Will the films change fans' relationship with the books?

[Black Breathalizer]

I understand the interest in keeping film and book discussion separate. But I would like to begin a discussion of how the films are changing our relationship with the books.

In a recent interview, Phillipa Boyens, one of the screenwriters for the films, was asked this same question. I found her response interesting:

Phillipa Boyens said:
"We can tell by the book sales that more people are reading the novels because they've seen the films and that's wonderful. But it's a little harder to talk about how the films might change a fan's relationship with the book. One of the guys who worked on the DVDs told me that he never thought the films would affect him, but that now, when he picks up the books, he can't get Ian McKellen as Gandalf out of his head. And how can you? Ian is so absolutely perfect in the role. So I just hope that we haven't done anything, in terms of the writing, that prevents people from going back to the text. Frodo and Sam coming together at the end of the Fellowship was played up big in the film, for example, but it was a low-key and slightly quaint scene in the book. You could read it now and think, 'Well, this doesn't feel quite right.' So I don't know."

I think this is a fascinating topic and would be interested in your reaction.

Have the films changed the way you now view your beloved novels?

[Lizra]

The films have made me appreciate the books more. While I really enjoy the films, when I read the books now, I am very moved by the dialogue. I love the things they say! I do appreciate the films when there are several paragraphs describing a location...to the left...coming from the right and south...all that directional description talk glazes me over like advanced math. A picture is worth a thousand words, in this case...for me! But, back on topic...I find the books to be more intense and special than ever.

[The Gaffer]

Hooray! A new thread so I can join in without interrupting...

I suppose we should differentiate between folks that read the books first and those who saw the films first.

As one of the former, my experience is similar to yours, Lizra. Having re-read them since seeing the first two films, they're all the more intense. There are a couple of areas where the films made me think again about the books.

I think the actor whose portrayal had the most effect on how I visualise the book is Sean Astin. All the hobbits' characters are rather different in the film, but I think that Astin's was the best performance. The way the elves were portrayed had a big influence on me; previously I'd seen them as pretty flat characters, while now they have more depth.

The characters that are most different in my head are Frodo and Aragorn. I can't see Elijah or Viggo when I read the books.

[Attalus]

I think that the characters whose appearance was vaguest in my mind, like the Hobbits and Celeborn, are most likely to be replaced by the movie versions, while my picture of Gandalf Elrond, and Galadriel are quite different and have remained distinct. Sauron in the movies is the most ludicrous thing about them, IMHO, and I disregard that awful eye perfectly. Oh, and all the Rohyrrhim are quite different and stay that way.

[Black Breathalizer]

The film actors, the set designs and locations, and the swords and other props, have added a whole new level of detail when I reread the books. For the most part, it has been no adjustment at all because the actors who were cast in the movie were amazingly similar the ones in my head. The wildest thing about this is that I hear the same comments from other fans of the book as well.

There were two exceptions. However, Sean Astin as Boromir and Orlando Bloom as Legolas were BETTER than what I originally imagined and I've had no reservations at all about changing my views.

One of the few things that now feels more awkward when reading the books since FOTR came out involves Samwise. I thought Sean Astin was a dead-on choice for one of my all-time favorite literary characters. I also appreciate his performance. I especially loved the "Taters" scene in TTT and thought it was brilliantly brought to the big screen. What I find a little harder to swallow now is the more "gushy" language Sam uses in the book that is not used in the film.

Also, I was concerned when I first learned that Jackson planned to play down the master-servent relationship between Frodo and Sam. However, strangely enough, I now find myself having difficulty hearing Sam saying "Master" when reading the books after watching the films.

[azalea]

Indeed this is a good topic, but any thread that includes the movies as part of the major discussion points MUST be in the movies forum, so I will be moving this there.

This has been discussed in other threads, but yes, they have changed the way I view them. I can now see a lot of the scenery more clearly, and can more easily visualize the different parts of ME that, although I had a clear picture of in my mind, weren't as realistic, just my imagination or images like drawings and such. Now I can see them as real places that I could walk to from my house if they existed. (It's hard to explain, but it isn't that the images in my head didn't make the places seem real, but they were two dimensional-seeming, whereas now they're "deeper").

But they do not inhibit my enjoyment of the books at all. The books contain so much more than the movies, and with reading, one is able to savor, to slow the pace, and linger a while, unlike watching the movies, where you are given the pace by the filmmaker, so it goes by more quickly. And like the others were saying, since I had read the books well before the movies came out, I will always retain my original relationship with them. Having the movies is an added bonus.

[The Gaffer]

Originally posted by Black Breathalizer
Also, I was concerned when I first learned that Jackson planned to play down the master-servent relationship between Frodo and Sam. However, strangely enough, I now find myself having difficulty hearing Sam saying "Master" when reading the books after watching the films.

I guess you could put that down to "modernising" the story. Merry old feudal England doesn't translate too well in less class-obsessed cultures (i.e. all of them).

It looks to me like they're going to transpose this essential aspect of the story entirely onto Gollum. The ROTK trailer had Gollum using the term "Master" towards Frodo, and it seems to me about the only way they can justify Frodo ignoring Sam's misgivings.

Though there is the added dimension of Frodo/Smeagol becoming one, which was much more explicit in TTT and changed how I saw about their relationship in the book.

What do people who saw the films first think about this?

[hectorberlioz]

well i can not get most of the actor out of my head( gandalf and sam, legolas and gimli). its hard not to imagine things from the movie. i imagined a lot of things differently...

[Dúnedain]

I think the biggest thing for me is the scenery. I always imagined great big things about characters, landscapes, battles, etc.., but the movies have totally outdone what I've imagined and I think have made reading the books more intriguing as it has helped me visualize things in other perspectives and in ways I never saw them. I think for me, that is the biggest aspect that the movies have done.

I also think that the movies have really brought forth into a greater context some of the underlying themes of the book that are sometimes overlooked by other subplots, such as how it captures the raw human emotions that permeate Tolkien's words. Also, the theme of the weight of the world relying on the smallest beings who have the will-power to go on. The sense of hoping against hopelessness is captured just as vividly in the films as it is in the books. The testing of Aragorns worth and humanity among others. The whole "there can be no triumph without loss" and "no victory without suffering" and "no freedom without sacrifice" and themes along those lines. I have to give PJ credit for those. Oh and I can't forget one of the things I'll remember most about the movies is the saying Gandalf says in FotR and that was shown in the RotK trailer "All you have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to you". I think these things are what truly make these movies great in addition to the larger scale things for me. Really the books are about all of these themes of hope and whatnot and the movies capture that in their true forms...

[Jedi X]

My first reads of the books were a long time ago, and the imagery pretty much is etched into my imagination. After seeing the movies, I do find the soundtrack popping in here and there. Nothing much else has altered.

Aragorn is a lot like I imagined him from the beginning. Of all of the characters, I would say it is Legolas that I imagined in a much different manner. Elrond, too. In fact, all of the elves. Not that I didn't like the movies, but I thought the elves just looked too human. I thought they should have cast taller and thinner people with narrower faces and more almond-shaped eyes. But that's just me.

Gandalf's eyebrows weren't big enough in the movies and his beard wasn't long enough. Especially in The Two Towers.

Also, hectorberlioz, the icon under your name (the name's sake, I assume?) is simply soul-stirring. Awesome.

[Elfhelm]

When I re-read the trilogy I used the cast from the movies and some of the scenery. So it affected the way I visualized things.

What I fear is that it may alter my relationship with the books in another way. There is a certain distaste I have for the blood and gore that PJ is emphasizing. And sometimes it seems the simplistic good guys bad guys plot of the movie is easy for people to latch onto. In the books, there are a lot of uncertain things that require thought and judgement, such as Aragorn having to negotiate their way into Lothlorien. But in the movies the elves are all on the side of the good guys. It's as if the kinslaying never happened.

So I think of Wagner and what happened to music lovers' relationship to Wagner after Hitler used the Ring Cycle in his propaganda. I would be very disturbed if something like that were done with the movies. It could never be done to the books, but the movies could possibly be used by racists in propaganda. In fact, I recall some klan people had posted just such an interpretation on the web. You can't really do that to the books. I don't know. PJ focuses so much on the newspeak in the movie. It would seriously disturb my relationship with teh books if I had to start proving that orcs are not black people, for instance, or more likely, that southron men are not Arabs.

[The Gaffer]

Originally posted by Elfhelm
But in the movies the elves are all on the side of the good guys. It's as if the kinslaying never happened.

That's odd: my interpretation was the opposite. The movie elves were much more explicitly distinct from hobbits and men than the book elves were. There was a real ambiguity about them which, I think, is absent from the book unless you know the Silmarillion.

And, for me, Viggo is too young and good-looking to be Aragorn (not taking anything away from his performance). Whatever happened to "all that is gold does not glitter?"

[Dúnedain]

Originally posted by The Gaffer
And, for me, Viggo is too young and good-looking to be Aragorn (not taking anything away from his performance). Whatever happened to "all that is gold does not glitter?"

See I thought Viggo was perfect as well. You can see his age in his face and eyes, for me that was enough. He felt like a man of age and experience.

"All that is gold does not glitter,
Not all those who wander are lost.
The old that is strong does not wither,
Deep roots are not reached by the frost.
From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
A light from the shadows shall spring.
Renewed shall be blade that was broken,
The crownless again shall be king.

He became at last the most hardy of living Men, skilled in their crafts and lore, and was yet more than they; for he was elven-wise, and there was a light in his eyes that when they were kindled few could endure. His face was sad and stern because of the doom that was laid on him, and yet hope dwelt ever in the depths of his heart, from which mirth would arise at times like a spring from the rock."


See to me that is Viggo, lol, guess it's up to your own interpretation though

[Balrog_of_Morgoth]

The movies have had a profound effect on me. In these last few years, I have been into Tolkien so much, and it is because of the movies.

I had read LOTR and Sil probably 5 times over before the movies, and one more time since the movies. I really felt that Gandalf and Aragorn affected me deeply. I visualized them, but to an even greater extent, I could hear their voices. I applied there voice to the book's dialogue.

Galadriel was good for me, too. I had always had a hard time getting a mental picture of her.

Helm's Deep is another good example. I really didn't have a hold on the immense size and scope of that fortress.

As other people have said, the scenery was great. Moria will be etched in my mind forever. And though the Balrog didn't really jive with Tolkien's description, I like the movie version better.

Orthanc is etched in my mind as well.

In general, I failed to realize the sheer greatness of the vistas in the books until the movies helped me out.

[Dúnedain]

Originally posted by Balrog_of_Morgoth
And though the Balrog didn't really jive with Tolkien's description, I like the movie version better.

Depending on who's interpretation you read

[Black Breathalizer]

I interrupt this discussion for the following rant...
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Originally posted by azalea
Indeed this is a good topic, but any thread that includes the movies as part of the major discussion points MUST be in the movies forum, so I will be moving this there.

I'm sorry but this is ridiculous. The thread is about HOW WE FEEL ABOUT THE BOOKS now that we've been influenced by the films!!!!!!!!

As a longtime message board administrator, I can say that Rule Number One of board moderation is: If it ain't broke, don't try fixing it. Administrators should be like game referees, the best ones never get noticed. Moving this thread accomplished absolutely nothing except return the book forum to an intellectual wasteland. I find it fascinating that a thread about naming children after LOTR characters or one featuring a strange word game is A-Okay for inclusion in the BOOKS forum rather than the GENERAL discussion forum but in this case, a legitimate book discussion is considered "inappopriate" because -- gasp -- the films are mentioned.

How about a little less hypocritical power flexing in the future, okay?

**************
The posts here SINCE the move (including this one) have completely changed the original focus of the discussion

[IronParrot]

No, BB, after having moderated this board for four years I must say that azalea is right about this particular decision. This discussion belongs in the Movies forum.

The reason is largely a matter of organization. Nowadays, simply because of the fact that it's easier and faster to watch the movie than read the book cover-to-cover over again, the Movie forum draws more traffic and invites a more thriving environment of analytical discussion.

In short, we formulated a policy that the "is it movie-related?" litmus test is administered before the "is it book-related?" test.

I bemoan the lack of comprehensive literary analysis in the Books forum nowadays but that's simply a side effect of people taking longer to read it, and fewer new theses analysing the text itself since so much ground has already been covered.

In fact, this thread is semi-redundant (there's another thread about how the movies affect one's vision of the books, albeit not one's relationship) but I'll leave it open.

Actual reply to the subject at hand forthcoming.

[IronParrot]

Now, to answer the question:

I'm not going to talk about my vision of the books - it's the same as what many people have already said: grasping the scenery is the big thing. When I read the books nowadays, Tolkien's lush descriptions of Middle-Earth in all its vibrance and colour hit me a lot harder than they ever did the first two or three readings before the film ever came out.

My relationship with the books is a different story.

Every time I read LOTR, I look for something different. The first time, it was to grasp the plot. The second time, the themes and foreshadowing. The third time, the nuances of the major characters and the names of the minor ones I forgot the first two times through. The fourth time, I tried to pronounce some passages aloud as guided by Appendix E. Whenever I wrote papers or theses on the piece, I'd comb the book (or at least certain chapters) looking for very specific passages that demonstrate specific motifs.

The first time I read the book after seeing The Fellowship on film, I was looking for the answer to that very question: how has my relationship with the book changed?

I'd say it's changed in the sense that while I still continue my routine of reading the story once a year, now I have the opportunity of bathing in it whenever I have seven (and later, twelve) hours free at a time.

By now, even though the film has only been released for less than two years, I think I've watched it about as many times as I've ever read the book.

So I'd say my relationship with the book has changed in the sense that it's no longer long-distance. Whenever I read it, the plot and scenery are second-nature to me. I have an easier time focusing on the literary specifics Tolkien created that could never be properly translated to cinema.

I think it's also easier to remember dialogue when you hear it spoken. In a sense, the book is a whole lot more quotable now, when you take the parts of the script that were taken verbatim (and my, are there ever many).

A year ago, I probably couldn't recite the opening lines of "Where now the horse and the rider?" and "Cold be hand and heart and bone" upon a whim. Now I can. That's the difference.

[Black Breathalizer]

I apologize in advance for this off-topic post, but I think the issue is important to air...
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Originally posted by IronParrot
No, BB, after having moderated this board for four years I must say that azalea is right about this particular decision. This discussion belongs in the Movies forum.

The reason is largely a matter of organization. Nowadays, simply because of the fact that it's easier and faster to watch the movie than read the book cover-to-cover over again, the Movie forum draws more traffic and invites a more thriving environment of analytical discussion.

In short, we formulated a policy that the "is it movie-related?" litmus test is administered before the "is it book-related?" test.

I wish I were able to see if you and azalea could keep a straight face while explaining why you felt the question, "Has your relationship with the books changed?" is not an appropriate books forum topic. But hey, I understood a long time ago that logic is rarely the deciding factor in message board decisions when a group of "gee, look what I can do" teenage board moderators are running a forum.

Originally posted by IronParrot
I bemoan the lack of comprehensive literary analysis in the Books forum nowadays.

Then why in the world would you remove a legitimate thread trying to address that very fact?!??!?! Moderators should be PROMOTING interesting discussions, not stifling them. I've never understood why so many boards allow its moderators to close or move serious and interesting discussions for the most bizarre reasons imaginable such as "well...uh...gee, uh...it's largely a matter of organization." Riiiiiight. Let's play "The Pants Game" in the book forum but don't you dare ask if the films have changed the way you view the books there!!!

Originally posted by IronParrot
In fact, this thread is semi-redundant (there's another thread about how the movies affect one's vision of the books, albeit not one's relationship) but I'll leave it open.

Oh, thank you, thank you, Oh Mighty One for deeming this trifling, little thread worthy of remaining open in your esteemed Elf eyes. It is truly a generous and lordly act. Thank you from the bottom of my unworthy peasant heart!

I realize you are above questioning, but nevertheless, I feel I must address your declaration that this thread is "semi-redundant." Yes, there was a thread asking the question "Has Jackson's FILMS captured Tolkien's vision?" This discussion thread -- at least until it was moved and the focus shifted to the movies -- was asking the question whether the films changed the way fans felt about THE BOOKS. Unless I've entered the Twilight Zone and everyone here has become mindless orcs, these two questions are clearly separate and distinct.

[Dúnedain]

Shutup BB you are going to ruin this thread...