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First Review Of Return Of The King
dipfan writes "Newsweek has a first review of the third instalment of LOTR - and gives it two thumbs up: "Judging from a recent Newsweek screening in New Zealand, The Return Of The King is a sure contender for best picture. More than that, it could be the first franchise ever that didn't, at the end of the day, let audiences down--either because of laziness, pretension, greed or other phantom menaces. This is an especially poignant possibility at a time when we can all still smell the smoke from the wreckage of The Matrix." Fingers crossed. There's also an entertaining piece on LOTR gaffes with comments from Peter Jackson (such as 'Well, it's too late to fire anyone,' and 'We didn't think Elijah looked very good with pus')."
Tolkien wrote his works for a narrow literate audience, wrote it alone based on his personal experiences, and the fact it wouldn't fit in just one book made it a trilogy.
The LOTR movie is based on that book. The others were based on merchandising.
"Just my personnal opinion, but the problem people have with The Matrix ending is peace. War is so much more glamour these days..."
Actually, the problem a lot of people had with The Matrix ending is that it sucked, much like the rest of the movie.
Let's not act like the W. brothers got very daring at the end, and didn't end it with a battle. The final hour was full of battles. The ending was nothing profound or gutsy, it was just lifeless, like the rest of the movie. The ending wasn't bad because they chose to have peace break out, it was bad because they decided that dialogue and characters wre unimportant.
My problem with it isn't peace... the 'both sides win' was a pretty ballsy move.
What I didn't like was (to paraphrase a great post I read here) that the last 2 movies used vaguesness to simulate depth, and did it poorly.
I enjoyed the action, but the constant allusions to some deeper meaning, which is rarely delivered, got old quick.
"Faith: Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge, of things without parallel." - A.B.
BEWARE - SPOILER!
I don't like that there won't be (even on DVDs) Scouring of Shire. That's why I find LOTR so great - it's so bitter-sweet end that war has got consequences even in such an idylic places like Shire.
> What I didn't like was (to paraphrase a great post I read here) that the last 2 movies used vaguesness to simulate depth, and did it poorly.
Significance by obscurity?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Tolkien sold the movie rights himself for 100K to settle a tax bill.
The first attempt to make it into a movie was a disaster, it was a disney style cartoon. I would have walked out if I hadn't been the projectionist.
Even if they read it later, the experience will have been forever ruined for them.
Oh please save us the sanctimonious claptrap. There are several hundred thousand books published each year and of those no more than two on average will be made into a big budget film. There is plenty of Tolkein left in its pristine unfilmed state, the Silymarilyn, book of lost tales that were found behind the dresser, etc.
Of course the only way those works are ever going to make it to a wider audience is if they are turned into films because Tolkein's attempt to immitate nordic sagas leads to tedious prose.
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Before responding, I just read every one of the posts in this thread from various who responded to anyone admitting they liked the Matrix Trilogy, and I noticed a trend that keeps showing up on this subject. Starting sentences that read like: "I didn't like it cause it sucked", "I didn't like it cause it was lame", etc. Sure some people offered valid criticisms, such as claiming that the films pretend to explore philosophical depths that they don't really want to delve into beyond the shallows. But so many of the posts start off, in effect, with a null-semantic content opening; "I didn't like it cause I didn't like it".
I'm sorry people, but anyone who starts off an opinion piece with a remark like that for an opening sentence is effectively holding up a big, flashing neon sign saying "I am ignorant and my opinion deserves to be ignored". Several of you go on to make points that show you deserve better than that. Sorry, but you're committing the equivalent of attending a fancy dress party with dog-poop on your high tops and bragging about how you're going to marry your cousin soon as she turns 15, and wondering why people can't get past the first impression. If I hadn't had some extra slack time, I would have never bothered to read past that first sentence, and I guarentee you are being marginalized by it.
Freuddot is doubtless generalizing too broadly in his post. I'm sure different people have different problems with the Matrix series ending. But he held my attention long enough to express his opinion, and I bet 95% or better of people who started his post finished it and a lot of those actually considered his opinion. My post is long, and a lot of people will drop out on the way, but I'll still bet better than half that start read the whole thing. The "It just is" posts are losing half their readers ten words into the post.
Who is John Cabal?
Sadly, the average Joe doesn't view reading as a recreational activity.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Starting sentences that read like: "I didn't like it cause it sucked", "I didn't like it cause it was lame", etc ... "I didn't like it cause I didn't like it".
I'm sorry people, but anyone who starts off an opinion piece with a remark like that for an opening sentence is effectively holding up a big, flashing neon sign saying "I am ignorant and my opinion deserves to be ignored"
When people simply say that the movie "sucked", it means just that, that they didn't like it. I have noticed that with a lot of Matrix fans in particular, expressing dislike for these movies is anathema, and that they treat it like a religion.
If you want people to explained to you why the movie "sucked" to them, you can politely ask. But to say that they are ignorant or sound ignorant is idiotic. Art is subjective, and sometimes, there are no clear ways to express why one dislikes a piece of art. In this case, the reasons are numerous, but why repeat them over and over. Saying "it sucks" it's enough, it communicates to you, that the writer didn't like the movie.
The defenses for this movie are just beyound ridiculous, the typical one is the "ignorant" and you "didn't get it" elitist charges, which are so pathetic, because you get the feeling that fans of these movies feel intellectually superior for a piece of work that pretends to be intellectual. It's amazing, what's so intellectual about leather clad people wacking each other like they're in a comic book, and pretending to regurgitate phylosophy 101 that doesn't advance the plot?
The original poster here has an even more amazing defense, people don't like the movie, because today they're INTO WAR!. Amazing, the insult is that if you don't like the movie, you must be some blood thristy war monger that can't appreaciate this sophisticated work.
Get a grip folks, and learn to respect other people's opinions. So you liked the movie, CLAP CLAP, good for you. But don't insult other people's intelligence because they don't share your same taste (or lack of it).
Enough.
- sigs are for wimps.
Funny- but, you know what? Good story-telling means that knowing the ending doesn't matter.
Case and point- when Gandalf fell at the end of the first movie- you could have heard a pin drop in the theater, and I found it to be a very, very powerful scene. Nearly everyone in the audience knew damn well he was fine and would return -but the power of the imagery of the comrades loosing their leader and friend just grips you to the point that, even though you know otherwise(and if you were smart, you'd realize it takes more to bump off Gandalf)- you really feel like he just died.
I think the difference is that too many movies substitute "what's gonna happen next? Find out!" for a good story. That is, however, not to say that all mysteries are bad- quite the opposite, I love mysteries/suspense(not the slasher kind though). If you want a good example, pick up one of Le Carre's spy novels; I strongly recommend reading from the first, especially if you're reading any of his first half dozen books or so- some of them -are- chronologically important.
Another good example is, believe it or not- Marathon. That game came at a time when Doom was "the" game- you ran around blowing up monsters and that was pretty much it. In Marathon, you had a non-linear play, you could suddenly find yourself on any one of three sides(even mid-level, if I remember right!); you had to do a lot of searching and pay close attention to details. It was the best FPS plot-wise I've ever played. You can currently play the demo on any modern OS- search for Aleph One. You can get the demo files from bungie's site, and if you have the original CDs, you can play the entire game. I'm replaying the thing from scratch right now, as a matter of fact.
Please help metamoderate.
I have been reading the Tolkien stuff for 30 years (I'm 42). Though I don't think the LOTR Trilogy is perfect (I missed Tom Bombadil...) it to me is obviously made with love for the story and characters and to me, true to the spirit of the story that I have spent so many hours in my life reading and imaginging! I have a three year old girl that I'm looking forward to reading the story to, and then watching the movie.
It is a tremendous achivement that Peter was able to make all three at once and the director's cuts of 1 & 2 are also tremendous. Thank you for bringing such a favorite story of mine to life! If only someone could do it with Dune...
I hope Peter Jackson is able to make The Hobbit with the same love and care as LOTR. I would love to see Smaug and the gold as seen by Peter and Co. Bring it on!!!
Bod
"I say we take off, nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."
Ever commute to work? A large portion of the people who take trains to work read books during the ride.
The first attempt to make it into a movie was a disaster, it was a disney style cartoon...
(snip...)
Remember also that this was at the time when the cult film Wizards was popular, an innovative and impressive film at the time, and with a similar theme. The animated take on LoTR might have been a hit, if done better and completed
If, by "the first attempt", you're speaking of the 1978 animated movie, it was directed by Ralph Bakshi, who also had done Wizards. Others more knowledgeable than I claim that Wizards was Bakshi's training wheels for LOTR. Don't know if it helped too much.
Also, Bakshi's take on LOTR you saw in 1978 was not supposed to be complete ; the first film ends, IIRC, right after Helm's Deep. A promised second-part never appeared, at least not by Bakshi's hand. A made-for-TV-something called "The Return of the King" did appear,a few years later (1980?/81?), done by Rankin and Bass (the folks behind the original animation of the Hobbit). I remember being just amazingly disappointed with it, especially considering the two had done a great adaptation of the Hobbit a few years earlier.
As a card-carrying member of the Tolkien lunatic fringe, I'm not thrilled by a few of the editorial liberties taken by Jackson, but overall it's a much more satisfying experience than the earlier attempts were. I do urge people I've talked to who have seen the movie to read the books, as they are much richer in experience than a 3-hour adaptation of each part could ever be. But Jackson' films definitely present the same aura of wonder, power and, for lack of a better phrase, the bigness of things the books projected as well. And that's nice to see visualized.