a transcript of the letter (and I'm not about to type it up myself :p)), but here is an interesting essay on the several adaptations of Tolkien's material ot other media. I don't agree with it entirely (too many jabs at PJ's films), but it reproduces many of Tolkien's complaints about Morton Zimmerman's ridiculous script.

 

[Jonathan Dagmar]

As far as I am concerned, due the the NUMEROUS and mostly ridiculous criticisms of Jackson's film, that the article is mostly bunk. Sure Jackson's film as the odd bit of clunky dialog, or a bad joke, but most of the chnages were made out of necessity. A movie that followed Tokiens dialog exactly would have been entirely stilted and really quite dull.

In all honestly in the book the charcater often blend into each other. It works in a book, but on a film you do NEED some degree of characature.

 

[Robert Anthony]

It's a good article, but it seems to go forward from the premise that the original work was perfection on paper, a literary work beyond criticism--and while it's a definite literary classic--it's not like there aren't problems with it. Hell, Tolkien has often admitted he didn't know what the hell he was doing, and didn't have much of a grasp on literary conventions and styles when he began. The writer makes a concession to Tolkien's infamiliarity with screenwriting and dramatic adaptation, but then largely ignores that confession and goes forward with the kind of point by point nitpicking that also shows a sort of infamiliarity with screen adaptations.

Not to say some of those criticsms weren't valid, but it all tends to turn into "They should have went about doing it EXACTLY like the book" which would negate the purpose of adapting it for film in the first place.

 

[Ricardo C]

In my defense, I only posted it because it contains some of Tolkien's comments on Zimmerman

But I do agree that PJ's handling of Weathertop was terrible. One of the few times Bakshi bested him.

 

[Richard Kim]

An insert that came with the ROTK DVD advertising the rebate for the EE has a pic of the EE box. I guess you can scan it and put into your sig.

 

[Robert Anthony]

I don't think it was quite THAT bad--but it was pretty mediocre. As are most of the action sequences not involving MASSIVE. It's his doubled-frames-slo-mo coupled with the close-ups and jump cuts that makes the fight choreography almost utterly worthless.

 

[Jack _Webster]

Some of the comments on this board just make laugh out loud.

 

[Ricardo C]

I prefer to laugh at the poseurs who pretend to be above such petty things as message board arguments.

 

[Jack _Webster]

I just think that the notion that Bakshi did anything better than PJ laughable, as well as the comment that PJ's MASSIVE work looked bad.

I never said I was above anybody or anything.

 

[Richard Kim]

Robert Anthony's post says that the action scenes NOT INVOLVING MASSIVE looked bad.

 

[Jack _Webster]

My apologies Robert - I must of read your post a bit too fast. I still firmly believe, however, that all of PJ's action scenes looked spectacular. I guess it's just personal preference.

 

[Ricardo C]

Isn't it annoying when people make offensive statements, but don't clarify who they're aimed at?

 

[Jack _Webster]

I actually thought there was plenty of tension as the Nazgul were approaching the hobbits in PJ's version. As for the Bakshi version, I don't really remember the tension in his scene too well - as I have tried to block all memories of that version from my mind.