Comment by sonofhans | Hacker News Reader

Comment by sonofhans | Hacker News Reader

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Example: the fellowship is fleeing the Balrog in the Mines of Moria. Gandalf makes his stand and is whipped by the Balrog, and falls to the edge of the precipice. The Balrog’s whip coils up from below, wraps his ankle, and drags him down to the depths as he cries, “Fly, you fools!”

Unless you’re Peter Jackson, in which case Gandalf (a) falls on his own accord, with no whip around his ankle, and (b) whispers, which sounds nice on camera, but wouldn’t be heard by his fellowship.

The movie is chock-full of this bullshit. Now, I’m not upset that Jackson deviated from the book, although I do notice — I’ve been reading LOTR since I was 9, and did research on Tolkien in graduate school. My problem is that many of his changes make things worse.

Yes, he got some things right, but the consistency of his flaws just grates on me. Faramir, for instance: in the book he does the right thing, and lets Frodo and Sam leave unhindered. This is in clear contrast to his brother, and an important illustration of one of Tolkien’s core beliefs: the evil is a choice, not determined fate or destiny.

In the movie, though, Faramir succumbs to the ring initially and leads the hobbits around for 15 minutes. I’m convinced that Jackson made this choice, and many others, only to pad runtime. He did the same thing to even worse effect in The Hobbit.

And yet with all that padding, he left out The Scouring of the Shire, one of the most important parts of the book. Screw Tom Bombadil: he was fun, and his immunity to the ring is a great moment, but the story can live without him. Leaving out the Scouring though is an awful choice; it’s a lovely and concise illustration and recap of most of the books themes, and shows the character’s growth in a clear light.

I agree with the comments.

It's really weird however that in some parts, Jackson goes at length to be very faithful to the book, almost in an unnecessary way. Yet in most places he decides to venture far away from what Tolkien wrote or suggested, making it into a pretty mixed bag.

Not only missing the Scouring of the Shire was bad, it was essential in Tolkien's philosophy of life (which is essential Christian at core). You can do good, but nothing guarantees that you will be rewarded for it, and the Scouring of the Shire is a stark reminder of that.

Instead, Jackson went for a Disney(TM) Happy End. Seriously?

Let's not forget Jackson is also to thank for Gandalf tackling Pippin with his staff when he finally grows up and tries to act like a responsible adult in front of Denethor as he tells about Boromir's death. That must have been the worst thing in the whole trilogy. This is exactly the opposite of how Gandalf reacts in the book.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5OxGHBMFEo

Aside from that, Jackson has a weird tendency to make everything look overtly visual instead of suggesting things. Theoden is "possessed" by Sauron, not by some kind of magical spell (that makes his beard change size!), but because of Wormtongue's ill influence over him. That's it!

In the same line, The Mouth of Sauron is represented by a character whose Mouth is the only thing visible from his face, and overtly large and dirty. This does not make sense. The Mouth of Sauron is not litterally the ugly mouth of some kind of demon, it is simply... a spokesperson. It's really tiring as he does this over, and over again.

Yes. I agree. The movies don't show Gandalf casting a spell on the door in Moria and the counter spell being cast by Durin's Bane. Nor Glorfindel helping Frodo escape the Ringwraiths or Gandalf repelling the wraiths alone on Weathertop. Those would have been cool to include.

As sacrilegious as this sounds to the majority of the fanbase, I hold hope that the trilogy will be rebooted by another director. Not necessarily as a way to create a superior product, but to compare how two studios have approached the story.

I've read the hobbit but never the LOTR, but in the making of LOTR videos they point out (a few times I think) that Tolkein's writing style was highly unusual and extremely difficult to adapt to a screenplay. It's been awhile since I saw them but one comment they made was that Tolkein seemed to just keep the story elements flowing on and on almost like he was writing more of a historical account rather than a novel with a classic arc. What we got on film was the classic arc more or less, meaning they had to twist and bend the source material somehow. They basically thought that a faithful adaption would not have found wide audience appeal because Tolkien broke too many rules of writing novels.

I wonder though..

I had read the LOTR several times, but it wasn't until I listened to it as an audiobook did it click for me just how much of the spoken dialog in the movies is pretty much word-for-word from the books. I get what you and others are saying about Tolkiens narrative style, but a lot of the dialog transitioned well to the big screen.

And it's mixed up with awfully bad Hollywood lines such as "Because I believe there is still Good in this world". Such a poor written next to Tolkien's.

> Nor Glorfindel helping Frodo escape the Ringwraiths

They replaced Glorfindel with another character that makes just as much sense and made it so the movie was not even more male dominate then it already was. It also improved the romantic relationship considerably. In some ways its actually an improvement from the books.

Overall I think that is just complaining on an incredibly high level. Sure, lets make a new set of Lord of the Rings movies every 5 years, I'm in. But given the history of Fantasy in Movies, LotR pulls of the nearly impossible.

Yeah, it's at the level of calling for a re-adaptation of The Godfather or 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Almost all the comments that are unhappy with the LoTR trilogy are upset that they didn't add every single thing from the book. Tom Bombadil adds nothing to the story. Glorfindel can and was easily swapped. I believe the books have ~160 different characters with speaking roles. If they were accurate with the books it would cost way too much and they would need 30 hrs of runtime.

> Tom Bombadil adds nothing to the story

He does. He's the only character on which the Ring has no effect.

> If they were accurate with the books it would cost way too much and they would need 30 hrs of runtime

Even by keeping it at the same length, it could have been way more faithful. Faramir is portrayed as an asshole in the movie while in the books he understands that his brother was mistaken and does not make the same decision with the hobbits. Going to Osgiliath made absolutely no sense at all.

Such changes were NOT needed.

Faramir is not just an asshole, they show him as conflicted. They show how his father is talking down to him and you can understand his motivation. And in the end he makes the same choice. And that makes it more impactful when his father gets angry and sends him back to Osgiliath.

At also made showing the taking of Osgiliath more natural in the movie.

> At also made showing the taking of Osgiliath more natural in the movie.

I have only one thing to add: Sam, who apparently knows the book, says:

> "We should not even be here"

Hear hear.

> With a terrible cry the Balrog fell forward, and its shadow plunged down and vanished. But even as it fell it swung its whip, and the thongs lashed and curled about the wizard's knees, dragging him to the brink. He staggered and fell, grasped vainly at the stone, and slid into the abyss. "Fly, you fools!" he cried, and was gone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HoZxdS5K8E4

I mean I am a hardcore fan of the books for my whole live, and I certainty have some small issues with the movies, but damn. Saying that Peter Jackson is not a good director is quite the statement.

It seems to me that because you love the books so much you are applying and insanely high standard. Given where Fantasy has been before and since in movies what was achieved was almost unbelievable how amazing it is.

> In the movie, though, Faramir succumbs to the ring initially and leads the hobbits around for 15 minutes.

I think this is not even a bad change. It made Faramir and thus Boromir and the family dynamic a bigger part of the story. It gives it way more impact later when Faramir rides out.

> He did the same thing to even worse effect in The Hobbit.

In the Hobbit he had to jump in last minute and the studio forced it to 3 movies. There was no saving that thing. The only reason he directed it at all is because they might have pulled the movie from New Zealand.

> And yet with all that padding, he left out The Scouring of the Shire, one of the most important parts of the book.

There is just no practical way to include this even in the extended editions. The movie gets made endless jokes about how it has like 7 endings. It just not how movies work.

Remember even the cinematic editions had to cut so many things, it totally insane to think they could have added what amount to a whole other part at the end that can arguably be its own movie.

> There is just no practical way to include this even in the extended editions

They have could have removed the 7 endings and just included that one instead. The other endings felt completely out of place anyway. That's typically the sign of a director that does not know what to include and to cut out.

So you cut out the Fellowship meeting? You cut the crowning or Aaragon where everybody kneel and was on of the best moments? Do you now show them leaving?

Do you seriously want to stretch the hobbies in bar scene at the end into a what could be its own movie. It simply doesn't practically fit.

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