I'm a 'hobbit-head' with fairly deep roots. First read The Lord of the Rings in the mid-70s and have never really stopped reading it since. (Not a big fan of fantasy otherwise. Never read it, in fact. But this story sure did grab me and has never let go.)
I'm not a fan of the movies. I'm posting this mainly because I do wonder if I'm really even-handed in my evaluation of the books vs. the movies.
I'll start with one compliment toward the movies; they sure did get the 'look' of Middle-Earth and it's inhabitants right.
I have one complaint that I think is justified. While the Fellowship was portrayed as stalwart folks, almost all of the '2nd string' good guys were portrayed as faltering or selfish. There was a point when Elrond (in the movie) was getting ready to cut and run. Galadriel shamed him into sticking around and helping in the effort against Sauron. Galadriel is the only example I can think of when one of the background characters actually did show some guts. Though she was also portrayed as being kinda creepy while she was pondering Frodo's offer to give her the Ring. (But that's not important, I guess. It could be viewed as a device to give a notion of just how corrupting the Ring was to those who chose to use it.) In the book Elrond made clear that, if there was truly nothing else to be done, he would take the Ring and hide & protect it, knowing full well that eventually he'd be conquered and the Ring taken by Sauron. One might wonder if he'd use the Ring when things got really bad. But neither the book nor the movie explored that. In the movie he was portrayed as nearly stomping his foot while telling Gandalf to 'get that thing out of here!' And Gandalf was portrayed as being surprised by this. Rather silly dramatics. Both Gandalf and Elrond knew perfectly well that getting the Ring to Rivendell gained them only a very little bit of time and that something else needed to be done with it. Gandalf didn't need to be told that the Ring had to keep moving. It's easy to imagine that he would've regarded keeping it there as being amongst the worst of their options. In the book Treabeard had realized for some time that Saruman and his orcs were becoming more and more of a threat. But being a slow-to-action type he had spent a long time pondering what action might be necessary and keeping his options open. The arrival of Merry and Pippin with the story that they had to tell convinced him that the situation was about to explode and that he'd better do something quick. Once he reached that conclusion there was no hesitation even though he was not sure that he and his folk wouldn't get slaughtered. In the movie Treebeard tried to claim that this was not his fight. Even though war was creeping right up onto his borders. In fact, he didn't seem to even be aware of that. It fell to Merry to talk down to him a bit and then trick him into witnessing some of the slaughter of his own flock. Then he finally got mad and did something about it. Better late than never, I guess. But I still think that Peter Jackson mis-handled him. (Of course, the Ents and the Huorns were getting really far-fetched. Even Tolkien himself couldn't handle them really well. Though perhaps he did as well as possible with material that was this hard to swallow.) I could go on. But you get the idea. It seems to me that only the Fellowhip behaved with any dignity. The supporting good guys were all kinda squirrelly.
On a related subject; the chapters where Merry and Pippin describe the destruction of Isengard followed by the parley with Saruman were a nice, entertaining interlude between the first big battle of the war and the plunge into something that we'd regard as a world war. One of the most intriguing episodes in the story. The movie people left it out completely. I was dumbfounded. Also it seems to me that Tolkien handled Saruman, overall, better than Jackson did. Saruman was pretty darned mysterious to the reader until after he'd been neutralized. Jackson revealed everything of importance about him right from the start. He almost seemed to be in a hurry about it. There was something unsatisfying about that.
I can think of another complaint. This one might be less justifiable. In some ways the 'scope' of the movies seemed too narrow. Mordor itself, for instance was too small. Physically, geographically. Not important? Probably not. But it still rankled. Some crucial events in the plot were too 'small' in the sense of time. One example that comes to mind is after the siege of Gondor. Aragorn is arguing that there's an army of orcs between Frodo and his goal. They need to go and challenge this army as a way of getting it out of Frodo's way. Then an army marches out of Minas Tirith. The scene switches to Frodo and Sam, still up in the mountains in the border regions. Sam says, "Look, Mr Frodo! The orcs are leaving!" And, sure enough, you find yourself watching this army of orcs heading for the exit and leaving an empty valley behind. Now this is exactly the way Tolkien described this part of the story. But in his case it clearly took days. Whereas in the movie it seemed to happen in ten minutes. The reason I feel less certain of this complaint is that Jackson only had a certain amount of time to tell a terrifically complex story. Some editing and some time-crunching was inevitable. (Though it also might have been a good reason to never make the movie in the first place. I think Disney considered a movie and thought better of it for that reason.) It was perfectly justifiable, for instance, to leave out Tom Bombadil for this reason. For that matter, he didn't really fit the books all that well. Though he did serve a couple of plot points, those same plot points could have been served without him. So I must reconsider my criticism of this. Jackson had to squeeze the story quite a bit to get it to fit. I do wonder, though, if he could have squeezed more in some places and less in others.
I don't think Jackson handled Sauron very well. He was more annoying than anything. He was handled very minimally in the books. There was only a few sentences of dialogue that I can remember. When he was talking to Pippin through the palantir. Otherwise he was left to the imagination. And he's more frightening there than he is in the movies. Jackson should have done the same.
But I'm also wondering if perhaps Jackson might have improved on Tolkien in ways? And that I'm perhaps too antagonistic to recognize it? I'm a hobbit-head, like I said. It's likely that folks like me can't be satisfied with any movie version, no matter how excellent. So am I missing some excellence in these movies?
I'm not a fan of the movies. I'm posting this mainly because I do wonder if I'm really even-handed in my evaluation of the books vs. the movies.
I'll start with one compliment toward the movies; they sure did get the 'look' of Middle-Earth and it's inhabitants right.
I have one complaint that I think is justified. While the Fellowship was portrayed as stalwart folks, almost all of the '2nd string' good guys were portrayed as faltering or selfish. There was a point when Elrond (in the movie) was getting ready to cut and run. Galadriel shamed him into sticking around and helping in the effort against Sauron. Galadriel is the only example I can think of when one of the background characters actually did show some guts. Though she was also portrayed as being kinda creepy while she was pondering Frodo's offer to give her the Ring. (But that's not important, I guess. It could be viewed as a device to give a notion of just how corrupting the Ring was to those who chose to use it.) In the book Elrond made clear that, if there was truly nothing else to be done, he would take the Ring and hide & protect it, knowing full well that eventually he'd be conquered and the Ring taken by Sauron. One might wonder if he'd use the Ring when things got really bad. But neither the book nor the movie explored that. In the movie he was portrayed as nearly stomping his foot while telling Gandalf to 'get that thing out of here!' And Gandalf was portrayed as being surprised by this. Rather silly dramatics. Both Gandalf and Elrond knew perfectly well that getting the Ring to Rivendell gained them only a very little bit of time and that something else needed to be done with it. Gandalf didn't need to be told that the Ring had to keep moving. It's easy to imagine that he would've regarded keeping it there as being amongst the worst of their options. In the book Treabeard had realized for some time that Saruman and his orcs were becoming more and more of a threat. But being a slow-to-action type he had spent a long time pondering what action might be necessary and keeping his options open. The arrival of Merry and Pippin with the story that they had to tell convinced him that the situation was about to explode and that he'd better do something quick. Once he reached that conclusion there was no hesitation even though he was not sure that he and his folk wouldn't get slaughtered. In the movie Treebeard tried to claim that this was not his fight. Even though war was creeping right up onto his borders. In fact, he didn't seem to even be aware of that. It fell to Merry to talk down to him a bit and then trick him into witnessing some of the slaughter of his own flock. Then he finally got mad and did something about it. Better late than never, I guess. But I still think that Peter Jackson mis-handled him. (Of course, the Ents and the Huorns were getting really far-fetched. Even Tolkien himself couldn't handle them really well. Though perhaps he did as well as possible with material that was this hard to swallow.) I could go on. But you get the idea. It seems to me that only the Fellowhip behaved with any dignity. The supporting good guys were all kinda squirrelly.
On a related subject; the chapters where Merry and Pippin describe the destruction of Isengard followed by the parley with Saruman were a nice, entertaining interlude between the first big battle of the war and the plunge into something that we'd regard as a world war. One of the most intriguing episodes in the story. The movie people left it out completely. I was dumbfounded. Also it seems to me that Tolkien handled Saruman, overall, better than Jackson did. Saruman was pretty darned mysterious to the reader until after he'd been neutralized. Jackson revealed everything of importance about him right from the start. He almost seemed to be in a hurry about it. There was something unsatisfying about that.
I can think of another complaint. This one might be less justifiable. In some ways the 'scope' of the movies seemed too narrow. Mordor itself, for instance was too small. Physically, geographically. Not important? Probably not. But it still rankled. Some crucial events in the plot were too 'small' in the sense of time. One example that comes to mind is after the siege of Gondor. Aragorn is arguing that there's an army of orcs between Frodo and his goal. They need to go and challenge this army as a way of getting it out of Frodo's way. Then an army marches out of Minas Tirith. The scene switches to Frodo and Sam, still up in the mountains in the border regions. Sam says, "Look, Mr Frodo! The orcs are leaving!" And, sure enough, you find yourself watching this army of orcs heading for the exit and leaving an empty valley behind. Now this is exactly the way Tolkien described this part of the story. But in his case it clearly took days. Whereas in the movie it seemed to happen in ten minutes. The reason I feel less certain of this complaint is that Jackson only had a certain amount of time to tell a terrifically complex story. Some editing and some time-crunching was inevitable. (Though it also might have been a good reason to never make the movie in the first place. I think Disney considered a movie and thought better of it for that reason.) It was perfectly justifiable, for instance, to leave out Tom Bombadil for this reason. For that matter, he didn't really fit the books all that well. Though he did serve a couple of plot points, those same plot points could have been served without him. So I must reconsider my criticism of this. Jackson had to squeeze the story quite a bit to get it to fit. I do wonder, though, if he could have squeezed more in some places and less in others.
I don't think Jackson handled Sauron very well. He was more annoying than anything. He was handled very minimally in the books. There was only a few sentences of dialogue that I can remember. When he was talking to Pippin through the palantir. Otherwise he was left to the imagination. And he's more frightening there than he is in the movies. Jackson should have done the same.
But I'm also wondering if perhaps Jackson might have improved on Tolkien in ways? And that I'm perhaps too antagonistic to recognize it? I'm a hobbit-head, like I said. It's likely that folks like me can't be satisfied with any movie version, no matter how excellent. So am I missing some excellence in these movies?
