Subject:
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Re: Lord of the Rings movie
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.fun
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Date:
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Thu, 20 Dec 2001 09:51:19 GMT
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Viewed:
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321 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.fun, Erik Olson writes:
> After seeing it the second time, I'm starting to glow. I better give it a
> third chance.
My random thoughts on it below:
I just saw this film tonight and I have no significant experience with the
material before this, although I may have seen those cartoons from the 80s
which did not make that much sense to me then. Offhand, I think they may
have trouble with word of mouth with this one inasmuch as there was a very
audible sound of disappointment when the movie ended without much REALLY
having happened in the story. The story is clearly NOT very self-contained
and many viewers are not going to have the background information on either
Northern European mythology or the novels themselves to fill in the holes
for them.
[BTW, the thing weighs in at 3 hrs! I had no idea of that fact when I sat
down to watch it in the theater. And just to get it out there quickly, some
people might find the violence too much for younger viewers -- which is too
bad because I feel sure that this film must be a 1000 times better than HP.
But whatever...]
Because I have a rather extensive knowledge of Northern European mythology,
I found the film fairly delightful for a number of reasons. If nothing else,
it's like a moving painting of a very high order -- it's quite amazing if
you watch it just as a series of very carefully rendered pictures.
The one visuals complaint I have is that whenever they pulled back from a
closeup to a large group scene with a panning motion, there was this
noticeable perspective problem wherein some people appeared to be squashing
down and others growing large. The problem arises from trying to make
actors of an approximately similar height seem like they were of strikingly
different sizes as the characters are depicted in the books -- that is, you
see characters that correspond approx. to trolls, fairies, gnomes, regular
humans, giants, etc. That was pretty weird. I don't know what they could
have done instead, but it's still a jarring thing to watch.
I can see where people would like LOTR, as books or a series of films -- it
is quite original and imaginative despite its heavy leanings on Northern
European mythology. Still, I couldn't help but feel that the tellings of
these stories was still a work in progress for Tolkien as the story
structure is predicated on all kinds of apparently dense histories that
precede the tale depicted in the LOTR itself. In fact, there is a REALLY
LONG prologue sequence that is in some ways better than the whole rest of
the film itself.
::spoiler alert::
::you have been warned, just skip the next paragraph if you don't want to
read it::
BTW, as a plot flaw I'd just like to assert that the death of Gandolf was
surprising and disappointing at the same time -- I had barely begun to care
about any of these characters as of that moment in the film. In fact, most
of the deaths in the film seemed quite premature. I want to actually care
about a character before they do all of this manipulative stuff in the movie
to cue me that I am supposed to feel sad now. When I don't actually care
about the characters, it just falls flat. I suppose if you had already read
the books, including The Hobbit, etc. it's probably more effecting...
:: end spoiler warning::
I'd probably give the movie high marks if I had more previous knowledge of
the events in the movie from having read the books -- but I don't, so I have
to go on what I saw tonight alone. And I guess I have mixed feelings about
the story, although none about the visuals. Even given my mixed feelings
about the storyline, I'd say that this work was many times better than
almost anything in the fantasy, sci-fi, sword and sorcery vein that is
anything like it. And sorry Erik, but Star Wars doesn't even come close to
resonating with the same ancient symbols that does LOTR, Star Wars is far
too contrived for that (and in the new films just plain old too crappy). If
for no other reason than the density of its culturally relevant symbolism,
LOTR may succeeed very well with the masses. Tolkien was not borrowing from
ancient mythology, he was wisely plagiarizing it outright! Smart.
Now, tell me more about these magical swords...?
-- Hop-Frog
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Message has 2 Replies:
 | | Re: Lord of the Rings movie
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| (...) Despite it being a "trilogy" Tolkien wrote it as one long book and this has always been the chief hurdle in turning it into a movie. But there was no audible sound of disappointment at the showing I saw (or audible snickers in the wrong (...) (23 years ago, 20-Dec-01, to lugnet.off-topic.fun)
| | | Re: Lord of the Rings movie
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| (...) All I meant was that the director, Peter Jackson, seemed to be paying a little tribute with his visuals to 'Star Wars' -- and from the audience noises on opening morning, I suspect there are visual in-jokes for former Peter Jackson fans in (...) (23 years ago, 20-Dec-01, to lugnet.off-topic.fun)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: Lord of the Rings movie
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| After seeing it the second time, I'm starting to glow. I better give it a third chance. The second time through, I notice some evidence of shortened scenes. SPOILER -- NOT A BAD SPOILER -- WATCH FOR THIS In particular, Galadriel's gifts (or rather (...) (23 years ago, 20-Dec-01, to lugnet.off-topic.fun)
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