What people think of Two Towers (*SPOILERS*)

[Ethereal]

Originally posted by jerseydevil
I actually consider that my favorite part. I always felt sorry for Gullum though. But I especially liked the "No one likes you" line. You can really feel for him then. I always wanted Gullum to be saved and I was sad that gullum ended up falling into Mt Doom.

i agree!! i always pitied gollum in the books, and since he was animated so realistically on the screen, i feel for him even more now! if he had been an unrealistic, cheesy, typical computer animated character, i don't think the movie would have affected how i feel about him, but i have to give props for the behind the scenes animation guys for bringing gollum to life so effectively! i always wanted gollum's good side to prevail rather than his bad one, and i empathize with your sadness over him falling into mt. doom!

[BeardofPants]

You guys gotta stop posting so much stuff! How am I EVER going to read through this thread?!

So: things I gotta look out for: Evil Faramir, Dodgy Theoden, Elves in the wrong place.... Love it already.

Oh, and JD - it's Gollum, not Gullum.

[jerseydevil]

Originally posted by BeardofPants

Oh, and JD - it's Gollum, not Gullum.

Thanks - duplicate mistypes. or rather triplicate mistypes.

[Noahamir]

Thanks IronParrot for your in-depth analysis of the movie, your "show, not tell" theory really helped me evaluate the movie's changes in a much better light!

[azalea]

Someone mentioned Gollum and the sun issue -- I noticed that too, but assumed it was due to ease of filming and relative unimportance in the storyline.

Also, in response to comment re: Frodo's fall in the Marshes -- I didn't mind that per se, and I see how it was necessary to show how Gollum was sticking to his word by being faithful, and surprisingly so. My thing was that it took a little longer than I thought necessary, time which could have been spent more wisely elsewhere on character development.

Also, just a "me" thing -- Edoras looked different than I had pictured, and it's weird because almost everything else so far scenery-wise has been about dead-on. And Rohan was rockier than I "remembered."

Oh, and there were places where I felt they were "telling" too much, rather than showing, but of course to get everyone on the same page so to speak I know it had to be done.

Edit: Ah, I keep forgetting what I was going to say! I wanted to mention that I, too, liked the guy that played Eomer. He did a good job.

[Foul_Dwimmerlaik]

After watching that - and hearing what people had to say about things that Tolkien felt and did regarding Lord of the Rings - makes me think even more that right now Tolkien is rolling in his grave at seeing his characters hacked by Jackson.

Then he should be mad at himself for making the decision to sell the movie rights. It was not a decision that had to be made.

I've said this before, and I'll say it again: Jackson's duty isn't to the Tolkien fans, it's to the studio that trusted him to make a successful movie. His job was never to make the most faithful adaptation possible, it was to put butts in seats, and he's done an absolutely spectacular job of it. If you don't like the changes, don't watch the movies, but saying that he did a poor job is directly contradicted by the box office.

[jerseydevil]

Originally posted by Foul_Dwimmerlaik
Then he should be mad at himself for making the decision to sell the movie rights. It was not a decision that had to be made.

I've said this before, and I'll say it again: Jackson's duty isn't to the Tolkien fans, it's to the studio that trusted him to make a successful movie. His job was never to make the most faithful adaptation possible, it was to put butts in seats, and he's done an absolutely spectacular job of it. If you don't like the changes, don't watch the movies, but saying that he did a poor job is directly contradicted by the box office.

I'm talking about how the movies compare to the books. Survivor gets huge ratings in TV - doesn't mean it's a great show. I still think the movies could have been A LOT better. If you're happy with them - then that's great. I'm not. I think they have a lot to be desired and they're not masterpieces. I agree the cinematography is beautiful and his selection of locations. But in the end - all he created was an action movie.

I've always said that Jackson made adumbed down version of the books - I just feel he dumbed them down way too much.

One of the main reasons for the success of LotR is really BECAUSE of the fans of the books. It would only be doing a fraction of what it is if it wasn't for the Tolkien fans. I went to see FotR 8 times only because I wanted to like it. There are some people that have become fans of Lord of the Rings because of the movies - but those people seem to be a minority. I've seen Two Towers twice already. I'll see it again only because I have a free pass. I may see it another time if they have an RotK trailer. But I have since realised that Jackson did not bring Lord of the Rings to the big screen - so I will stick more to the books.

The people that think he did a great job and everything - can continue to kiss his feet and praise him. I'll continue to feel how I feel about them. And I will continue to state how I feel about them - just like everyone that thinks the movies are great and shouldn't be criticised because after all - "it's only Jackson's interpretation." So - I DON'T LIKE his interpretation, his vision or his movies of Lord of the Rings. I think he hacked the story to pieces.

[Kalimac]

Thanks to IronParrot for a good summation.

I quite agree about Faramir. People should keep in mind that we have not seen the last of Faramir. He will be back in Return of the King to complete his characters arc. I also believe as you do that Aragorn's tumble into the river was a way to segue back to Rivendell so the audience could witness the departure of the elves.

The only bit that I might add concerns the reasoning behind Frodo falling into the marshes. I saw a good deal of similarity between Frodo underwater in the marsh and Sam underwater in Fellowship . . seems this may be a theme to watch for in ROtK. The difference here of course is that it is Gollum who extends his hand down to clasp Frodo's and pull him to safety. Watch for role reversal in ROtK . . when it will be Sam's turn to reach out to Frodo.

[cassiopeia]

Originally posted by BeardofPants
You guys gotta stop posting so much stuff! How am I EVER going to read through this thread?!

I know what you mean, BoP! (BTW when will you be seeing it?)

I havn't seen the movie yet (6 more days to go!), but like someone else said, I am worried. I have just read TTT again and I realised again how much I love it. I can't describe it properly, like Sam can't describe his love for Frodo. I know I am going to be disapointed, I knew this after seeing the FOTR, because I was disapointed after seeing that. But I grew to love the FOTR, despite some awful changes. I respect your (Entmooter's) opinions more that anyone else, because I know, that as big fans of Tolkien's work, most of you will feel how I feel.

I am really annoyed about Faramir, Aragorns 'death' and Theodens' exorcism. But enough has been said about that.

What I really loved from the book was Sam and Frodo's friendship. It seems that PJ has done a reasonable job with this, judging from the posts here. What color is Gollum? In the books he is black (I think, but maybe I'm confused), but from what I have seen he looks brownish.

[Khamûl]

Originally posted by Gerbil
BTW - I think I made a mistake on it anyway - isn't Chariots of Fire the official Olympics tune? Oops

Sorry 'bout that. Guess we were just on the same wavelength. Btw, I think the Olympic theme is "Fanfare for the Common Man" by Aaron Copeland. It sounds like it anyway.

Originally posted by BeardofPants
So: things I gotta look out for: Evil Faramir, Dodgy Theoden, Elves in the wrong place.... Love it already.

Oh come on now, you wouldn't let us jade you before you even see it, would you?

[jerseydevil]

Originally posted by cassiopeia
What color is Gollum? In the books he is black (I think, but maybe I'm confused), but from what I have seen he looks brownish.

He's like a pale flesh color. And he has hair on his arms. There is a close up of his arm when it's around Sam's neck - and you can see he has hair. I have a feeling that's a live action person's arm - but not sure.

[Armelien]

My initial reaction to The Two Towers was absolute outrage. As i thought about it more I realized that it would have been impossible to make the film as well as the books , I still really enjoyed the film, It was very well made and captivated me and the audience through out the whole movie. But there was a lot that could have been done to make it better. I was very angry that PJ for changing the plot so much. FOTR stayed very close to the plot and that was my expectation for TTT. I was expecting the movie to end as it did in the book(Gandalf riding of with Pippin and Frodo being captured by orcs). Im very sad that i have to wait an whole year before i can see Shelob!!! That wasnt the only thing I was dissapointed in, I think that the ents should have played a bigger part in the movie. I was outraged when the council decided not to fight Saruman. And i thought it was lame when Treebeard did his roar call thing and all the ents, not questioning why the sudden chane of mind, came and attacked Saruman. I also think that Merry and Pippin were still portrayed as idiots, they did get some good lines in but i didnt think it was enough. It made it look like their escape and getting the ents to fight was just from pure luck. It didnt show how smart and mature they became, and I dont think that was very fair to their character. I was also displeased with the way Faramir was portrayed. I think they should of stuck to the book with him. I also hated how he took Frodo, Sam, and Gollum to Osgiliath(I think that is the name of the place).
Some parts they added were very good and some i just thought were awful. I like how Haldir died in battle(i think thats his name(blond elf). I think that added to the horrer and sadness of the Helms deep battle scene. I thought the whole scene with Aragorn "dying" in the river could have defentitly been done with out. The worst part of the whole movie was that move that Legolas did to get onto the horse during the battle with the orcs(when the orcs were fighting on those dog things). It was the corniest thing i've ever seen. It was like this stupid Matrix move. Gimli had some very hillarious lines but i thought it was taken to far. It made the situation seem a lot happier and funner than it really was.
The movie wasnt all bad. I enjoyed it even though it strayed too much from the plot. Gollum was as exactly as I thought he would be, and Grimma was EXCELLENT!!! I liked how they showed that even the young boys and old men had to fight in the battle, it really added to the horror of Helms Deep. The Dead Marshes were also marviously done. I liked how they showed the ring taking Frodo, making him angrier and moodier. The ending song at the end of the credits is GREAT!! Gollums song made me so sad and realize how gollum felt. All people who heard the song as they were leaving the theater and hated it(i was one of you) I would strongly recommend that you listen to it again when you can hear the words and get more of a feel for it.
I can honestly say that I enjoyed FOTR more, I still loved TTT. Even though I was a little dissapoited, I still am a big fan and you can expect me to be in the front of the line for the Return of the King!

Michaela

[Rían]

Originally posted by jerseydevil
On a side note - Rian's "ooooo eeeeee ooooooo" reminded me of what I was thinking the two times I saw theTwo Towers (Iwas going to mention it when I was getting back yesterday - but I forgot). When Frodo, Sam and Gullum are at the Black Gate - I'm expecting some of Sauron's soldiers to come up from behind - there to be a behind the rocks scuffle and then to see the three in custom - getting into line with the other soldiers and march through the gate - "ooooooo eeeeee ooooo"

That's funny! Do you mean like "The Wizard of Oz"?

I was trying to get across the weird, high-pitched noise that you hear in the old campy sci-fi movies, kind of like tuning an old radio - how would you type that noise? But actually, what I typed does come across like the monkey-soldier chant in the Wizard of Oz, doesn't it! ooooo eeeee oooooo ....... ooooOOOOOooooo! There's no place like home, Toto!!

And I totally agree with the Olympic torch scene - that's just what I thought, too! Really silly.

I'm pretty sure the main Olympic theme is NOT "Fanfare for the Common Cold" --uh, sorry -- "Common Man" - I think it was something specially composed by John Williams for the Los Angeles Olympics, IIRC, but I don't remember the name of it. You're talking about the trumpet fanfare thing, right?

I'm in the minority, it looks like, about Haldir - I thought his scenes were well done. I didn't even mind that the elves came to help out Rohan, even though it wasn't in the book, because it was modeled after the Last Alliance, when elves and men fought side by side.

[Smaug]

It looks like one of the mods/admins should post a poll "How many ppl thought "Olympic Torch Bearer" when the wall came down in Helms' Deep"

[Rían]

(totally off subject, but I did a search, and I think it's "Olympic Fanfare and Theme" by Williams, written for the 1984 Olympics.)

(back on topic) And I like how the "scalp count" thing between Legolas and Gimli got in, too.

[jerseydevil]

Originally posted by RÃ*an
That's funny! Do you mean like "The Wizard of Oz"?

Yup. It just looks exactly like the Wizrd of oz scene where the Lion, the Scarecrow and the Tin Man are looking down watching the soldiers march by as they make their plans to rescue Dorothy.

And I totally agree with the Olympic torch scene - that's just what I thought, too! Really silly.

I'm pretty sure the main Olympic theme is NOT "Fanfare for the Common Cold" --uh, sorry -- "Common Man" - I think it was something specially composed by John Williams for the Los Angeles Olympics, IIRC, but I don't remember the name of it. You're talking about the trumpet fanfare thing, right?

It's the general Olympic theme that they always play for every Olympics. "Call of Champions" was the particular theme for the Salt Lake City Olympics.

[Khamûl]

You're right Rian. I heard Fanfare for the Common Man and thought it sounded familiar. I bet they've used it for the Olympics at sometime or other.

Back on topic, the elves at Helm's Deep didn't bother me as much as I thought they would. I'm not quite sure why, but they just didn't bother me that much.

[Eruviel Greenleaf]

Wow. that was an amazing movie. . .

i even like the elves at helm's deep. sure, it made no sense considering the book, but hey there were tons of nit-picky things like that which i have decided to ignore, due to the fact that it was a great movie. er. yeah. so, i think the elves being there fit, in this case. though how did they get there in time, eh? oh well. . .

one thing that did bother me was the use of Gimli almost entirely for comic relief. but other than that, and possibly a few other minor things (must see the movie again!) i thought it was brilliant. especially gollum, and i think miranda otto was a great eowyn and i look forward to the next movie, in pelennor fields...

i was quite impressed by the battle of helm's deep, minus a few nit-picky things (NOT differences from the book though).

i liked that arwen mentioned the valar. and she didn't bother me as much in this one.

can't wait to see it again!

[IronParrot]

Gerbil:

"With a comment like that, it's not really worth labouring over a long post to prove you wrong. Glad you enjoyed it. Calling it perfection is stupid though."

I absolutely did not call it perfection.

But I am also absolutely convinced - and history will prove me right - that no other team will ever pull off a film of The Lord of the Rings better than this one. And I would not hesitate to speculate that no other team could have.

jerseydevil:

"Since this seems to be directed at me since I have basically said that Jackson is a pseudo fan - I guess I'll address this."

Well, I wasn't directing it at you specifically... but I guess it applies to you since I apparently described your perspective rather well. On to your comments, then:

"Jackson on the other hand points out directly in the commentary - that all they wanted to do was make a fantasy movie. They discussed it and he thought - "why not just go to the books that inspired the genre.""

True. The realization that nobody else had done it (Ralph "Aruman the Red" Bakshi obviously doesn't count) was the motivation for acquiring the rights to Tolkien's work.

So, suddenly having that motive means Jackson and company were unfamiliar with the piece beforehand? That's a hole in your logic, my friend. So just because he said, "I want to make a fantasy film... hey, let's make LOTR!" that means he didn't adore the work beforehand? Who says he just didn't initially realize that someone had done his favourite story? I don't follow your line of thought.

Furthermore: I don't think anybody's questioning his visual fidelity here to a great extent, but if they did, they'd best take it up with John Howe and Alan Lee (and why they didn't earlier, I won't ask). But similarly, if you're questioning the literary fidelity, then take it up with Philippa Boyens, specifically hired by Peter Jackson as a die-hard fan who'd studied the thing backwards and forwards, and made a good deal of the creative modifications. Read interviews, watch the stuff on the DVD - she had reasons for the changes she made, whether we would agree with them or not.

"And I don't think he has succeeded in keeping the fundamental themes of Lord of the Rings. "JRR Tolkien" was on PBS last night - and they interviewed Christopher Tolkien and many many people that worked with Tolkien and knew him personally. After watching that - and hearing what people had to say about things that Tolkien felt and did regarding Lord of the Rings - makes me think even more that right now Tolkien is rolling in his grave at seeing his characters hacked by Jackson. You may disagree- but these are my feelings."

Just out of curiosity, what exactly are you referring to when you suppose that there is some sort of thematic inconsistency here?

Recently, I was re-reading Tom Shippey's Author of the Century (easily my favourite Tolkien analysis) and I thought on more than one occasion, "the film got that right." As evidenced by a recent lecture in... Chicago, I think... Dr. Shippey agrees. I'll go into the specific themes and motifs and handlings of Tolkien's intentions that I'm referring to, but I'd like to hear your side of this first.

(cont'd)

[IronParrot]

(cont'd)

"I don't think that Jackson brought Lord of the Rings to the screen. In order to do that - Jackson would have actually have had to supply some character development - instead he created an action film. I think that is one of the reason I am less upset by The Two Towers - I expected the stupid comic relief, I expected the overdone slow motion sequences, I expected non-stop action. That's pretty much what he delivered."

This is worth a few more posts of response by itself, but I'll cover this briefly:

Regarding character development, I don't see how this is shirked. Perhaps within Fellowship alone, yes - but that's not the whole story, and Tolkien's own characters were not fully realized by the end of Book II, Chapter 10 either. I will make a full post on character development later, perhaps even on a separate thread. Remind me if I forget, because I'm off to a ski trip this weekend.

Regarding "an action film", action isn't a genre, it's a narrative and dramatic device heavily reliant on visuals. Lawrence of Arabia is an action film. Heck, Warner Bros. originally advertised Casablanca as an action film. Does "action = no character development"? A shaky assumption at best, based on deplorable mainstream trends of the past decade, and not on this film itself. Unless you'd care to elaborate.

Regarding "comic relief", are you saying that comedy doesn't fit into the tone Tolkien set? I think the Professor cracked a lot of great jokes in his piece, and that furthermore, the film follows the same tone. In fact, some fan reviews by people who must have been very rusty about the book had them thinking that Legolas and Gimli's "headcount" competition was a Hollywoodized addition. If anything, comic relief is faithful to Tolkien - and I especially refer to Gimli, and to an even greater extent, Pippin. Pippin's entire character in Tolkien's work develops from an immature buffoon to a world-weary warrior among hobbits. I'll wait for ROTK to validate this, but Jackson is doing the same.

"In my opinion he didn't even attempt to preserve the fundamental themes of The Lord of the Rings."

And in your opinion, what are these fundamental themes? (Bonus points for demonstrating exactly how Jackson ignores them.)

As I said, more later. Hopefully within the week.