LOTR:Return Of The King Trailer

noda132 writes "The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King trailer is now available! I just found it on theonering.net. It's only 9mb big, but it's a start." You can also get it from AOL as well. Update: 09/29 20:13 GMT by S : The official site now has the new trailer as well.

Comments

Obligatory analysis

[TopShelf]

The frame-by-frame analysis can also be found here.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[gowen]

I'm not entirely sure thats frame-by-frame...

Frame 2: Very like Frame 1. Everyone has moved very slightly...

Frame 3: Very like Frame 2. The camera has started to move. Very slowly...

Re:Obligatory analysis

[narkotix]

does anyone else read that link as the ONIONring.net?

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Anonymous Coward]

No. Just you. The rest of us learned to read in first grade.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[NanoGator]

Too bad Tyler Durden didn't release the teaser. There'd have been an easter egg for all those frame analyzers out there.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Anonymous Coward]

Gotta love that heading on the frame-by-frame analysis: "Major spoilers alert!!!"

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Vindicator9000]

didn't seem like it had any shots of the Shire after the battle and the destruction of the ring... Does anyone else think that Peter Jackson is going to totally screw up the original ending *really bad*? I keep hoping that he keeps it more or less as written (I'd love to see a small army of Hobbits trouncing Sauruman's henchmen), but given what he has cut out already as "non-essential," I can't help but have some misgivings.

Don't get me wrong, I actually thought the first two movies were quite entertaining. I didn't really mind him cutting out Bombadil, and I'm willing to overlook the horrible treatment of Treebeard, but something tells me that they're just going to totally screw up the beauty of the original ending.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[bzzzt]

I believe it was announced 2 years ago that the movies would not contain the "scouring of the shire" chapter...

Re:Obligatory analysis

[CaptainBaz]

Actually, at least in cinemas, each frame is shown twice.

So...

Frame 2: See Frame 1.

...

Frame 4: See Frame 3.

etc.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[sgage]

I think it's fairly well accepted that there will be no "Scouring of the Shire". Oh well.

Yes, cutting Bombadil was unfortunate. Not sure about the treatment of Treebeard, but Faramir's portrayal bothered me some.

Oh well, it's just a movie. The book is still there...

Re:Obligatory analysis

[szo]

Pray tell me, what's the point of this? There won't be any surprise in a movie that claim to be closely based on a book... If you are curious, go read the book.

Szo

Re:Obligatory analysis

[the_real_tigga]

Prediction:
Under the premise that "Scouring" scenes have been shot at all, some "Extended DVD Collection" will contain the "bonus" ending scenes.

Short cuts fasing in and out with some slow happy music playing, and at the end a four-line dialogue when Frodo joins the elves and Gandalf leaving Middle Earth.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[dinivin]

Thank God. That was one of the stupidest endings of any book that I've ever read.

Dinivin

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Rallion]

Yeah, all the changes have been rather...too bad. But I can accept all of them, as much as it bothers me to see Faramir being...not so nice. In a movie, you really have to keep the action moving, and make the climax at the END, which means that the removal of Bombadil, and even the Scouring, are necessary. And I can understand why Faramir was changed, too. In the movie, it's far more difficult to show the ring as an evil thing. You can't just use subtleties, you have to come out and say it. And if Faramir had been all nice about it, the idea wouldn't have come across at all.

Ah, still. It makes me sad.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[CaseyB]

Under the premise that "Scouring" scenes have been shot at all, some "Extended DVD Collection" will contain the "bonus" ending scenes.

Shots of ruined Hobbiton were shot, at least, for Frodo's vision in the mirror.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Apreche]

I was just thinking about that.

Nooooooo! That's the best chapter. Whit Saruman being all old and stuff. It's hilarious.

Hopefully they'll at least put it on the extended DVD version. They at least have to show the trip to the gray havens in some fashion. Ring falling in volcano != end of story.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, that's what we thought before going to see The Two Towers...

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Crayon Kid]

Dunno about that. I myself have gotten a bit sick of all the "prince marries princess and they all live happily ever after" stereotype endings you see in fantasy books. The LOTR ending is more realistic and it suits such a nice piece of work.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Overly Critical Guy]

No, they won't. You can't put in something you didn't film.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[bziman]

but something tells me that they're just going to totally screw up the beauty of the original ending.

Dude, PJ has already said he axed the Cleansing. From what he said, they didn't even film it for the extended edition. Too bad. I'm looking forward to the "Phantom Edit" equivalent for LotR.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Anonymous Coward]

A *pair* of easter eggs, more like. Two eggs and a sausage.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[flagstone]

The Faramir backstory is apparently expanded on in the Extended Two Towers DVD (including more on Boromir). Dunno if it will address your specific concerns, but the FOTR Extended edition did much to improve Galadriel's character IMHO, so there's hope.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe it's not so bad that scenes are left out. Why should those who still haven't bothered to read the book get to enjoy the full story. They don't really deserve it.

btw it just occurs to me, weren't there scenes of the scouring at the mirror of Galadriel scene?

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Anonymous Coward]

False.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[LDoggg_]

I'd love to see a phantom edit of The Two Towers where most of the gimli jokes get axed.

With the exception of maybe the part about the dwarf women, the rest of the gimli comic releif was completely unnecessary.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[mattACK]

Nope - only DLP cinema updates twice per frame. False.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Vindicator9000]

Well, that sucks. I realize that there were scouring scenes in the mirror pool, but I still think that in removing the entire section of story from the end, you lose a great amount of insight on character development over the course of the story... You don't get to see how Merry, Pippin, and Sam have grown into great leaders of their people, and you don't get to see the ultimate brokenness of Frodo over his failure (even though the ring was destroyed, Frodo still ultimately failed his task). Also, you miss out on seeing what Saruman and Wormtounge are reduced to - for me, the satisfaction of that far outweighed what happens to Frodo.

Bottom line: the ending was Tolkien summarizing the entire point of the series. I think that his intention was to show that we all have choices, and that they define who we are. Without the final chapters, the story becomes just another blood-and-guts fantasy epic (which is what a lot of people have been calling the movies from the beginning), albiet a good one. Tolkien's message has been completely lost.

Sorry, I didn't hear before that they were axing the shire. It still sucks far worse than any edits thus far. Needless to say, I'll still see the damned thing, and I'll probably like it.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[WatertonMan]

Yeah, I was thinking that too. But while there were shots of battles in Hobbiton, weren't they of events different than in the book? It's been a while since I read the third volume, but I seem to recall the shire being occupied by Sauroman and a bunch of humans along with Wormtongue. In the vision in the first film I could swear they were Orcs attacking.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[WatertonMan]

I can understand the changes to be honest. And in the director's cut the lack of a perception of time passage wasn't as bad. (Although it still was there -- especially Gandalf's wandering before returning to the Shire. It seemed like it took a week rather than years)

I must admit that I wasn't a fan of Strider simply giving the swords to the Hobbits rather than them finding them. I understand it, but I'd have preferred that to have been left in even if they left out Bombadil.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[coreytamas]

PJ did say that the Grey Havens would be in the final movie. Sorry I don't have a source for you; I heard it earlier this year.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Rallion]

Well, I know they (they being PJ, crew, and even cast) really do understand the characters and the changes they go through. I'm sure they'll write in scenes or dramatize existing ones to make sure people get the impression. I know they don't skimp on portrayals of the great responsibility taken on my Merry and Pippin in RotK, that much is clear from the various previews. Of course, things from the very end are still very much shrouded in mystery, so how they'll show the effect on Frodo is hard to say, but from a saga that's over 10 hours long, I'm sure we'll have a significant amount of time after the destruction of the ring--just not a whole new subplot--and there really are plenty of opportunities for that, I think. I'd like to see the lasting effects of his two wounds mentioned, though...

Re:Obligatory analysis

[syle]

Does anyone else think that Peter Jackson is going to totally screw up the original ending *really bad*?

Leaving out the Scouring is not screwing up the ending badly. Remember how the ring is destroyed in the fires of Mount Doom? That is the ending.

"And after they saved the entire world from an eternity of suffering and destruction, they went home and PEOPLE WERE LIVING IN THEIR HOUSES! OH MY GOD! NOOOOOOOOO!!"

I'm glad he's leaving it out.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Anonymous Coward]

I still think that in removing the entire section of story from the end, you lose a great amount of insight on character development over the course of the story...

Have you seen the movie, then?

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the ending you refer to in the RotK book may be a little anti-climactic as a movie ending. On the other hand, I would like to see that ending at least in the Special Edition DVD.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[gfxguy]

You are right. And that was my thought too - that was just a vision, not anything to do with "The Scouring of the Shire."

Re:Obligatory analysis

[gfxguy]

Actually, I've read that a lot of the extended parts were actually new material. I'd guess that now it's next to impossible, but after the first movie they still had a lot of actors and props they could use. Actors would still get called back for sound studio work and so forth.

I'm not saying they will add it, but not all the material in the extended versions were stuff that just ended up on the cutting room floor.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[gfxguy]

But they can't retract Faramir's shortsidedness, even if they balance it with some good stuff.

To me, the Faramir part was the worst change they made. I can also forgive Bombadil, and even the order of events surrounding Gandalf's confrontation with Saruman. The book was fantasic, and it was a face to face confrontation. But I digress...

The part about Faramir that bothers me the most is he finally gives up the ring after seeing Frodo almost give it to the wraith. It's like "Well, Frodo's at his weekest point now, so I'll cut him lose with the ring, which is the key to our survival." I know it was supposed to be more like "Now I can see what evil the ring brings," but I saw it differently.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Anonymous Coward]

Tolkien had no 'message'. Read the foreward in Fellowship of the Ring.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[dinivin]

Taking a boat off into never-never land is more realistic? Having Saruman and his henchman take over the Shire is more realisitic?

Dinivin

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Anonymous Coward]

I can understand cutting out some parts in the interest of running time etc. It the altering of the basic story and fabrication of things not in the book that really bothers me the most. And for no reason I can see, Aragorn falls off a cliff for example. Why?
Of course I will see it, and buy the dvd, then the extended version, then the boxed set when it finally comes out.

Still its sad, to me at least, the visuals are incredible, but only a shadow of what might have been. The book is ALWAYS better than the movie I guess...

Re:Obligatory analysis

[venobandino]

There will be no scouring of the Shire scene in the movie. So no, you will not see an army of hobbits taking out Sauraman's henchmen. Sauraman will die at the begining of the film. - according to TorN. AicN.

Re:Obligatory analysis

[Vindicator9000]

Isaac Asimov once sat in on a college lecture where the class was discussing the message and social implications of a story that he'd written (I forget which one). He maintained his silence for several minutes, until he could hold his comments no longer. He loudly exclaimed that he had absolutely no message in mind when he had written the story, and that its purpose was for nothing more than entertainment value. The instructor politely said that his intentions for the meaning of the story made not one whit of difference in what meaning the audience got out of it.

Point: In art, the intent of your message often has nothing to do with how the piece is actually interpreted. This is especially true in literature. If, for example, the audience of Lord of the Flies interprets the story as nothing more than kids on an island, than who is William Golding to argue? If his intended message (or non-message) was not apparent to the audience, then it's his own fault.

did it get hammered allready ???

[phaktor]

well lets see it's 5:00 am on the west cost and the site is /.ed allready. we all need to go back to bed.

Re:did it get hammered allready ???

[PrintError]

8:02am here and it's /.'d I don't think it's us... let's blame Fark instead! The server is all Farked up... sounds better if you ask me.

Re:did it get hammered allready ???

[k0de]

Some of us are sick of work already and looking for a good distraction -- it's 9:30 AM here in NL, Canada (GMT -3.5).

Re:did it get hammered allready ???

[Anonymous Coward]

Where's a torrent when you need one?

Re:did it get hammered allready ???

[Groote Ka]

ok, off topic but nontheless: What do you think the time in Europe is when it's 5.00 at the west of the US (I presume US)?

Told you /. is too americanocentric.

Re:did it get hammered allready ???

[theTerribleRobbo]

Ever heard of... umm... The Rest Of The World? Yes? NO?!? Oh dear...

Re:did it get hammered allready ???

[Anonymous Coward]

Most of the readers are American. It's hosted in America. The topics deal by and large with things going in America. Deal with it.

Re:did it get hammered allready ???

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it sounds quite retarded.... but then again so is fark.

wow

[fjordboy]

800 KB/second! Best trailer download yet! Totally sweet.

Strange, the official lord of the rings site has no info on the new trailer. *shrug*

Re:wow

[fjordboy]

Just finished watching the trailer...wow, that's going to be great! I was pretty impressed, though it seems to be a bit of a downer....every time the text flies in it's something sad: "There can't be victory w/o loss" "no triumph w/o suffering" etc. Oh...and theodon's speech to the troops (I assume it's theodon...I didn't get a good look) includes talking about how there will be fighting among men in the future...but not now because they have to unite. I don't know about the men of Gondor and so forth...but that's not the sort of speech I'd want to hear before going into battle. *shrug* I'm sure the movie will be awesome though.

Re:wow

[Anonymous Coward]

The trailer will be officially launched later today. I'm waiting for the 'full screen'-quality official release instead of these low-quality ones. The 19MB file is almost there, but the AOL/9MB one surely isn't (I just peeked for a few seconds to see that the image quality sucks).

Re:wow

[Anonymous Coward]

how is this offtopic???

Try AOL, principles aside

[davebarz]

OneRing is /.'ed but AOL is tortoising along at 1.5kb/s. By 8:00am I'll be basking in the glory of the Return Of The King trailer.

Re:Try AOL, principles aside

[tedgyz]

Holy Mackarel! 170KB/s download speed. Principles aside indeed!

how long will be ROTK ?

[Tybalta]

Rumors tell that over 3 or maybe 4 hours? Anybody heard anything "official"?

Regarding the trailer, I think that this will be the most fantastic part of the whole. My favorite scene from the trailer is when Aragorn reclaims the Narsil from Elrond ... man, that scene has some real power in it (if you read the books, ofcoz) :)

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[Anonymous Coward]

It was over a week, when I read it.

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[AKnightCowboy]

My favorite scene from the trailer is when Aragorn reclaims the Narsil from Elrond

What's a Narsil and who is Elrond? Aragorn is the tall hippie guy with the beard right? I guess I could've read the books, but I didn't want to spoil the ending of the movies. I wonder if it's a trick ending and good loses and darkness washes over the land. That'd be really cool.

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[akpcep]

I would imagine there will be the usual length cinematic release (well, usual for a LOTR film so far), then the 2 disc DVD, then the 4 disc DVD.

Of course those of us with a great deal of patience will be waiting for he 12 disc DVD boxed set of the trilogy...

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you've read Tolkien's books, and actually liked them, then any scene "has some real power in it." That's because Tolkien fans get downright orgasmic over all of the pointless dribble that spewed from Tolkien's pen. I offer you a brief description of Tolkien's masterful writing technique: 150 pages of walking around bullshit in which only 5 pages actually contain an occurence of some sort, 50 pages of horribly written poems and songs, another 50 pages devoted to the (plagiarised) mythology of Middle Earth, 25 pages at both beginning and end to provide the illusion of continuity from one book to another.

With the remaining ~40 pages, scattered amongst the garbage, you get a story that is actually worth reading, so long as Tolkien's not the one writing. Tolkien fans seem to forget that when Tolkien's works were first released, critics thought they were utter shit.

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[phil reed]

Elrond is the elf from the first episode, the one who called the meeting.

Narsil is the name of the broken sword that you saw in the first movie. It was used to hack the ring from Sauron's finger in the war 3000 years earlier.

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[akpcep]

"Tolkien fans seem to forget that when Tolkien's works were first released, critics thought they were utter shit. "

VanGogh only sold one painting in his lifetime.

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[larien]

Hrm, perhaps you should look up sarcasm in a dictionary?

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[pmace]

Elrond = Agent Smith. "Hello Mr. Aragorn. Surprised to see me?"

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[Dr. Manhattan]

Yeah, you're a troll, but in this case the answer comes from beyond the grave:

"Some who have read the book, or at any rate have reviewed it, have found it boring, absurd, or contemptible; and I have no cause to complain, since I have similar opinions of their works, or of the kinds of writing that they evidently prefer."

- J.R.R. Tolkien, on critics

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[AKnightCowboy]

Elrond is the elf from the first episode, the one who called the meeting.

Narsil is the name of the broken sword that you saw in the first movie.

Ah, thanks. I wonder if Aragorn will use Narsil to cut the ring off Sauron again. Such questions. Anyone know of a good spoiler site or is the script kept pretty well locked up tight? (BTW, don't tell me to go read the books, I'm not interested in anything but Peter Jackson's interpretation of Middle Earth).

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[phil reed]

I wonder if Aragorn will use Narsil to cut the ring off Sauron again.

Not likely. It's generally understood that if Sauron gets his (its?) hand on the Ring again, it's all over for the good guys.

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[Swift(void)]

Well, unless peter jackson had totally lost his mind by the time they shot the 3rd movie, gollum helps in the destruction of the ring. I really hope he was still sane at the time the did it.

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[nomso]

My favorite scene from the trailer is when Aragorn reclaims the Narsil from Elrond ... man, that scene has some real power in it (if you read the books, ofcoz) :)

It has power to kick PJs butt, if you have read the books.

Aragorn carried with him Narsil all the time, in broken form, until the Nine Companions set out from Rivendell, and Narsil was reforged and named anew Anduril - Flame of the West. Thereafter he bore that sword even to the last chapters of the book.

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[Tyler Durden]

My favorite scene from the trailer is when Aragorn reclaims the Narsil from Elrond ... man, that scene has some real power in it (if you read the books, ofcoz) :)

And having read the books, I can say it's about time that Aragorn gets Narsil. It would have been better if it was reforged by the Elves and then taken by him right after the Coucil of Elrond like it was supposed to, however. Oh well, better late than never.

I hope they keep the part from the book where Aragorn uses the Palantir to contact Sauron and show him the sword, thus spurning his evilness to battle. (No really - look it up. It happened.)

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[sweetwayne]

Thank you! It's about time we hear from someone with some sense who has actually read LOTR. Narsil was never stored on some pretty table in Rivendell, and the sword was reforged after the council of Elrond in FOTR.

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[twbecker]

Actually, wouldn't it be Mr. Arathorn?

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[Tybalta]

Sorry, you misunderstood my words ... or maybe i didn't elaborate clearly :

The Elrond-Narsil-Aragorn scene will rock in the film. I'd like the way PJ adopted this, and make it a very powerful event, when Aragorn recives his sword.

Aragorn-going-tobe-king was always one of my favorite "subquest" from the book and one of the favorite scenes from this is when Aragorn and his company goes through the Path of the Dead :

"Oathbreakers, why have ye come?" - and a voice was heard out of the night that answered him,
as if from far away: "To fulfil our oath and have peace."

Then Aragorn said: "The hour is come at last. Now I go to Pelargir upon Anduin, and ye shall come after me. And when all this land is clean of the servants of Sauron, I will hold the oath fulfilled and ye shall have peace and depart for ever."

"For I am Elessar, Isildur's heir of Gondor."

I wonder, if this will be in the film ... it would be nice :)

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[Rallion]

Oh, yeah. That scene would be good to see. If I remember, though it was just talked about, and not explicitly described...though it's been a while and I don't have my books here (Gak!). It would be nice to have it shown as a conflict between Aragorn and Sauron as much as possible, since that's how I see it myself. Heh.

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[nelsonal]

Unbelievably talented and generous man, who died after he believed he was a miserable failure. He originally wanted to be a mission leader, and run something like a modern homeless shelter, but after giving all his possessions, and most of his meager stipend to those less fortunate than him, his higher up decided he was mad and had him tossed out. He tried painting and he thought failed at that too. Odd that he is certainly one of the most famous old masters today.

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[Tybalta]

Unknown Source :

'The owners of the theater chain I work for has started planning for the ROTK.

They have received information that ROTK is expected to be exceptionally long. It will include a 15 minute intermission. The movie is expected to end at a predetermined spot, but the film will continue to run. There will be a filler strip included by New Line that carries a musical score and some sort of color pattern.

RUMOR has it the film will be around 4 hours long.'

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[Tyler Durden]

Yeah. If I remeber it right, Aragorn goes somewhere alone for a while and then comes back looking old and tired. Later on, Gandalf finds out what happens and is amazed that Aragorn did so. The way Aragorn tells it, the conflict nearly breaks him. It's something that even Gandalf doesn't dare try!

Seeing the sword is a real shock for Sauron even though he is easily the most powerful being on Middle Earth. I think it's Gandalf who says of him, "He still knows fear."

I'm definitely re-reading the 3rd book before I see the movie.

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[dswensen]

What I want to know is, will they call it Anduril?

I think the whole point is that Jackson is trying to draw the transformation of Aragorn from ranger to king closer to the climax of the story. I can see the appeal of that.

Aragorn in the books is a flawless, comic-book hero by the time of the Council of Elrond, and is waving Anduril around at every opportunity (at Eomer, at Hama, etc.) The only real moment of any drama concerning Aragorn (as far as I'm concerned) is where he shows himself to Sauron and the Paths of the Dead. I think both moments become more interesting if Aragorn is a more vulnerable, conflicted character than he is in the books.

Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love the book version of Aragorn, but I think the movie version of Aragorn is just a bit more interesting. He's more conflicted. I like that. And the sword ties into that vulnerability. Jackson has made it symbolic of his transformation, and delayed that transformation enough to make it interesting.

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[Thuktun]

Aragorn in the books is a flawless, comic-book hero by the time of the Council of Elrond, and is waving Anduril around at every opportunity (at Eomer, at Hama, etc.) The only real moment of any drama concerning Aragorn (as far as I'm concerned) is where he shows himself to Sauron and the Paths of the Dead. I think both moments become more interesting if Aragorn is a more vulnerable, conflicted character than he is in the books.

Probably because Tolkien was building an epic, and thus writing in a lofty, heroic style for many of the larger-than-life characters like Aragorn.

This is one of the reasons one might forgive Jackson for the changes made to the story. Lack of human flaws and drama make for less-than-stellar motion pictures.

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[cptgrudge]

There are people that I know that dislike the Tolkien books. FWIW, I have a friend that doesn't read. Ever. I told him about the Tolkien books. I told him that there are people that don't like them for whatever reason. He had seen the movies and kind of wanted to read the books.

He loves them, and reads some every day.

Something about Tolkien seems to cross all boundaries of race, religion, and age. We talk of the changes made between the books and the movies, reasons for them, and also on the books as themselves.

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[Yanray]

That would break the Hitchcock rule "The Length of a movie should be directly related to the endurance of the human bladder."

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[Jaysyn]

Welcome to Rivendale.....Mr. Anderson.

Jaysyn

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps YOU should dumbass.

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[Madcapjack]

And Aragorn renamed Narsil, Anduril. I wonder.

you know, Tolkien expressed one complaint about his book: it was too short. Well I think the movies are too short-six films would have been much better. Too many good things are left out. Still I'm happy. my childhood dream fulfilled, without too much dissapointment. Not like that A$$hole Lucas. ( :

Re:how long will be ROTK ?

[LDoggg_]

Apparently 3 and a half hours, give or take a minute.

Read the book first

[Davak]

Am I the only one that saw the first LOTR movies before reading the book? What was I thinking?

It totally destroyed the experience for me as the movie's images were stuck in my head as I read.

At least I didn't screw it completely up and read the book before this last one.

Davak

Re:Read the book first

[Davak]

Doh, typo.

At least I didn't screw it completely up since I read the book before this last one.

Davak

Re:Read the book first

[davebarz]

It's much worse a phenomenon than that. Prior to the movies, I'd read the whole trilogy at least 5 or 6 times. Nevertheless, when I read it now, I still picture all the movie characters. I can't even remember how I used to picture them. On one hand, it's a testament to the quality and immersive brilliance of the movies. On the other hand, it's really annoying that they stole from me the images of characers I've treasured since childhood.

Re:Read the book first

[Anonymous Coward]

Eh, torn here myself.

Bilbo, Frodo, Sam, Gandalf, Aragorn, Grima, Theoden, Eomer and Eowyn were right on in terms of my mind's eye. Excellent choice for casting.

The movie Galadriel has since gotten into a catfight with my mind's former Galadriel, and has emerged victorious. ;)

Arwen? I can't say anything ill towards Jackson for that. As 'Luthien reborn', that is, the hottest elf chick ever(tm), there exists no woman on this planet that could have filled the role without complaint. If something horrible happens and the Silmarillion is put to film, I sincerely hope they leave out the tale of Luthien.

I can tell you one thing, though. Every time I read through Lord of the Rings now, I keep thinking of Legolas kicking Orlando Bloom's scrawny surfer-boy ass. :P

And I never imagined Haldir being fat. A fat elf? What the hell was that?

Re:Read the book first

[Jugalator]

Yeah, ditto.. :-P

Although I'd prefer my own imagination, it's not too bad since I think the LOTR trilogy as movies were so good. Reading the books also feels like a super-mega-extended deluxe edition of the movies, so that's nice. :-)

Re:Read the book first

[squaretorus]

Am I the only one that saw the first LOTR movies before reading the book?

No. Although I have no intention of reading the books so maybe I don't count. Actually I didn't even want to see the movies and were it not for their Xmas release dates I probably never would have (family gathering, pissing each other off, lets go to the cinema).

I reckon I saved myself a lot of wasted hours reading by shortcutting the plot in a couple of movies. Wizards! Pah!

Re:Read the book first

[CoolHnd30]

Yeah, well my kids will unfortunately not even have the chance to read the books first. :(

Re:Read the book first

[TopShelf]

They should just release a new printing of the books, and call it "The Author's Cut."

As for myself, I've probably read LOTR 15 times or so, and have been blown away with how good a job they've done with the films. Sure, there are things to complain about (I'll reserve my judgement on the whole Faramir thing until I see the extended DVD this fall), but by and large Jackson took on a monumental task and succeeded admirably.

Re:Read the book first

[Anonymous Coward]

Haldir's not fat! He's big-boned!

Re:Read the book first

[the_consumer]

My internal images of the characters are still dominated by Ralph Bakshi's animated version, particularly the hobbits. Fortunately the narrative and charcterizations of that version have been wiped from my mind through subsequent readings.

Re:Read the book first

[elektra_168]

Hi. I have not read the books, and would like to hold off until after this movie. So while I do want to see the trailer, I am determined to stay 100% spoiler-free. I noticed that theonering labeled this trailer with "MAJOR SPOILERS" - can someone verify if this trailer does indeed contain spoilers, or is just a normal trailer as would be seen in a theater? Thanks, elektra_168

Re:Read the book first

[Hoarke42]

Since the books are always better than the movie, I'm watching the movies first, or else I'd be too disappointed by stuff left out when watching the flick.

Re:Read the book first

[stanmann]

I was thinking that Orlando Bloom was pretty well on, however My Elrond scoffs joyfully at Mr Smith.

Re:Read the book first

[ddimas]

Bet on the spoilers. New Line knows that most people seeing this movie have not only read the books, they have memorized them.

Re:Read the book first

[ddimas]

Don't speak of that Wizards knockoff he did.

Re:Read the book first

[epicstruggle]

I dont know why but i have always pictured Elrond as the green giant (http://www.greengiant.com/).

later,
epic

Re:Read the book first

[I_M_Noman]

it's really annoying that they stole from me the images of characers I've treasured since childhood.

Which is why I won't go to see the movies. I've read the whole lot 20+ times (Silmarillion included).

Re:Read the book first

[Anonymous Coward]

On the other hand, it's really annoying that they stole from me the images of characers I've treasured since childhood.

That's right, blame the movies for that. Because you were forced to see them, after all.

Re:Read the book first

[Anonymous Coward]

I had read the books when I was about 13, once, and never read them again. The only character(s) who didn't closely match my expectations were the orcs, who I had envisioned as being furrier for some reason.

Anyway, I re-read the books and I don't picture the actors at all, but when I read the dialogue, the voices of the actors resonate. This doesn't bother me at all, honestly. When a voice is conjured that readily to a line of dialogue, it tells me that the actor and director did an excellent job of finding a real-world voice for a fictional character. I've read books were the movie character just did NOT "feel right" and match the dialogue, and LOTR hasn't been like that. Again, except for the orcs and to a lesser extent the Uruks.

Re:Read the book first

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not stealing when you willingly give it up

Re:Read the book first

[robbo]

I agree completely. Now, whenever I read the Council of Elrond, I mentally insert a threatening "Mr Anderson" every time Elrond speaks.

Re:Read the book first

[Anonymous Coward]

Orlando Bloom is hot. That is all.

Re:Read the book first

[Anonymous Coward]

Which is why you are still a virgin.

Re:Read the book first

[pizzaman100]

It could be worse. I saw the "Made for TV" cartoons before reading the books. Imagine picturing Casey Kasem whenever Meriadoc Brandybuck starts talking.

Re:Read the book first

[DavidBrown]

My internal images of the characters are still dominated by Ralph Bakshi's animated version, particularly the hobbits.

It could be worse. Your internal images of the characters could be based on the animated Return of the King, complete with that lovely Orc song, "Where there's a whip, there's a way".

As an aside, it occurs to me that Hollywood, or New Zealand, really, could do a whole TV series based on the Simillarion alone.

Re:Read the book first

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey, good one. Oh wait, no it wasn't. Back to the minor leagues with you, cumdumpster.

Re:Read the book first

[LDoggg_]

I know its a popular to slam Bakshi's version as it did look like a bad acid trip. I did however think the nazgul in his version were just a little scarier, and they are still the ones in my mind when I read the books.
The rest of the characters were pretty goofy looking. The hobbits all looked like Nicholas from Eight is Enough. Legolas looked like Shaggy from Scooby Doo. And I'm not sure what the hell Bakshi was thinking when he put together the Balrog, or the Tusken Raider/Orcs.

Nothing compares to the abomniation that was the animated Return of the King.
Gotta get "Frodo of the nine fingers and the ring of doom" out of my head.

Re:Read the book first

[jandrese]

This is the approach I started with Harry Potter. I watched the first two movies, then read the books. There are some things that work better in the movies than in the books IMHO. Anyway, after watching the movies, I wasn't disappointed by the books, rather I liked getting the story again with more depth. Granted, my mental image of the characters changed while reading the books (Hagrid is a lot bigger in the books for instance), but that was fine. Unfortunatly I blew past the movies and finished all of the other books as well, so I'm bound to be disappointed when the movies come out.

Re:Read the book first

[Anonymous Coward]

Loser.

Re:Read the book first

[Eric Savage]

What really endeared me to the movies was how much the movie was like the images in my head. When I saw the shire in the first preview, it was as if someone had stolen my brain. The horsemen, Gandalf, Boromir, among others were all practically printouts of my mental imagery. The only exception was Gollum, who is close but I always imagined him a little darker and slimier and generally more evil.

Re:Read the book first

[hellfire]

On the other hand, it's really annoying that they stole from me the images of characers I've treasured since childhood.

This has to be the cheesiest complaint I've ever heard. How exactly does one blame other people for "forgetting" something? Losing imagery is the fault of your own brain, not the fault of any media corporation. Does the media bombard you and every other consumer with imagery? Yes, but you have every right to ignore it and even still, if you "lost" this imagery I doubt it was very strong in your head.

Re:Read the book first

[No Such Agency]

Hell, for that matter I don't even remember having a strong visual image of any of the characters. It's a shortcoming I know, but I tend to form a better "internal" (ie. their feelings and motivations) image of book characters than external. Even a distinctive character like William Gibson's Molly/Sally just ends up in my head as a shorthand version - "chick in black leather with embedded mirrorshades" - which suffices to let me mentally picture the action of the book.

Re:Read the book first

[Oliver Wendell Jones]

If you read The National Lampoon's 'Bored of the Rings', Treebeard is replaced with the Jolly Green Giant, his name is Birdseye and he is lord of the Vee-Ates. ho ho ho.

Re:Read the book first

[stripe]

Hmmm, how long do you think till the MPAA figures out a way to bill you or sue you for all that imagery you copied into your memory and replaying in your head?

Re:Read the book first

[Moofie]

Gollum (and particularly Gollum's voice) scared the piss out of me when I was little. When I'd watch it on TV, I'd actually leave the room for his scenes, and have my parents holler at me when his scenes were over.

Still kinda skeeves me out.

Re:Read the book first

[CGP314]

That's the reason I never went to see the Harry Potter moves. I love the books too much to loose my images of the characters. With LoTR, I experienced the story in so many forms already, there was no reason not to see the film.

Re:Read the book first

[Mac Degger]

Heh...for some reason I always pictured Gollum as a non-transparent, black and slimy version of Slimer from the Ghostbusters movie :)

Ho Ho, Good morning, Chaps.

[Anonymous Coward]

During our summer vacation this year, my wife and I amused ourselves by taking leisurely drives in Ohio and photographing every diamond-shaped highway sign that we saw along the roadsides. (Well, not every sign; only the distinct ones.) For provenance, I also stood at the base of each sign and measured its GPS coordinates.

This turned out to be even more fun than a scavenger hunt, so we filled in some gaps when we returned to California, thereby proving my theorem of producing god-awful movies with over the top budgets who please only sexually dysfunctional nerds and divorced men, which can be found in LaTeX format on my website.

Sincerely,

Donald E. Knuth

Use AOL

[tjensor]

Uff... I feel dirty....

seriously though, I got the trailer in seconds fom there, one ring is only 1/4 through and I've allready watched it!

now I just have to wait till december 17th :(

Re:Use AOL

[myom]

I feel dirty too, it's like men tapping the one power, in the Wheel if Time books. Then again, the taint on my soul washes away, while AOL's communications bill for uploading the trailer 7583758785 times is for ever.

Bittorent?

[Sandman1971]

Has anyone seeded this on a bittorrent tracker yet?

Re:Bittorent?

[Anonymous Coward]

Better question: Is it different from the (workprint, I guess) version that's already been doing the rounds? That version looked to me to be missing quite a lot of CGI (like when the show a line of Rohan horsemen)

Re:Bittorent?

[Anonymous Coward]

Someone posted this comment with a torrent link.

Re:Bittorent?

[ob1knob777]

Yep, I spent awhile trying to d/l it on theonering.net only to find out I could have got it through bittorrent a whole lot quicker. There are already 79 people seeding it over on suprnova. suprnova

Re:Bittorent?

[croddy]

file is corrupt -- others had the same complaint.

X-Video Extension version 2.2
video_out_xv: Xv image format: 0x32595559 (YUY2) packed
video_out_xv: this adaptor supports the yuy2 format.
video_out_xv: Xv image format: 0x32315659 (YV12) planar
video_out_xv: this adaptor supports the yv12 format.
video_out_xv: Xv image format: 0x59565955 (UYVY) packed
video_out_xv: Xv image format: 0x30323449 (I420) planar
error while decoding MB 0 0
ffmpeg: error decompressing frame
unsupported slice header (FF)
ffmpeg: error decompressing frame
unsupported slice header (FF)
ffmpeg: error decompressing frame
unsupported slice header (FF)
ffmpeg: error decompressing frame
left block unavailable for requested intra mode at 0 8
error while decoding MB 0 8
ffmpeg: error decompressing frame
error while decoding MB 23 3
ffmpeg: error decompressing frame
Segmentation fault

Re:Bittorent?

[Covener]

My mplayer didn't mind, using ffsvq3 as the codec.

Re:Bittorent?

[John3]

Available here.

Re:Bittorent?

[Entropius]

I would, but BT's banned by my university--they see it as one of those Evil Piracy Programs That Waste Our Bandwidth, despite efforts to educate them.

Why we only have 7 Mbits/s of bandwidth for a university with 10k students is another mystery...

Re:Bittorent?

[Anonymous Coward]

Or the direct link:

http://www.gametab.com/files/torrents/rotk_trailer _480x280.mov.torrent

Re:Bittorent?

[TiggsPanther]

I would, but BT's banned by my university--they see it as one of those Evil Piracy Programs That Waste Our Bandwidth, despite efforts to educate them.

Education? In a University? That's not gonna work!

Tiggs

Well..

[Anonymous Coward]

..At least I've not yet seen Arwen riding onto the Pelennor (or Cormallen) at the head of a host of elves.

I'm still expecting it.

To bastardize a bastardized Elrond, "There is no strength left in the film-making of Jackson."

Ah well, I suppose I'll spend six bucks anyway, just to see the ride of the Rohirrim.

Re:Well..

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it possible the movies themselves were fine, even if they were different from what you expected? (Or not word for word with Tolkien's text?)

ONLY! 9Mb

[MosesJones]

I know that isn't really very big, but it did make me realise how much the internet has kicked on in the last few years, and how high-compression technologies like Wavelets etc have been superceeded thanks to broadband connections.

9Mb isn't huge by todays standards, but it is worth considering for a second how much our viewing habits have been changed. No-longer do we go to a movie JUST to see the trailer... we download it. We all know that soon you'll see 100Mb full quality trailers being available.

Prediction of the day.... within 3 years someone will post on Slashdot that a trailer is "only" 100Mb.

Re:ONLY! 9Mb

[chtephan]

Well, the Matrix Reloaded Trailer also had an official 100Mb version. 1000 Pixel wide, awesome quality.

But I fear that a lost of space was wasted by the quicktime mpeg4 video codec, I recompressed it using the ffmpeg mpeg4 compatible codec, the result was about 70Mb, but without any visible artifacts though it was just recompressed.

Re:ONLY! 9Mb

[Epistax]

You may be right.
I open up MS Word XP. I create a new document and save it. File properties, file size? 24,064 bytes. That's right, a blank piece of paper has 24 pages worth of plain text in formatting.
I, for one, do not welcome our bloated overlords.

Re:ONLY! 9Mb

[Anonymous Coward]

When you "re" encoded it you lost some edittable qualities of the video. Quicktime is an awesome format for editting and compression and the sorenson codec embedded into makes it easier to manipulate pixel by pixel. Truthfully, there's no difference between a 70MB file and a 100MB file. If you have the bandwidth for the 70MB file, you have the bandwidth for the 100MB file.

Re:ONLY! 9Mb

[xmpcray]

Well it should stay around 30-40MB with compression also improving with the years..unless the trailer is some 5 minutes!

Re:ONLY! 9Mb

[Anonymous Coward]

No-longer do we go to a movie JUST to see the trailer... we download it.

I've never gone to a movie just to see a trailer. I always thought people who did do this were slightly nutty...

Re:ONLY! 9Mb

[JCholewa]

> I've never gone to a movie just to see a trailer. I always
> thought people who did do this were slightly nutty...

Are you kidding? Trailers are two or three minutes each of the best scenes of an upcoming movie. The movies themselves are basically those cool trailers, but with an extra hour and a half of stupid, boring filler material.

Boo-yah, gimme two solid hours of trailers, and I'm sold! :)

--
-JC

Re:ONLY! 9Mb

[fenix down]

You say that now, but by the time Word impeaches it's 5th president with the porn folder summaries and Outlook inbox backups it hides in there, you'll have a certain twisted appreciation of it.

Seriously, innane MS "features" fucked both Blair and Deibold already, and it's only September. By next year they'll have a bluescreen that forwards any files with "bribe" in them to the Times.

Re:ONLY! 9Mb

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, anyone who's been downloading pr0n these days know that 600+Mb videos are nothing out of the ordinary. They're usually chopped up into 30-100Mb pieces, but still...
Speaking of downloading lots of data, Comcast has a $99/month cable modem service now where you get over 3Mbps download speed... He he...

Re:ONLY! 9Mb

[Anonymous Coward]

Um...it's ONLY 9megs because the quality of the trailer kinda sucks, to the point of pre-Phantom Menace quality.

Personally, I'd rather have the 100+ MB trailers such as the uber-high-res Matrix Reloaded one that was released a few months ago.

/. effect

[kaltekar]

Come on you ninnies, it only took me 10 tries to download the file. You can do better then this. Slame the AOL server. Make them earn there money.

Re:/. effect

[Anonymous Coward]

wget has auto-retry and auto-continue.

Worst Idea ever...

[mschoolbus]

Please do not put direct links to movies on slashdot...

Unless you find some movies on SCO's page, then feel free.

Re:Worst Idea ever...

[Croaker]

Unless you find some movies on SCO's page, then feel free.

Wha? Will AOL not do as a stand-in for SCO, or have they been rehabilitated?

Re:Worst Idea ever...

[TwistedGreen]

Heh, are you afraid that we're going to slashdot AOL?

Torrent here!

[arnoroefs2000]

Here's the .torrent for the new trailer as all the sites are bogged down already.
Be sure to keep your download running to help others with their download!

Re:Torrent here!

[arnoroefs2000]

Damn...5 secs and already at 500kb/s upload :)

Re:Torrent here!

[jrest]

My download through this torrent link is corrupt. At 1:42 into the movie the sound becomes distorted and video stops.
I'm using BitTorrent 3.3, the newest as far as I'm aware.
I tried it twice. Did not help. Is anyone else having problems?

Re:Torrent here!

[slux]

Trying to play the file I downloaded resulted in mplayer segfaulting. BT also complained about a block failing a hash check at one point during the download.

Re:Torrent here!

[Lyzard]

mine is also corrupt. quicktime just crashed completely.

Re:Torrent here!

[LordKronos]

Mod parent up. This is a bad link. I'm getting the same problem playing it back in Quicktime 6.3

Re:Torrent here!

[rehabdoll]

same here :(

Re:Torrent here!

[shut_up_man]

Yep, me as well. BT 3.3 and QT6 and it crashes at 1:42. Bit annoying...

Japaneese version has been around for weeks

[Anonymous Coward]

The Japaneese version of this trailer (identical but with subtitles and ads on the side) has been available for weeks around the net.

Also, the quality on this seems funky but if it's on AOL streaming, I guess it's for real.

Re:Japaneese version has been around for weeks

[Anonymous Coward]

and all the swords have been replaced with walkie-talkies!

Friend Finder Inc

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, well, so you are interested about FF? There is so much to say
that it might be difficult to arrange all my thoughts but I will try.

If you are still reading this you might just happen to have a
subscription to one of their sites, be interested about the company,
or just curious. If your reason is the first one mentioned, I suggest
you keep reading and maybe even tell others about what you may have
discovered.

Some background info first. FF was established in 1996 by Andrew
Conru. The network of his sites is about a dozen aimed at different
markets. These websites are basically personal adds on the internet.
They offer free accounts, however these have great limitations. Paying
members on the other hand have more abilities, and the more you pay
the more you can do. Well that's not too bad you might say, not many
things are free in this world. But there are so many troubles behind
company that your money could be better spent somewhere else. I would
have to say that most of the problems this company has begin with the
owner himself Andrew.

The websites were built on very poor code to start off with and for
the longest time they just implemented patch, after patch. Sometimes
doing more damage than good. Did you ever emailed or call FF when
something was wrong and were just told " O were are simply updating
the website, they will be up in just a few minutes." The trouble here
arises from the fact that Andrew has always been the head of the
programming department, and for some reason or another he has to touch
everything that other programmers have worked on.

Another issue that the sites usually have is that they are very slow
and unstable, even on DSL, and CABLE connections. Well, you might be
surprised to know that the sites for the longest time have been hosted
on basically home made computers. A high school kid could go to Fry's
and buy all the stuff he needs to build a computer that FF uses to
host its websites. Just imagine what kind of computers the rest of the
company has to use on a daily basis for their work, especially
Customer Service. I'm talking about 586 machines or Pentium 1 and 2
machines.

Have you ever had a "Corrupt Profile" on any of the FF sites?
Sometimes CS can restore them and sometimes they can't. When they are
not able to, it usually means that Andrew turned off this ability and
CS can't do anything about it. But why does the corruption occur? Well
most of the time it's because the computer hosting the sites runs our
of memory or disk space. It's that simple. If you are confused let me
elaborate. When you create an account the information gets written
into the hard drive. However, when you use your account the
information gets transferred to the RAM for faster access of the
information, and when you log off the info goes back to the hard
drive. But if the computer runs out of hard disk space it has nowhere
to go and Poof!!! You got a corrupt profile. This was their problem
for a while, later on they had another massive rash or corrupt
profiles due to poor implementation new security Andrew wanted. I
won't bore you with the technical details, however in that case he had
no choice but to let CS restore profiles because it was such a massive
issue. However, I know for a fact that when CS was not allowed to
restore profiles it was because the Andrew wanted people to create new
ones with new email addresses just so that they could sell that new
email address, and because they wanted to claim more listings.

Have you ever been really frustrated with the Billing or Customer
Service department? I know I have. There's basically a bunch of dumb
asses in both departments. Specially the ones who run the show, the
promote people who are not qualified for the positions and they can
control them with money. The rest are just as shady as Andrew and
don't have a problem working for corrupt company. But to be

The trailer is online...

[Kid Charlemagne]

The trailer is online at thelordoftherings.net... 47% done at 177kbps as we speak.

Re:The trailer is online...

[Kid Charlemagne]

sorry... that is the lordoftherings.net (got excited there)

Re:The trailer is online...

[Sillypuddy]

Can't find the link anywhere. can you post?

-joe

Re:The trailer is online...

[Anonymous Coward]

Another one who is overjoyed by the The Two Towers -trailer at lordoftherings.net? Unless it's available on different server(s) already, it will be available _later_ today.

Re:The trailer is online...

[Anonymous Coward]

Did anybody else read this as LordOfHerings.net?

Frodo

[Durzel]

Lego-Las Kenobi: That boy is our last hope..

Yodagorn: No, there is another.

(sorry, couldn't resist)

Re:Frodo

[Anonymous Coward]

(sorry, couldn't resist)

Try harder next time please.

Re:Frodo

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry but I thought that was more then an off-topic
scoring. Must be a russian judge. ;-)

Also: 12 minute preview

[bigmouth_strikes]

Here's the torrent for a 12 min preview by Peter Jackson. It includes most of what is in the trailer and then some background goodies.

http://bittorrentmovies.de/~supernova/torrents/2 33 /ROTK_Preview_(12mins).torrent

Re:Also: 12 minute preview

[Anonymous Coward]

It would help if you actually had the .torrent file at the link you specified (yes, I removed the spaces that slashdot puts in there). The file doesn't exist. Try again, monkey.

Re:Also: 12 minute preview

[slux]

The torrent link gives a 404 not found for me too, even with that one extra space removed. Anything I'm missing?

oh no ....

[Digypro]

Someone had better call the grammar police
It's only 9mb big
oxy what?

I, for one, ...

[Anonymous Coward]

... welcome our ringbearing overloards.

Imagine a beowulf cluster of orcs!

FAG NIGGER GAY

Rereleases

[Whispers_in_the_dark]

Does anyone know which cities the re-releases (of FOTR and TTT) will appear?

Re:Rereleases

[Lurch Kimded]

... and are they going to do those re-releases in the UK as well?

hmmm

[fjordboy]

Did anyone notice the reforging of the shards of Narcil in the trailer? I was under the impression that aragorn already had his sword, and jackson just cut it out...hmmm, is this anywhere near the chronology of the books? I thought his sword was reforged before this point...

Re:hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Never underestimate the power of flashbacks.

Re:hmmm

[meta-monkey]

In the books, it was reforged in the Fellowship of the Ring, just before the fellowship sets out from the house of Elrond. Petey fucked up that part, too.

Re:hmmm

[fireduck]

no, it is no where near the chronology of the books. as i recall, in the text, Aragorn took the re-forged Narsil with him when he left Rivendell. The elves then don't show up until after the final battle when Aragorn and Liv Tyler get married. I think Jackson wanted to keep the love story at the forefront so the eowin (sp) storyline would be more bittersweet, and so shifted this aspect of the story.

Re:hmmm

[Isofarro]

The elves then don't show up until after the final battle when Aragorn and Liv Tyler get married.

Elrond's two sons show up along with Aragorn's rangers after they visit Isengard. They accompany Aragorn down the Paths of the Dead.

Re:hmmm

[Angostura]

Jackson has done a fair amount of tinkering with the chronology and action in other parts of the film. For the most part I think he has done a splendid job in bringing out aspects of the story which Tolkien left un-developed. It is rather like seeing the same story through the eyes of a different story teller.

In this case, I think that the tinkerage with the chronology could be rather fine - in the books the reforging of Narsil is a rather ho-hum affair. But Jackson appears to be bringing it center stage to mark out another step in Aragorn's development from ranger to King.

I really like the way he manages to stay true to the original while adapting it to the screen.

----

The only part I really find fault with was the end of Fellowship. In the book Aragorn is beset with doubt - he doesn't know where Frodo has gone, whether he has been captured, or what to do.

In the film its like "Oh, there goes Frodo and Sam, well, by chaps. Lets chase after the others".

Re:hmmm

[*weasel]

This apparently was why Peter Jackson felt he had to reorder so much of the content of the books so the film would be as chronological as possible. ::sigh::

Re:hmmm

[wizman]

Contrary to popular belief, there -are- people here who have not read the books. Spoiling any aspect of the movie (regardless of chronology) could at least in some way be tagged as a spoiler.

Not a big spoiler, granted, but just a suggestion before this thread goes crazy.

Re:hmmm

[10Ghz]

Well waah waah waah. If you don't like it, stay at home and don't watch the movie! problem solved! Fact is, Jackson didn't make a re-telling of the book, he made a movie-adaptation out of it. And there are bound to be differences. Just accept that fact.

Re:hmmm

[ddimas]

Narsil was reforged before the fellowship left Rivendell. Aragorn made a big stink about leaving it at the door at Edoras.

Re:hmmm

[b-baggins]

It's generally understood that an adaptation will stay true to the theme and vision of the book, while making allowances for the realities of film verses print.

A more accurate description of what Jackson has done is make a fantasy film inspired by the books of JRR Tolkien.

Re:hmmm

[ErikZ]

Ok, if you've been reading Slashdot for longer than an hour, you'll have noticed that the posts tend to wander. This is a feature of Slashdot, you learn things about the subject and about things related to the subject.

This is a post about the "Lord of the Ring" movies. You should not be shocked to discover that people will talk about:

The books
The previous movie
What's wrong with the previous movies
What's wrong with their dog
etc..

Frankly, your complaint just makes you look stupid.

Re:hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a flashback, moron.

Take a look at the sword in the trailer...notice it's the *same one* he's got in the first two movies.

Note that we've already seen at least one flashback to the Fellowship meeting in Rivendell.

Got it?

Re:hmmm

[gjbivin]

It is rather like seeing the same story through the eyes of a different story teller.

That's the way I decided to approach the movies, as "another telling of the story". I've been a longtime fan of LOTR, having read it probably 15 or 16 times since that far-off ancient day in high school when I was introduced to "The Hobbit" by my English teacher.

So far, I've enjoyed the movies -- I want to enjoy the movies, especially after the Bakshi and other travesties. Most of the changes have justifications or at least can be rationalized, viewed in the context of movie requirements. Yes, Faramir didn't haul Frodo, Sam and Gollum to Osgiliath -- but watching that Frezetta-style scene on the wall with the ringwraith made it all worthwhile. The ents were a bit cartoonish. No, there weren't elves at Helm's Deep. That being said, I still think PJ has created the definitive LOTR movie(s); at least until somebody else tries in a couple of decades or so. Christopher Lee as Saruman -- yes!

Heck, the "Wizard of Oz" movie bears little resemblance to the original books, but now is better-known than them and has become an integral part of our culture in its own right.

Re:hmmm

[ExtraT]

Maybe it's a flashback? After all, TTT had flashbacks to Aragorn's conversations with Elrond and Arwen.

Re:hmmm

[carnun]

I have to main gripes with wath Jackson has changed in the previous two movies. Tolkien emphasizes the difficulty of Frodo's leaving by having him make the decision to leave without consulting the rest (e.g. Aragorn in FotR).

In TT he also mangles Farimir's nobility. Tolkien always holds up Faramir as the essence of valour, he never decides to take Frodo back to Gondor, but realises the depth of Frodo's commitment and that Frodo has his part to play in which he (Faramir) can't interfere.

AOL?!?!

[Anonymous Coward]

AOL IS EVIL! They're allied with that monopolistic bastard Gates! Nothing worthwhile is on AOL and everyone with two brain cells to rub together knows it! AOL is for the drooling stupids who are too stupid to use a computer! The Internet should go back to the BBSes it used to be, before all the lame-ass newbie ass-fuckers started screwing everything up!

Yes, it is corrupt.

[kiddailey]

The mirror that TORN put up is a corrupt download, so my bet is that that is what the torrent is :( Bummer... I've been trying to get it from another site for over an hour now.

Re:Yes, it is corrupt.

[deinol]

I got mine from here:

http://www.aixgaming.com/filerush/download.php?t ar get=return_of_the_king_trailer_480x280_fixed.mov

No corruption, good file. Thank Penny Arcade for the link.

Groan

[Anonymous Coward]

Flash-back and flash-forward are unknown concepts in your universe?

That download is corrupt...

[Anonymous Coward]

TSIA

Norwegian mirror

[Stig_Soleng]

You can get it from http://www.stud.ntnu.no/~stigespe/lotr3_trlr_dl.mo v

Yah MPAA!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Yah! Lord of the Rings and Matrix trailers! Yah we love the MPAA this week 'cause they made stuff geeks like! Yah! Next week we'll go back to hating them for being evil! yah consitency!!

Re:Yah MPAA!!

[Silverhammer]

Blockquoth the poster:

Yah! Lord of the Rings and Matrix trailers! Yah we love the MPAA this week 'cause they made stuff geeks like! Yah! Next week we'll go back to hating them for being evil! yah consitency!!

Read the FAQ.

Re:Yah MPAA!!

[jayhawk88]

Gosh, how observant and witty of you to point out a minor piece of shared hypocricy that absolutely no one else has ever observed before, evar. Yay for unimaginative, obvious trolls!

Re:Yah MPAA!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Who's the troll? The troll or the troll that follows him?

Re:Yah MPAA!!

[ahector]

or the troll who follows the troll who follows him?!

or ME?!

my brain hurts.

Re:Yah MPAA!!

[Dynedain]

Scary how much it's like Gollum's relationship with The Ring isn't it?

bittorrent vs apache

[Anonymous Coward]

ok. bittorrent delivered me a corrupted file at 80k/s. AOL delivered a perfect file at 340k/s.

bittorrent: not even as good as AOL.

Re:bittorrent vs apache

[mrtroy]

flamer

bit torrent is the way to go i bet bit torrent cant be /.'d

Re:bittorrent vs apache

[Anonymous Coward]

you mean "troll". and for a quick tour of "the slashdotting of BT", check out the fanimatrix thread from last night.

Re:bittorrent vs apache

[hendridm]

AOL doesn't run Apache, it runs AOLserver.

Re:bittorrent vs apache

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, AOL *does* run Apache in addition to AOLserver. You could even verify this yourself with the HTTP response you get.

Re:bittorrent vs apache

[Anonymous Coward]

ITYM "AOL can't be slashdotted." You'd need one hell of a pipe to cause problems for these guys.

Re:bittorrent vs apache

[hendridm]

lynx http://www.aol.com/dsfasfgsg

Not Found
The requested URL was not found on this server.

AOLserver/3.4.2 on http://www.aol.com

Netcraft seems to agree. I concede that they may be running Apache as well, however, but not primarily.

Need ... to ... hibernate ....

[dgb2n]

Can't wait, can't wait, can't wait.

If I could find some to hibernate betwen now and 17 December, I think I'd be a whole lot better off.

Re:Need ... to ... hibernate ....

[Anonymous Coward]

See, that's what HL2 was meant to be for, but now that it got delaied?

lordoftherings.net has full screen preview posted

[pbranes]

Here's the link.

http://progressive.stream.aol.com/newline/gl/newli ne/lordoftherings/TheTwoTowers-tlr_fs.zip

I for one...

[Anonymous Coward]

welcome our new Dark Overlord!

Some clarity on the trailer versions

[kiddailey]

There are at least three versions of the trailer floating around that are NOT the 12 minute preview or the short montage that was part of that preview (from TTT DVD)

• There's a very poor quality, so-dark-you-can-hardly-see-it version with Asian type all over the frames (ROTK_Trailer.mpeg)
  
  
• There's the better quality, 320x240 version that AOL released last night at midnight EST (lotr3_trlr_dl.mov)
  
  
• A Danish site released a BEAUTIFUL, 19MB, 480x280 version (rotk_trailer_480x280.mov) ... but it's downloading at 2.8k/s at the moment :(
  
  
• TORN mirrored the file from the Danish site, but it was corrupt and was cut short at 11MB. They've temporarily removed the link.
  
  
• There's a few Torrent links mentioned here for the 480x280, but it is a copy of the corrupt version. Make sure the one you're grabbing is 19MB

Re:Some clarity on the trailer versions

[Anonymous Coward]

Where is the Danish site?

Re:Some clarity on the trailer versions

[nhaines]

Well, the Danish site is here, but it's pretty bad off.

Let it load, and the link is the QuickTime-looking window graphic on the left. It pops up in a seperate window to let you choose your download size, so make sure your pop-up blockers are in check. :)

Re:Some clarity on the trailer versions

[size1one]

if you have the 19mb version, create a torrent. That danish site is going to be /.'d for a long time.

Re:Some clarity on the trailer versions

[Anonymous Coward]

The TORn link is back up...

Update: After beating the server round the head a bit, The TORn mirror is back! Again, apologies for the earlier inconvenience.

http://img-nex.theonering.net/movies/rotk_trailer_ 480x280_fixed.mov

Also, here's direct links to the danish site (www.sf-film.dk)...

http://www.sf-film.dk/sf/trailers/rotk/
small (4324379 bytes)
medium (9041479 bytes)
or large (19927973 bytes)

I'm getting sh!t speed at the moment from sf-film.dk ...

Re:Some clarity on the trailer versions

[asuzuki]

Ok, here's a direct HTTP link to the fixed version, as posted on TORN.

However, there seem's to be a problem with mplayer, it crashes instantly, strange because it seemed to player SVQ3 files with no problems whatsoever.

Anyway for all you Windows/Mac Users, a friend of mine confirmed that it works fine with Quicktime 6.

Here you go:

http://n.ethz.ch/student/asuzuki/download/rotk_tra iler_480x280_fixed.mov [20MB]

Have fun,
Alex

PS: If anybody could convert it to DivX or something, let me know, I want to see it aswell!! :-/

BitTorrent, woe... (Socre: 5, Insightful)

[Anonymous Coward]

I got a corrupted file from bittorrent, and it was much slower than the FTP link. maybe we should forget about BT for anything that's legal to distribute -- it looks like a big victory for caching proxies this fine morning.

uh, no.

[Anonymous Coward]

BUZZZZZ!

Thank you for playing. Please try again.

Mod down as "idiot".

[Anonymous Coward]

TTT was the previous movie, asshat.

Re:lordoftherings.net has full screen preview post

[Anonymous Coward]

You sir, are an evil man.

The only reason it was corrupt...

[Anonymous Coward]

... is because the source file that was Torrented was corrupt.

Re:Torrent CORRUPTION! (Socre: 5, Insightful)

[Anonymous Coward]

so this is great. one bad seed spoils a terabyte of .torrent traffic. people all across the world are uploading and downloading a broken MPEG file because they trusted their content delivery to BitTorrent.

with hash-enlightened gnutella-style peer-to-peer networks, we avoid this trouble, because people remove bad links from their shares, and we select the hash that has the most sources. kazaa even estimates the integrity for us. gnutella is clearly superior to BT -- which keeps distributing the bad apple long after its owner has thrown it out.

Re:lordoftherings.net has full screen preview post

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the trailer for The Two Towers has been around for a year so... so let's just wait for the (full quality) Return of the King -trailer, shall we.

Re:lordoftherings.net has full screen preview post

[rev_norton]

You sir, are an evil man. This is for the two towers. I guess I could have read the link.

Re:The only reason... (Socre: 5, Insightful)

[Anonymous Coward]

surely the owner -- the bad seed -- has noticed this by now. why does the corrupt torrent keep avalanching across the internet? we could be using that bandwidth for something useful, not just delivering corrupt mpeg data.

Quick time

[Anonymous Coward]

For some reason, I can't download the latest quicktime at work. Some firewall thing I can only imagine. Does anyone have this converted to a more M$ friendly version?

Thanks in advance,
Inferior Geek

Only 9MB???

[SteelX]

I'm downloading your "only 9MB" file on 28.8Kbps dial-up, you insensitive clod! :-)

Re:Only 9MB???

[Anonymous Coward]

You retard - that was his point.

Re:Only 9MB???

[wirelessbuzzers]

So? The site is slashdotted! We're getting the same 1.5k/s as you are...

Re:Only 9MB???

[Anonymous Coward]

You humor-impaired moron - he was making a joke.

8:00AM?

[bsDaemon]

by davebarz (546161) Alter Relationship on Monday September 29, @08:06AM (#7083545)

do you mean 8:00am on Tuesday?

Re:8:00AM?

[TheFlyingGoat]

His post shows to me as 7:06am. The times on Slashdot are in your timezone, if you've set it properly in your preferences.

I don't wanna watch it

[cyranoVR]

I started to watch the trailer, but I couldn't finish. I just couldn't...I want to save all my enthusiasm for the actual movie which - based on both the last two movies and what happens in the book - can't NOT be good. I was watching the trailer and I was like "I don't need a trailer to know that this movie is going to ROCK." So you guyz can have my bandwidth :)

Re:I don't wanna watch it

[UserGoogol]

Yes. And even if they relplace the paths of the dead with Jar-Jaromir's Magic Airship, and have Saruman die by a Nuclear Warhead launched by the Valar, the movie'll still be great because of what will remain.

Another mirror

[Mayk]

Another mirror to /.

Fullscreen Version

[Anonymous Coward]

The fullscreen version will be released at some point today, on the http://lordoftherings.net website.

My biggest gripe with PJ...

[epicstruggle]

... is the inclusion of any significant number of elves to battle sauron. The reason armies of elves should not be there for me, is that this is where humans are supposed to redeem themselves for the mistake of Isildur, who should have destroyed the ring when he had the chance.

Does it bother anyone else? Its minor, but why not bring an army of dwarves too, if we are rewritting things.

All in all, still a great adaptation. You go PJ.

later
epic

Re:My biggest gripe with PJ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Heh...the "reforging" of the Last Alliance in the Two Towers movie was probably the most teeth-grindingly bad part of the whole movie.

You know...the LAST ALLIANCE...it was called that for a reason.

Re:My biggest gripe with PJ...

[Niahak]

Actually, it's interesting to note that dwarves DID battle Sauron, though not in the same region. My version of ROTK (which is pretty old, but should still be similar to newer ones) has in its appendices a brief account of Brand and the Dwarves' battle with Sauron's allies in the North.

So in fact if he included dwarves rather than elves in the movie he would be following the book more closely.

Re:My biggest gripe with PJ...

[JLSigman]

Having read the books for more years than I care to admit to, I do have a problem with some of the re-writing. It's like Peter Jackson only saw the most superficial layer when he read the books... if he realy ever read them at all.

The changes to Arwen I don't mind too much, since she never came across as a worthy mate to Aragorn in the books. But Aragorn in this movie is barely a worthy mate of the Arwen in this movie! I do miss Aragorn's people (the Rangers), I was disappointed in the sexing up of Helm's Deep (there's a reason Tolkein didn't have Elves there...), and the whole thing with Faramir and the Ring was plain wrong.

But it is gorgeously filmed. I just hope that people who have never read the books don't get too confused or disappointed in the massive changes.

Re:My biggest gripe with PJ...

[dswensen]

That's totally unfair and uncalled-for. Peter Jackson is an ENORMOUS Lord of the Rings fan, and that's about the only reason you're not hearing Frodo say "talk to the hand" and Gandalf drinking a refreshing Pepsi-Cola (TM).

Stanley Kubrick himself once called the Lord of the Rings completely unfilmable -- and, in the books' original form, he's right. Many things which make the book great will simply not fly in a movie medium. You might think they will -- thirty minutes of a guy in a yellow jacket and pointy shoes talking about sheep and Goldberry, and Faramir finding Frodo and Sam in Morder and going "aw shucks! Get out of here with that Ring of Power, you scamps!" In a lengthy, leisurely book like Lord of the Rings, that's fine, but in a movie that already clocks in at three hours a pop with tons of stuff cut out, you'd be bored out of your nitpicking skull. I love Tolkien dearly, but most of his material is as dramatic as a flapjack, because Tolkien was ultimately a lover of the slow and pastoral life of the English countryside. Which is great, but doesn't make good film. Sorry.

Consider how moving and exciting the Lord of the Nazgul scenes from RotK would be if Jackson adapted them faithfully. He rides into Gondor, Gandalf says "you cannot come in here," a rooster crows, some trumpets play, and the Nazgul turns and leaves. Yeah. Thrilling stuff. The crowd would be on the edge of their seats.

Listen to Jackson's DVD commentary on Fellowship sometime, with the other two writers, and how much they agonized and labored over every change that they made, and how many things Jackson wanted to leave in but simply couldn't and deeply regrets. He even laments having to take out Glorfindel and Gildor Inglorion.

I am a big fan of the books, and I was disappointed with a few of the changes too, especially in Two Towers. But Jackson and everyone else have labored very hard to bring as faithful a movie adaptation as they could to a book that is, fact's a fact, completely impossible to adapt faithfully and still have it be any good. Go watch the Rankin-Bass or Ralph Bakshi adaptations of LotR sometime if you want to see how truly, awfully BAD an adaptation could have been. Tolkien fans got very, very lucky when Peter Jackson landed this project, and sorry -- he deserves better than "oh he probably never even READ the books." That is pure bunk.

Re:My biggest gripe with PJ...

[drinkypoo]

FOUR armies?!?!? Look, it's the lake-men.

I'm actually still pretty pissed about Faramir being a little bitch at the end of TTT. I think that was a bad decision. He's supposed to be an icon of nobility, and instead he's just Boromir Pt. 2. Nothing in the movie really annoyed me more than that. NOT IF I FOUND THIS THING LYING ALONG THE ROAD WOULD I TAKE IT, or whatever he was supposed to say right up front, something close to that. When I went to see the movie I had just read the book recently, and that scene was stick in my head, with the proper wording, and then Faramir acted like an ass. To me, that means PJ acted like an ass. Thanks, Peter! You're a dick.

I'm still impressed by the movies (though Gollum's feet had a little bit of jarjarism a couple times, so even the technical aspects have the old tired problems) but I think that PJ took a few too many liberties.

Re:My biggest gripe with PJ...

[b-baggins]

Just because he's an enormous fan doesn't mean he knows what the heck the books are about.

I think most people (and I agree with them) are not upset because Jackson has made changes, but because the changes run contrary to the theme and vision of the book, and literally re-write characters in the story. Aragorn becomes some stereotypical cliche of reluctant king. Frodo is a sniveling coward, Faramir is just slimy and petty, Theoden is confused and indecisive, even after his rescue from Saruman's influence, etc.

It's one thing to adapt a book to the screen, it's another to completely re-write the book.

The scenes you make fun of show how little you understand how literature can be translated to the screen. The scene with Faramir can be very powerfully done. The viewer already knows what Boromir was like, and here comes Faramir, his brother. People EXPECT him to be like Boromir. The whole scene in the book is classic Hitchcock "bomb under the table" suspense. It WOULD keep people on the edge of their seats.

Ditto with the scene with the King of the Nazgul. Remember the decision Gandalf has to make. Also keep in mind the scene surrounding that confrontation. The horror of the presence of the King of the Nazgul on the surrounding people can be tremendously powerful, also that Gandalf is afraid. He doe NOT know that he can beat this king, and the king of the Nazgul is tremendously confident that he will have Gandalf for lunch.

It's called TENSION, and it's something that neither you nor Jackson, who is, at heart, nothing more than an action film director, can get. Like you, Jackson's idea of subtlety is an arrow through the heart instead of a sword lopping off a head.

Re:My biggest gripe with PJ...

[dswensen]

If you want to make a point, try doing it without the ad hominem attacks next time, thanks. You have no idea what I do or don't understand, or my appreciation of subtlety, so let's not pretend you do.

I understand perfectly well how literature can be translated to the screen. I also understand part of the reason for LotR's enduring popularity is that it is different things to different people, and additionally, that any film adaptation of a work of literature is the interpretation of one person, or, in this case, three (Jackson, Boyens, Walsh). Jackson's vision of Lord of the Rings is not the same as my own, nor should it be.

Insofar as the scenes mentioned are concerned -- in some sense you are preaching to the choir. The changes made to Faramir, especially the trip to Osgiliath, was by far my biggest gripe with Two Towers. I was extremely irate about it, but on further reflection, could understand why Jackson made the decision. I just wish he could have handled it differently. For my part, I found the encounter with Faramir in the books to be devoid of suspense -- but likewise found the movie version swung too far in the opposite direction. Because I support Jackson's privilege to make changes to the original doesn't mean I worship them all as immaculate.

As far as the Lord of the Nazgul scene goes, that remains to be determined -- I am anxious to see what Jackson does with it. In my opinion, the strength of the written word is that it can support the sort of subtle, existential horror and dread such as you describe far more reliably than a visual medium, because they rely on the reader's imagination.

You can bank on that tension more or less forever in the written word -- in Tolkien's work, the Nazgul are mostly a non-existent threat until the (very brief) confrontation on the Pelennor Fields, where the fearsome Lord is undone by a stab to the ankle and one swipe from a sword. To his credit, Tolkien still manages to pull them off as dreadful despite the fact that they never actually do much but ride around and slaughter the occasional Prancing Pony bed-bolster.

While this approach might work for the die-hard enthusiast (as might a 15- or 20-hour faithful adaptation of the work), the LotR film is an expensive project that needs to make a profit, and that means placating the majority of moviegoers who expect a bit more action from their fantasy films. I think it's the price we pay for having a film adaptation at all, and though I have problems with Jackson's interpretation as well, I think we as an audience could come off much worse than we have. Again, I point to Jackson's precursors, Bakshi and Rankin-Bass. You want to see a filmmaker taking some liberties with the story? Watch Bakshi's LotR sometime. Saruman becomes "Ahriman" (sometimes), Treebeard is supremely comical, Elrond wears a tee-shirt to the council at Imladris, and Boromir is a shrieky nincompoop who dresses like Hagar the Horrible. Jackson is a purist by comparison.

I didn't go into the Lord of the Rings movies expecting the book to be retold in movie form. Not only is that impossible, it would hold few if any surprises for someone who's read the books as many times as I have. If I wanted that precise experience, I'd just read the book again. Instead, I got to see Boromir as a slightly more sympathetic character, Faramir as slightly less (again, that didn't work out so well), Aragorn a bit more conflicted, and the Nazgul a little more active, and a pretty fantastic Watcher in the Water, while still (in my opinion) maintaining quite a few (not all) of the book's original themes.

It's not a faithful adaptation, but I don't believe a faithful adaptation could or should be filmed, nor would it be interesting even if it was. That's just my opinion. I believe that people who want the experience of the novel should read the novel. A movie of the novel is going to involve some retelling and some shuffling of the elements, because one medium is of the eye and ear, the other is of the imagination. Anyone goin

Re:My biggest gripe with PJ...

[Anonymous Coward]

I think most people (and I agree with them) are not upset because Jackson has made changes, but because the changes run contrary to the theme and vision of the book

As interpreted by you. Or possibly misinterpreted by you.

The vast majority of Tolkien geeks are quite satisfied with the films. I think you are in the minority here.

Re:My biggest gripe with PJ...

[EvilNight]

I do have to agree.

That one change flies directly in the face of everything in the books. The elves had committed the sin of depair by assuming that Sauron was unbeatable. They had given up. Part of the drama of Helm's Deep was that you had some 300ish old men and boys and they were still able to hold that fortress for as long as they did, despite the apparent certainty of defeat and total hopelessness they all felt. How much more moving would it have been without the elves there? I really think PJ made a bad call on that one. Glaringly, painfully, *stupidly* bad. You do know that originally, Arwen was filmed at Helm's Deep as well, but due to massive fan outcry (they dubbed her Xenarwen) PJ pulled it, cut most of her scenes and digitally edited her out of the background of the other shots.

Frankly I love having Arwen replace Glorfindel, as it's a very effective way to up the romance in the film. That's a wonderful addition, and the substory with her and Elrond is playing out very well.

The best part about doing this as a movie is that you can show some things the books left out. I think we're better off with an interpretation than a shot for shot remake with no soul. With the exception of the elves at Helm's Deep, it is thematically true to the books.

One now wonders if Peter is going to include the Scouring of the Shire. That's a fan favorite chapter, but it's stuck in between the climax and the resolution. Peter said he didn't intend to include it, but there's been a lot of people complaining about it (including me). I hope it makes it into the special edition DVD of ROTK.

Re:My biggest gripe with PJ...

[gfxguy]

I disagree - some of the changes obviously would have just belabored the point, but some of the changes make no sense.

Let's look at leaving out the gift giving in FOTR. Yes, it was included in the extended version, but that's not really quite fair to the movie going public. Who, after seeing it in the theater once or twice, and then maybe renting it when it was available, has seen the extended version? Why, it's the big fans - the ones who already read the books and knew about the gift giving, left in or not. Now, the FOTR had a lot of long, beautiful, yet somewhat boring shots. Some of what was left in could easily have been cut to fit in things more important to the story.

The worse part, again, is the Faramir part. Here they added stuff that wasn't in the book - made those scenes LONGER to put stuff into the movie that wasn't in the story. In other words, they went out of their way to change the story, as opposed to going out of their way to make it follow the book.

Me, I'm sure he read the books. I'm sure he loves them. And like a lot of "artists", he wanted to add his own ideas to it, much to the chagrin of the fans of the story. I mean, if your band covers someone elses song, if it sounds EXACTLY the same, then what's the point? You cover it to add your own flair to it. Some people might like it better, some might not like it as much.

The problem is that here, instead of creatively cutting down on stuff so that the movie flows along better, he seems to have gone out of his way to make sure he didn't follow the books.

Not only that scene, but the whole Aragorn thing when he goes over the cliff. That was a huge time wasting departure... and the point was? To give Liv Tyler an even bigger role than she should have had?

I saw TTT on it's first day of release. I had a friend who went to a midnight showing, and I talked to him in the morning before I saw it (in the afternoon). He said it was good, but Jackson made it a "movie" instead of a "film", and my first thoughts were "that's pretty pretentious of you, you elitist bastard." Then I saw the movie and was very dissappointed - the Dwarf jokes, the Legolas estrogen brigade...

Don't get me wrong, I loved it! I will be getting the extended version. I have the cinematic version (only from the free Blockbuster rental deal) that I'll be giving away. I loved the movie, but was so dissappointed because it could have been so much more, more faithful, and even more interesting. Not all the changes were to help the flow of the movie, a lot of them simply made no sense to me.

Re:My biggest gripe with PJ...

[gfxguy]

I really like the look in Gollum's eyes (in the trailer) when Sam catches him lying and Frodo doesn't believe it.

I'm not that mad at Peter Jackson, it's just he's the one who had *the* opportunity to do the LOTR right and, while he's doing a fantastic job, he's butchering parts for no good reason.

I still can't imagine how confusing it must be getting for people who haven't read the book. And the dwarf jokes and the Legolas "sexiest elf" stuff are just annoying.

Hey, we couldn't get Tony Hawk so we'll have Legolas slide down the steps on the shield, shooting his bow and arrow - then kick up the pointy shield right at the end into an orc... that'll be kewl! Also the CG part where he swings up onto the horse. Man, that guy is good! Woohoo! Let's pander to the audience, we couldn't possibly enjoy it otherwise.

Re:My biggest gripe with PJ...

[topologist]

I'd agree with that comment if you substituted "Tolkien geeks" with "geeks". Unless you're a member of the Tolkien Society or the like, I don't see how you can claim to speak for the Tolkien geek collective :-)

I liked Jackson's "Fellowship" for its stunning sets and cinematography, but not very much else. However, if it encourages viewers to discover the books for themselves, that's a great positive. Some of the deviations from the narrative of the book are understandable, but most are not. Even foregoing the issue of changes from the text, which have been discussed elsewhere, there were some glaring negatives (in no particular order):

. The balrog of Moria was realized wonderfully, but the end of the bridge scene was a complete disaster. In the book, Aragorn and Boromir stand behind Gandalf and face down the balrog on the bridge, while the rest of the company waits inside the doorway at the end. In the movie, all of them huddle inside the doorway, while Gandalf stands alone on the bridge. In the movie, when the balrog pulls Gandalf down with it, Aragorn (for whatever reason) has all of a minute or two to run over and pull Gandalf up (the way it's filmed..to add to the "tension", presumably) - instead, he restrains Frodo (which is okay, as he has to be protected, but the way it's filmed, it looks like Aragorn has ample opportunity to run over to Gandalf, instead he's portrayed as a coward).

Over the bridge!' cried Gandalf, recalling his strength. 'Fly! This is a foe beyond any of you. I must hold the narrow way. Fly! ' Aragorn and Boromir did not heed the command, but still held their ground, side by side, behind Gandalf at the far end of the bridge. The others halted just within the doorway at the hall's end, and turned, unable to leave their leader to face the enemy alone.

. The long, lingering shots of the vacant expressions on the actors faces (notably Frodo; Gandalf was excellent, and Sam was pretty good too), and the five minute "drowning" scene towards the end could've been replaced with a real scene, such as an explanation of how Aragorn could dole out daggers of Westernesse from a sack.

. Why was Galadriel depicted as suffering from a severe case of radiation poisoning? Cate Blanchett is a great actress, but the director's vision of Galadriel was flawed. All of this is IMO of course, but there are many who agree with me. Anyway, flame on.

Re:My biggest gripe with PJ...

[rbird76]

There aren't many, but I think that Silence of the Lambs was both a faithful adaptation of the book and a good movie in its own right. It isn't nearly as difficult to handle or as long as the Lord of the Ring trilogy, but it was done well. There may be smaller compromises in it, but I don't think there were major ones.

I don't disagree with you - this is more my $0.02 than anything else.

Re:My biggest gripe with PJ...

[Mac Degger]

Uh...in the books, Frodo was a coward (hey, he takes after his father!). And Aragorn was much more the typical arch-hero in the books.

As for your treatment...what you seem to assume is that people 'know this' and 'know that'...but that's all stuff which is built up in the books over paragraphs and chapter. You don't seem to realise that a movie is much more compact and just doesn't have the space (timewise) to include all that, not without it being boring beyond belief.

Now, sure, I think that the extended version of the first movie, although it's longer by half an hour, is shorter (feels shorter) than the theatrical release. But to get it correct and include everything (or even just half) of what was left out would make the movie run an hour longer and wouldn't do justice to the books, in the end.

Read more and watch more, and you'll understand there is a huge difference between the medium of film and that of the written word. The latter can have long inner-thought passages and has the convenience of being able to put in loads of subtext, context and history. A movie just doesn't. Even a trilogy has to obey the 'laws' of pacing and interest.

Re:My biggest gripe with PJ...

[CaptainCarrot]

There are a lot of really great movies that aren't primarily centered on nonstop action!

Despite the episodes of violence it contains, Lord of the Rings isn't a particularly violent novel and the story does not naturally lend itself to adaptation as an action film, but that's the direction Jackson decided to go. It's at the heart of everything that's wrong with these films. A competent director knows very well how to build and release dramatic tension without resorting to baser means of stimulating an audience's adrenal glands. Either this was beyond Jackon's capacity or he didn't think he could get a movie like that funded.

Consider as an example the race to Bucklebury Ferry in the first movie. Any hack film-noir director could have filmed that scene very effectively as written, and it would have been positively spooky. Jackson's approach was to make it an Indiana Jones-type last-second escape. This set up a completely different dynamic with regard to the Nazgul, draining them of any real feeling of menace. Tolkien used them as he did because, as he pointed out, their main weapon was fear. Jackson's version of the Nazgul didn't look like anything to be frightened of.

The focus on action instead of character and mood led to other distortions. Saruman's role was exaggerated hugely in the first movie. To cover for the imbalances this introduced into the story, it was exaggerated even further in the second. An audience could be forgiven if it forgets that Sauron, not Saruman, is supposed to be the main enemy here. (And that ridiculous literal firey eye glowing atop Barad-Dur! Far from frightening, it was almost funny!) So much was made of Helm's Deep that PJ will likely have very little room for the seige of Minas Tirith. That means that one of the most dramatic and filmable moments in the story, the madness and suicide of Denethor, will probably be given short shrift. (And indeed, since Faramir has been mangled into merely a slightly smarter copy of Boromir, he and his dad will have little to disagree over.)

Yes, some plot alterations are inevitable for the reasons you say. A limited amount of character modification is also inevitable. But too far is too far. Here's how I explained it to a friend who had trouble understanding why I didn't like TTT. Suppose your favorite book was a deeply metaphorical work about a vengeful whaler captain's worldwide hunt for a particular whale, as told from the point of view of one of his crew. After many years and a notorious failed attempt, a movie is made of this book that by all accounts has every chance of succeeding. In all eagerness and willingness to like this movie, you sit down to watch. As the film progresses, you see that the hunt doesn't take place over all the world's seas, but over a small stretch of water off the coast of New England. And it's not a whaler and it's mad captain, but a fishing boat and a hard-bitten, cynical skipper. And the POV character isn't one of his crew -- he has no crew -- but the law enforcement official who hired him. And it's not a white whale, but a great white shark. And it dawns on you that this film isn't Moby-Dick at all, but rather Ja

Re:My biggest gripe with PJ...

[Stalky]

Uh...in the books, Frodo was a coward (hey, he takes after his father!).

Rubbish. Pick up the books again and read how he behaved in the barrow, on Weathertop, at the ford, and at Amon Hen. If that's cowardice, the world still awaits its first act of bravery. Courage, you may recall, is not the inability to feel fear, but the ability to carry on in spite of it.

So read the damn books already!

[Anonymous Coward]

They've been out longer than you've been alive! I think that puts the burden on you to reading avoid spoilers, not on others to keep them away from you.

Direct link to the 19MB version

[MrvFD]

As I'm quite positive I'll not get the 19MB version from the Danish site before the official site kicks in later today, I want to make sure no-one else gets it, either :) http://www.sf-film.dk/sf/trailers/rotk/trailer/ROT K_trailer_large.mov 266.17B/s, whee.

Yes, I have it but...

[kiddailey]

I have it, but have no idea how to actually get a torrent going... or I would. No dedicated server :(

Re:Yes, I have it but...

[size1one]

1) Get TorrentSpy
2) Find a Tracker
3) Follow these directions
4) Happy /.ing

I hate the books and movies

[caveman902]

Ever since I was a kid and was forced to read the Hobbit I have hated the stupid story.

Mirror

[savagexp]

I've posted it on my site. Please, be gentle.

Re:Mirror

[size1one]

I've posted it on my site. Please, be gentle.

Don't worry /.ers stampede in an orderly fashion.

Re:Mirror

[savagexp]

I'm currently grabbing the 19MB torrent version. I'll up that as soon as the DL is complete.

Apology for the truncated 11MB version...

[Anonymous Coward]

I set the 19MB 'official' version rsyncing before we noticed that /. had linked - and the upload stream onto our binary server disintegrated resulting in the truncated upload which ended up being live for 30 minutes or so. This has been fixed now - see http://www.theonering.net for more information - and once you've got a connection to Apache on our binaries server it's actually quite fast. (You have to queue to get a connection atm, however). This is definitely the version to get, however - any of the 19MB bittorrents is probably the best way to go. -- Arathorn (theonering.net sysadmin)

Re:Apology for the truncated 11MB version...

[Anonymous Coward]

Its all going slow as hell. We need more mirrors. If you have a copy there Arathorn, PLEASE make a bittorrent of it ASAP and seed it. Its the only way were going to get it above speeds of 1kbps for everyone.

Either that or keep searching for lots of mirrors =)

Hello?

[Overly Critical Guy]

Someone asks this in every LOTR article.

For the last time, Peter Jackson announced years ago that there would be no Scouring. They included an homage to it in the Mirror of Galadriel scene.

The reason is because he didn't want another story after the main climax.

Re:Hello?

[I am Kobayashi]

One sequence that will not make it from the book into the film despite the hopes of many fans, according to repeated statements by Jackson, is the "Scouring of the Shire", in which the Hobbits return home at the end of their quest to find they have some cleaning up to do. The fall of Saruman originally takes place at the end of this scene, so it is not clear where it will occur in the movie.

From: Wikipedia

I agree that it should have been filmed and put in an extended DVD version (if not the theatrical release)... Who knows maybe they will film it solely for a DVD release (if they calculate it will be profitable -- and given the success of the movies perhaps it would be).

Fixed (and working) link

[Otto]

That particular server is always down. Never works right. Try this one instead.

http://www.emptylogic.com/suprnova/torrents/233/RO TK_Preview_(12mins).torrent

Post it

[Anonymous Coward]

I am downloading it from a German site now. When I get it (a long time away) I will make a bittorent of it. I am talking about the 19MB version. Nice quality, the only one worth downloading. Forget the silly AOL one.
TORN is currently working on finding enough mirrors so that they dont all go down simultaniously, but it might be a while.

Update the story there, becuase at the moment it is useless.

Re:Torrent CORRUPTION! (Socre: 5, Insightful)

[km790816]

If the parent were diligent about removing the tracker if/when they find out the .torrent is corrupt this wouldn't happen.

BT kicks ass, except when it doesn't. Don't get all pissy.

You are a goddamn idiot.

[Anonymous Coward]

Shut up and read the posts. The original file from TheOneRing.net was bad. BitTorrent is a perfectly fine delivery system, and you are a goddamn idiot.

Mine too.

[Anonymous Coward]

All I get is Madonna's voice saying over and over again, "What the f*ck do you think you're doing?"

Rangers from the north cut out?

[galaga79]

** SPOILER WARNING FOR THAT THOSE HAVEN'T READ THE BOOKS **

Is it just me or does it look like the movie won't have the rangers of the north? I am making this assumption because the part of the preview (on the Two Towers DVD) that obviously shows them about to enter the Path Of The Dead has Aragorn, Gimli, Legolas but no rangers (or the two elves that come with the rangers).

It will a real bummer if there are no rangers in the film, because not only did they sound like bad ass warriors in the book but they also give Aragorn something very important, which relates to Aragorn and Arwen love story which the movie makes such a big deal about.

Re:Rangers from the north cut out?

[tuffy]

Is it just me or does it look like the movie won't have the rangers of the north? I am making this assumption because the part of the preview (on the Two Towers DVD) that obviously shows them about to enter the Path Of The Dead has Aragorn, Gimli, Legolas but no rangers (or the two elves that come with the rangers).

Not sure if the rangers will appear or not, but *somebody* has to accompany Aragorn, Gimli and Legolas through the Paths of the Dead. Those three alone can't possibly be enough to take the ships on the other side (even with a bit of oathbreaker assistance) nor provide any significant aid to the battle at Minas Tirith.

Re:Rangers from the north cut out?

[Ken D]

That was already obvious from the Two Towers movie. AN army of elves replaced the army of rangers that was supposed to arrive during the siege of Rohan.

I can only imagine that they decided that putting the information into the movies to explain who the Rangers are would just clutter things up. The movie audience already knows who the elves are, so just use them instead.

Re:Rangers from the north cut out?

[tuffy]

That was already obvious from the Two Towers movie. AN army of elves replaced the army of rangers that was supposed to arrive during the siege of Rohan.

I can only imagine that they decided that putting the information into the movies to explain who the Rangers are would just clutter things up. The movie audience already knows who the elves are, so just use them instead.

That makes sense. But it'll make the Paths of the Dead an odd scene, since the elves don't fear the dead. That means out of all of them, only Aragorn and Gimli will feel any particular fright while all the elves are indifferent. I can see it happening that way, though.

Re:Rangers from the north cut out?

[hanssprudel]

In the Two Towers movie ALL the elves died at Helm's Deep, so there aren't any elves to pass through paths of the dead with them either.

Maybe it will just be the three of them passing through, and PJ will skip the whole episode with the ships and have Aragorn lead the oathbreakers straight onto Pelenor (I haven't seen the trailer, so there could be something in there that refutes this)...

Re:Rangers from the north cut out?

[Anonymous Coward]

Halbarad brought thirty rangers, not an "army".

Re:Rangers from the north cut out?

[stripe]

All the elves died in the movie? I was a little curious about why all the humans were put in the keep and the elves left to defend the wall. Figured the humans were the weaker element since there were only 300 or so of them and they were mostly too old or too young. They would do more and last a little longer shooting from the keep walls than trying to defend the lower wall. A lot of elves died, but the retreat into the keep shows some of them surviving reach the keep. One was helping Legolas carry Gimli into the keep, and some were running ahead of Aragorn into the keep. Also it looked like elf archers were manning the inside wall of the keep. A small group charged out on horseback, but there must be troops left inside the keep to defend the caves or else charging out would just doom those in the caves faster. Since those scenes were not in the movie I would assume that those would be made up of survivors from both the human and elf contingents.

Re:Rangers from the north cut out?

[joshki]

I'm sure he's going to have Arwen, the great elf-warrioress that he created for the movie, show up to give Aragorn his standard and fight by his side in the final battle... at which point I will probably vomit in the aisle, get up and leave the movie theatre. If I bother to go at all.

Re:Rangers from the north cut out?

[Stalky]

*somebody* has to accompany Aragorn, Gimli and Legolas through the Paths of the Dead

And most of the impact of the journey will be lost if PJ has chosen to send his ubiquitous elven band to perform this task, because, as Legolas assures us, human shades hold no fear for an Elf.

Re: LOTR:Return Of The King Trailer

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, how about a return of movies that aren't boring, don't suck, don't have an annoying following, and actually have plot? Oops, wrong forum.

I'd rather bittorrent my balls into a hydraulic press than endure one more minute of that garbage. I can't believe I bought into the hype!

Trailer Comparison

[Anonymous Coward]

Check out a comparison of the different trailers by going here. I think youll agree the danish one is the only way to go:

www.wiblin.id.au/trailercomparison.jpg .

Re:Trailer Comparison

[pmace]

Was anyone else thinking "I'm not clicking.... it must be goatse".

Filerush.com mirror for new trailer

[AIX-Hood]

Hi guys, here's another mirror for this, both bit torrent and high speed links available for this trailer. Got over 10k downloads from here for the Matrix 3 trailer last week. :) http://www.aixgaming.com/filerush/download.php?tar get=lord_of_the_rings_3-trailer-low_res.mov

Finally!

[Lface]

This is the complete 19MB version.

You hafta see it.

[hornal]

I'm not sure these movies are as great as everyone thinks they are. Have we been fooled by hollywood into thinking you are nobody if you don't see these movies?

swedish mirror

[asuzuki]

There's a swedish mirror site up now aswell, pretty fast.

http://farbror.acc.umu.se/pub/test/maswan/rotk_tra iler_480x280_fixed.mov

Return of the King 480x280 Fixed Torrent

[AIX-Hood]

Here's the torrent for the non-corrupt fixed 480x280 trailer for LOTR 3 http://www.filerush.com/torrents/return_of_the_kin g_trailer_480x280_fixed.mov.torrent

Re:Return of the King 480x280 Fixed Torrent

[AIX-Hood]

For some reason it does spaces, so here's a real link: http://www.filerush.com/torrents/return_of_the_kin g_trailer_480x280_fixed.mov.torrent

SWEET!!

[Anonymous Coward]

The 19 mb fixed version is UP on BITORRENT. I am download it at 25kbps right now. Go here, the link above is WRONG:
http://www.aixgaming.com/filerush/download .php?tar get=return_of_the_king_trailer_480x280_fixed.mov .

Dont BOTHER WITH THE OTHERS, the servers are slowed down incredibly. This is what you want until the official one comes out.

Artwork and radio play had more effect on me

[Latte Lovin' Lurker]

I've lost count of how many times I've read Lord of the Rings. (I'm a geek, I admit it... :-) I read the books long enough ago that my mental image of Tolkien's world was pretty well-developed before seeing the films. So, while the movies have influenced how I imagine some of the characters and settings, they haven't really changed it. Most of my visualization of Middle-earth is based on the artwork of various illustrators and Tolkien himself. (I have to confess that it took me years to purge from my mind the image of Boromir in a Viking helmet from the Ralph Bakshi film, though.) What has had a huge impact on the way I imagine Middle-earth, though, is the 1981 BBC radio play. When I read the books now, I imagine the characters speaking in the voices of the actors in the radio play!

Principles aside?

[phorm]

AOL being what they are, we wouldn't use their products, but why would we feel bad about gobbling their bandwidth instead of slashdotting some website belonging to some poor fob with limited bandwidth and server resources?

The only bad thing I can see coming from this is if AOL decides that having their site semi-slashdotted by bandwidth hungry geeks on a consistent basis would cause them to juggle the links or stop posting trailers in public places...

Wrong again.

[Anonymous Coward]

Youll actually find the file here: http://www.aixgaming.com/filerush/

bitTorrent link

[dfj225]

here is a working bitTorrent link to a .mov. The file is not of the best quality but it is all there.
Click here

Re:Bittorrent link

[dex@ruunat]

oops, typo

this is the correct link:
http://matilda.phys.uu.nl/~bas/rotk_trailer_480x28 0_fixed.mov.torrent

Re:Bittorrent link

[dex@ruunat]

ok, the html parser is doing weird things to my url. Retrying: http://matilda.phys.uu.nl/~bas/rotk_trailer_480x28 0_fixed.mov.torrent

Re:Bittorrent link

[drinkypoo]

ALL your links are bad.

Re:Bittorrent link

[dex@ruunat]

I'm seeing lots of 200's in my access.log that suggest that the links are ok. Just fot your conveniance another one: http://www.o2w.nl/~bas/rotk-trailer.torrent

Re:Bittorent? FINALLY

[paranoia2k]

Finally a working torrent of the full 19MB version...

Downloaded at usual 200kB+ speeds and played in QT 6.3

Direct link to torrent is here.

Bittorrent link

[dex@ruunat]

http://matilda.phys.uu.nl/~bas/rotk_trailer_480x28 0_fixed.mov.torrent

BitTorrent, goes...

[LinuxGeek]

I'm getting the torrent now @ 160KBps right now. The new torrent clients released last week are much faster, did you get the new version?
But if someone is sharing a corrupt file, then don't blame that on BitTorrent.

Think Flashback

[Anonymous Coward]

There is no reason the true chronology can't be maintained, just shown out of order for dramatic reasons.

Uncorrupted version available:

[aaronvegh]

http://www.filerush.com/torrents/return_of_the_kin g_trailer_480x280_fixed.mov.torrent Go gettum. :-)

Do you support the MPAA?

[HiThere]

If you don't support the MPAA, then why would you see this movie?

You could justify it, I suppose, if you made a donation to some group opposed to it equal to the ticket price, but otherwise it looks like just doing whateve is convenient at the time.

Enthusiasm is very good, but it shouldn't be an end in itself. I find myself unable to fit seeing this, or any Hollywood based movie, into my ethical standards. I would find it even harder to fit paying to see it into my standards, though were I to see it, practicality would probably ensure that I paid.

That said, there is, perhaps, one theater that I might consider seeing it at. In this theater the owner uses one of the billboards to place political statements that I normally agree with, and have never seriously disagreed with. (Also, there was an attempt to drive him out of business a couple of years ago by refusing him access to first run movies, though they seem to have given up on that.) The balence might tilt in favor of seeing it there. But I'm dubious. (I won't know in actuality until a chance occurs.)

Re:Do you support the MPAA?

[Anonymous Coward]

Some of us don't even have ethical standards, you insensitive clod.

Re:Do you support the MPAA?

[MysticGlyph]

I'm glad that I wont have to worry about you sitting near me in the theater when I go see this movie on opening day, later that week, and when I see it again the next weekend, but I'll be sure to toast to you with my ice cold (overpriced) Coca-Cola ...now you go change the world for us while the rest of us mindless unmotivated followers of corporate america enjoy a great movie and actually ENJOY ourselves and have fun!

Re:Do you support the MPAA?

[NtroP]

The problem is that there aren't any alternatives - for me. Is there an Indie release of LOTR? Will they do as good a job at entertaining me as this one [probably] will?

I will go to the theater and see this movie. I will go because it is very well done, needs to be seen on the big screen, and I live in North Pole, Alaska and my dog sled is up on blocks at the moment.

I don't support Microsoft (ethically) either, yet I have OfficeMac loaded on my Mac because OOo doesn't open some spreadsheets properly for me and I have to be able to coexist with the rest of the world.

I will make use of the products offered by the MPAA and Microsoft when there are no alternatives. In the mean time I will do everything I can to support Indie/Open Source offerings at every oportunity.

BTW, I own the LOTR/Hobbit/Silmarilian books and have read them MANY times. As pleasurable as it is to curl up with a good book, I also like to take my family to the movies and enjoy the experience together.

Though I applaud your dedication to your "ethics", you remind me of the "professional protesters" I pass everday on the way to work (yes, I work. I have to support a family. I have to be able to afford movie tickets.) I see the same people out there protesting about anything and everything for months on end. You have to admire their fortitude - I'd never be able to afford that much time off work. I have to live in the real world. Where do you suppose they get their funding?

If it makes you feel any better, I grumble and complain loudly at paying $7.50 for a ticket. But it must be worth it, because I still pay it for two or three must see movies a year.

Oh, when bandwidth and compression technology are at the point where I can perhaps download a movie and play it at full digital quality on my 42" plasma TV - you may occasionally see me protesting the MPAA more directly. But, all things considered, I'd MUCH prefer to have a legal alternative - I've already proven that I'm willing to pay for it.

Part of a flashback, maybe?

[thefinite]

It was reforged and given to him when he left Rivendell, but I think what is seen in the trailer may just be part of a flashback. I don't think that is a terrible idea, because it is more topical in "Return of the King" anyway, especially when you consider that those who see the movies and don't read the book might forget the significance of Narsil.

MOD UP

[drinkypoo]

This is the link that works. I maxed out my cable modem's download.

I watched the Japanese version, but it's corrupted

[UncleMediocre]

But the dialogue is strangely out of sync with the actor's lip movements. Also, here is how mine started:

Gollum: Frodo-san, please to give me ring.
Frodo: I am not liking tone you are! Be soap.
Gollum: Can you not see my fervor?
Frodo: All your ring are belong to us!
Gollum: EKEKEKEKEK

I didn't hear the rest because of the overdubbed techno-music.

ffmpeg workaround

[noda132]

ffmpeg's SVQ3 decompression seems to crash with the 19MB version of the trailer. The workaround: use the win32 dlls. For mplayer:

mplayer return_of_the_king_trailer_480x280_fixed.mov -vc qtsvq3 -vf pp=al

Re:ffmpeg workaround

[The One KEA]

You're using an old version of mplayer. I'm using rathann's mplayer-0.91-2 packages from http://ftp.falsehope.com/home/rathann/mplayer with the faad2 codec and ALSA sound support added via rpmbuild, and it works fine for me.

Re:ffmpeg workaround

[MrvFD]

Actually, you are using an old version of mplayer. Newer mplayer versions (eg. 1.0pre1) use ffmpeg's own svq3-codec instead of relying on the windows dll. The problem is with this new codec which apparently crashes with this particular .mov (though the problem isn't there with the official trailer at Apple's site).

Re:ffmpeg workaround

[noda132]

I am using mplayer CVS from yesterday. *Newer* versions crash, *because* they rely on ffmpeg's buggy svq3 decompression. Older versions which rely on the Windows .dll run fine. My post was perfectly clear: To use the Windows .dll and circumvent the ffmpeg codec problems, use the command I posted.

DivX version - direct link

[asuzuki]

I had problems viewing the 19MB Quicktime (SVQ3) File with mplayer, and no, it wasn't the corrupted version posted early on TORN and seeded via bittorrent.

Anyway, a colleague converted it to DivX, for your viewing pleasure...

http://n.ethz.ch/student/asuzuki/download/rotk_tra iler.avi

Enjoy.

Anyone having trouble with QT version?

[Anonymous Coward]

D/L'd from two different sources, including the "fixed" one on filerush. QuickTime player gives me some numeric error (-8992) and the video wont play.

Anyone else having the same problem?

Re:Anyone having trouble with QT version?

[Nermal6693]

Not the same problem, but when I downloaded it, it tried to open the file in SimpleText rather than QuickTime. I did a Get Info on the file and it says it's in MooV format (they normally say QuickTime). I set it to open with QuickTime and it works now.

I'm running OS X, if you're not then this probably won't help :)

Gollum Raps!

[Corrado]

This is pretty funny!

Gollum Da Man!

Re:Gollum Raps!

[Anonymous Coward]

Work warning: Nude female photo on this link.

Re:Gollum Raps!

[Kaz Riprock]

You can try the original site too, but it's often down/off...

http://www.nedevett.com/gollum.swf

Re:Gollum Raps!

[gfxguy]

That's just wrong!

But how can something so wrong be so funny?

Uh this is OLD news..

[Nuclear Elephant]

This trailer is actually on the 2nd DVD .. nothing new to see here folks, move along.

10 minute svcd preview

[traid]

I am not sure where this came from but here is a 10 minute SVCD interview with the directors talking about ROTK. Lord.Of.The.Rings-Return.Of.The.King.10.Minutes.Pr eview-SVCD-TeRaX.mpg (tarred to prevent streaming, 222M). Please put up some mirrors of this as I probably will not be able to keep it my server for too long.

-traid

Oh My God We Even Crashed Bittorrent

[Anonymous Coward]

We even pushing the filerush torrent. It is starting to go all screwy because of too many downloaders. This is just insane! =)

Re:Oh My God We Even Crashed Bittorrent

[AIX-Hood]

Well, it turns out that the problem was that I was stupidly doing queries on things every time someone clicked the download page, which killed it all under the /.'ing. Now that I've changed it to an include of a static object, filerush was only down for about 30 minutes, and is now back up, with even more users than before, at even faster speeds... So the php and the bit torrent technology wasn't to blame here.

Boy are you without a clue!

[Anonymous Coward]

This is the official theatrical trailer for the movie. The "trailer" (if you even want to call it a that) on the TTT DVD was just a preview of some finished scenes.

There is SOOO much more to this new one.

Shelob

[Anonymous Coward]

Did she go on a diet for the movie? I always pictured her being much larger than Frodo, but in the trailer she's looks like she's hardly any taller than him.

Internet2 uses download the trailer at high speed

[FastDownload]

Internet2 users, download the trailer at ultr-high speed from the National Logistical Networking Testbed. See http://www.cs.utk.edu/~atchley/lotr/ for details.

Good? Ha! This surpasses *good*.

[tarsi210]

The trailer...oh, the sweet, beautiful trailer....damn you! My lust for fine filmage of Tolkien only increaseth.

You know how I know this movie is going to kick ass? (And not just kick one ass, kick collective ass.) PJ is still refilming scenes in NZ. Yes, still.

For those of you who don't find this amazing, how many months does it take after a movie is in the can for it to come out? Quite a few. PJ is certainly pushing the limits on New Line's production crew to get this one out in time...but he'll do it. The man has earned my trust by delivering time and time again.

I know this will be good because PJ himself said he will reshoot, and reshoot, and reshoot fucking AGAIN until he gets it right. You have to love a director with that much dedication to the film he is releasing, no matter what your view on his interpretation is.

Trailers....bittersweet torment.

Re:Internet2 uses download the trailer at high spe

[FastDownload]

This is the 19 MB version at 480x264.

Spolier Alert (Answer to your question)

[The Closet Optimist]

ANSWER/SPOILERS below!

The Scourging of the shire is not in the movie. Instead Saruman is killed at Orthanc (roughly in the same way).

Before people flame PJ for such a "betrayal" of the story, consider this departure from a cinematic perspective: 9 hours of movie lead up to the spectacular ending of the ring only to lead off into another hour to cover The Scourging?

This unfortunately just wouldn't fly from the cinematic perspective, even though the book lovers like most of us want to get every little last bit out of the story of Middle Earth. It is a film adaptation after all.

This is probably what happens...(SPOLIER)

[The Closet Optimist]

In the first two movies, Aragorn clearly does not have Narcil. As an earlier poster pointed out, it was reforged and given to him in Rivendell. That did happen in the books.

Also, in the FOTR extended DVD edition Elrond mentions reforging Narcil in the scene where Aragorn is at his mother's grave.

Now, the cinematic ROTK poster clearly shows Narcil's hilt in Aragorn's hands. So how does he get it? My guess is that Arwen makes a flight from the rest of the elves and takes it to him. This pure speculation on my part, but I suspect that PJ wants to make Arwen's character a bit more significant than just a strong woman waiting in the wings for the war to end...

Anyone else have any ideas?

Re:This is probably what happens...(SPOLIER)

[Anonymous Coward]

BTW, it's Narsil.

Who said you can only be a nit-picker in English?

Sam/Frodo/Gollum love triangle

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey I hope they resolve all these gay themed subplots that they have been presenting... the two towers, the master/slave thing with Frodo and Sam, that big gay wizard dude, the evil one eye penis that that Frodo keep seeing, those homoerotic elves. The fact that there are no chicks in the story so they had to beef up that elf chick role for the movie. Maybe it will all be a wacky act Frodo has been putting on, like Jack Tripper from Three's Company.

For those having problems with MPlayer

[Taloon]

I had the same problem under MPlayer 1.0pre1. I used this to fix it: -vc qtsvq3

You'll have to have support for the QT Win32 DLLs compiled in.

Covener said in another reply to this that ffsvq3 worked for him. I'm running Gentoo on an Athlon Thunderbird. Maybe there's some strange bug in the ff codec that doesn't effect everyone.

Re:For those having problems with MPlayer

[croddy]

athlon here too, debian unstable.

(Socre: 5, Insightful)?

[Anonymous Coward]

(Socre: 5, Insightful)? Where are the (-1, Troll) Mods when one needs them...?

mirror

[KirkH]

Here's another location for the higher quality 480x280 .mov version that is not corrupt. Get it while the gettin's good:

return_of_the_king_trailer_480x280_fixed.mov

Did anyone else think...

[HomeySmurf]

...this looked a bit like Braveheart with elves and orcs?

However, I have no doubt this will be the best of the three. It was certainly the best book and full of lots of exciting battles and special effects opportunities.

All new WORKING torrent

[noa]

Here is a brand new torrent file for the 19,927,973 bytes large rotk_trailer_480x280_fixed.mov with md5sum

http://people.metamatrix.se/noa/rotk_trailer_480x2 80_fixed.mov.torrent

The tracker is on a 10mbit connection, so hopefully it will hold.

MARCO: Sucky trailer

[Anonymous Coward]

And it'll be a sucky movie too.
I will NOT watch this crap.

Let's face it. This is as bad as anime.

- Marco

Apple's Trailer Site...

[Quadrature]

There is also a nice version on Apple's trailer site: http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/newline/returno ftheking/

tolkien pro war

[minus_273]

most eripens had issues with the lort series becasue of its seemingly pro watr stance. Kinda funny when you look at in the sens that if france were in middle earth they would have talked with sauron around a u shaped table :-p

Re:tolkien pro war

[Xybot]

pardon?

Apple Trailers

[Aaron England]

You can also get it from apple trailers

well...

[Anonymous Coward]

"every time Elrond speaks."

How can Elrond speak....IF HE HAS NO MOUTH?

Official trailer, better than the others (!)

[Anonymous Coward]

Download from this URL:

http://a772.g.akamai.net/5/772/51/dceb98a304a021 /1 a1a1aaa2198c627970773d80669d84574a8d80d3cb12453c02 589f25382f668c9329e0375e81785ea61cd36a40938aa0f83f 86ad847ad2189ee59c23097/returnoftheking_m480.mov

Re:Official trailer, better than the others (!)

[fjordboy]

link - right click, save target as. It seems to be working just fine for me! 26 megs of lotr goodness.

Saw it last weekend

[ducomputergeek]

My fiance and I went to see Second Hand Lions, which a great film that if you get a chance to go see it you should, and the trailer played during the preview.

The theatre was dead silent during and a few seconds after the trailer stopped. Then three people got up and left. They had spent $7.50 each to see a 3 minute trailer and missed a wonderful movie.

Anyway, I am downloading it now...

Re:Saw it last weekend

[happyclam]

They had spent $7.50 each to see a 3 minute trailer and missed a wonderful movie.

My guess is they worked at the theater or were let in for free by a friend, just to see the trailer. If not, it's a shame they couldn't have spent that $22.50 on something a little more worthwhile like feeding hungry children or improving their nation's educational system. Or buying LOTR action figures.

Not me

[Overly Critical Guy]

I'm not sure. The writing style and tone of the books is so different from the movies that the books take on a world of their own in my mind. The plots are more or less the same and the characters sometimes say the same things, but somehow it's different in context when I read the original books. Tolkien had a distinct writing style, particularly with the dialogue.

Now has video from official LoTR site

[FastDownload]

I updated the exNode at 4:15 pm to contain the official trailer released by www.lordoftherings.net. This is the 27 MB trailer.

Also available from official sites..

[joni]

The trailer is also available from lordoftherings.net and also from apple.

LOTR ROTK

[Anonymous Coward]

OMFG so 31337 LOL!!! LOTR ROTK Rulz! Ok I guess I can't use so many capitals and simulate an aol'r on Mountain Dew

Spoiler...

[Anonymous Coward]

The hobitz dies. Don't say I didn't warn you. Surf /. at +1 instead.

Good choice...

[Snaller]

... that was the most boring trailer i've seen...

Spoilers on TheOneRing.net...

[deemaunik]

the irritating thing was that i belive it was TheOneRing.net that fucked it all up for me. i'm one of the few that hadn't read the books a billion times in my childhood and was watching the movies for the first time... experiencing the story piece by piece via the movie. i planned on reading the book after the movies finished up, but as i was browsing for information on gollum, as he was by far my favorite character... i came upon the final ending. which pissed me off to no end. no warnings, no spoiler alerts. a simple sentence fucked the entire experience for me. so... what could quite possibly be the best story ever told, i learned the ending to pre-emptively due to that site. this may not have happened to anyone else, but by fucking god it pissed me off. again, spoiler alert- this is the the BIO PAGE that fucked it all up for me that they have absolutely no alert for. if you dont know the story, dont click this link. http://www.theonering.net/movie/char/smeagol.html in any case... it's completely unrelated, i just wanted to post a rant about how pissed off i was that i had found that. i am, however, looking forward to the movie. i will not, however, open that vid as i don't want to learn anymore than i already do.

Re:Spoilers on TheOneRing.net...

[SemiBarbaricPrincess]

One would think that the word Biography would have tipped you off to the fact that it was going to tell you what had happened to Gollum. Don't misunderstand me, I am sorry that the story was ruined for you. However, I can't help but feel that you brought it on yourself.

Re:Spoilers on TheOneRing.net...

[deemaunik]

with no warning of a spoiler, while reading a bio, i expected nothing more than a summary of a character. not a full fledged description of how he is involved with the ending.

GOLLUM BITES OFF FRODOS FINGER & FALLS INTO MT

[Anonymous Coward]

that is all

26 MB trailer, zipped

[mraymer]

Get this one instead. It is 26MB zipped. The quality of the 9MB file is not pretty.

Re:GOLLUM BITES OFF FRODOS FINGER & FALLS INTO

[deemaunik]

i love how these flaming morons decide to make these fucking posts and leave them anonymous. i wish there was logs that i could get ahold of and fly to the home of these people with an ak-47.

Or the audience's fault...

[DrMorpheus]

...like a literary teacher told our class once; "Come back to this story once you've matured and can appreciate it." I thought she was blowing shit at the time, but I've found out that she was right. The audience does need a certain level of maturity to fully appreciate some works of literature.

That was Boris Karloff

[DrMorpheus]

who did the voice of Gollum for the animated series. It's too bad he died before he could at least do a cameo in the LoTR's movies.

Re:That was Boris Karloff

[Moofie]

WOW! I had no idea. Never even bothered to check IMDB.

That's really an amazing bit o' info. Thanks!