Slashdot Mirror
Interview with Peter Jackson on LoTR Bloopers
erth writes "Newsweek has an interview with Peter Jackson asking him what he thinks about some of the most famous and/or obvious bloopers in the LoTR series. Moviemistakes.com has more Fellowhip of the Ring, The Two Towers, and Return of the King bloopers as well for your snickering pleasure." I just wanted to give my props to Jackson and all- we took off early yesterday to see the final film. It was everything I hoped for... except for the bits that I expect I'll have to wait for the extended edition DVD to see. And I was to busy grinning ear to ear to notice any serious bloopers.
No blooper is as big as PJ being denied an Oscar these last 2 years.
If he doesn't get it this year the Oscars will become irrelevant. It's just that obvious.
Blearf. Blearf, I say.
I'm pretty sure that the book has far fewer mistakes, as far as Tolkien could be concerned, so just go read that. I'm doing just fine with paper and ink.
The Hobbit was the first book I read and still my favorite. They say that he wants to use some of the same actors, too. All in all, it gives us something to look forward to.
Here is more info:
http://www.icv2.com/articles/home/3977.html
Usurper_ii
Ron Paul
unless i'm mistaken, the picture accompanying the article is of a regular orc, not an uruk-hai. (the caption reads 'Why are tough Uruk-hai KO'd by mere rocks?')
wow, i'm a nerd.
Fitting punishment for their heresy. We all know there can be no "flaws" in these holy movies. The silencing of this instigator is a victory for Truth and Justice everywhere.
It's nothing but crumpled porno and Ayn Rand.
I don't know why I'm responding to such an obvious troll, but here goes.
Gandalf cannot touch the ring or he will be corrupted by it. The ring would use gandalf's power against everyone and very bad things would ensue. The reason that Frodo is able to hold the ring and not instantly turn bad is because hobbits have no inherent powers of their own, also, hobbits seem to be more resistant to the rings corrupting influence. All things that you would know if you had ever read the books.
Can we have an interview with CmdrTaco on Slashdot Bloopers? Same format - list out all the dupes on slashdot in the past 5-6 years, and give Rob a good way to tell us why he doesn't read his own website. ;-)
oops, I goofed, that's a link to the first movie
:-)
use this one instead
Mods: please mod parent down, and this up.
/* oops I accidentally made a comment, sorry */
And I was to busy grinning ear to ear to notice any serious bloopers.
and apparently too busy to edit your comment.
:) i kid because i love.
MySQL Mistake #8: Failure to close connections properly will bite you in the ass during a Slashdotting.
Middle Earth is a past earth, in the same way that Beowulf is a past earth, or The Illiad is a past earth. That was Tolkein's intention.
And, there was much more to Gandalf's reluctance to touch the ring. Remember, Gandalf was no more human than Sauron or the Balrog were human -- he was an immortal. He was also part of the last song; it was impossible for him to fight directly against Sauron. He moved, he shaped, he cajoled, he prodded, but he took no direct action. Ever. That was the fate laid out for him at the dawn of the world.
Well, except against the Balrog. I guess Immortal Beings Created at the Dawn of Time can fight each other directly.
Slashdot is jumping the shark. I'm just driving the boat.
Yes. It's supposed to occur in our "prehistory".
A lot of people seem to ask this.
The short answer is obviously "because then there's no story". Even if this is the only answer, it doesn't have to be an issue. For example, a lot of people enjoyed the first Matrix movie, even though its premise violates physical laws (since human bodies cannot generate more energy than is put into them).
However, there are perfectly reasonable justifications for why the "just fly an Eagle into Mordor" isn't going to work.
In your scenario, Gandalf flies an Eagle over Mount Doom and drops the Ring in. If you recall, Gandalf was unwilling to even touch the Ring in the first movie because he felt he would be unable to resist the temptation to use it. He felt that hobbits in general and Frodo in particular would be better able to resist the temptation. This is because they have very little ambition or desire for power, as well as having relatively little innate power.
However, even Frodo, when it came down to it, was incapable of throwing the Ring into the fire! Gandalf would have been even more unable to.
What would probably happen in your scenario, given how Tolkien has set up the story, is Gandalf would take the Ring, mount the Eagle, make it most of the way to Mount Doom, and say "Forget this throwing away business, you can all call me Lord Gandalf now." There is no way he (or anyone else, I would argue [except perhaps Bombadil]) would be capable of dropping it in.
Another difficulty with the Eagle scenario is that it's extremely blatant. There is no secrecy possible. This means Sauron would have perceived it immediately. His significant psychic/spiritual power would instantly been focused on preventing the destruction of the Ring, either by destroying, cowing, or deceiving the bearer.
These first points are derivable from the movies alone. The following one requires knowledge of the books.
The (giant) Eagles are not at the command of anyone in Middle-Earth. They are the servants of Manwe, who in Tolkien's legendarium is the head Vala (arch-angel kind of figures), the ruler of Middle-Earth. The Valar felt that defeating Sauron was the responsibility of the peoples of Middle-Earth themselves. They sent help in the form of the Wizards (including Gandalf and Saruman), but even they were not supposed to act directly, but only advise, guide, and prompt. So while it's acceptable for the Eagles (as Manwe's representatives) to assist the effort against Sauron in minor ways, they cannot act more directly.
Do not speak unless you can improve on the silence.
"And I was to busy grinning ear to ear to notice any serious bloopers." Anyone else out there catch themselves grinning like an idiot in the dark during these movies? I know I did. I was worried when I heard they were being made that they couldn't live up to the material, but Mr. Jackson did himself proud.
The pages states the following;
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King - 29 mistakes
Revealing: In the first scene in Edoras (the capital city of Rohan). The first pan over Edoras: You can see the pan is shown in reverse, with the smoke going into the chimney and the fire at the end is burning backwards. The flags are fluttering oddly as well.
Revealing: When Theoden is talking to Eowyn before he dies one can see that he is wearing contact lenses.
Factual error: Hobbits can't grow beards, yet Samwise Gamgee has stubble in most of his close-ups in Return Of The King. Even if they could grow beards, it seems unlikely they would be in a position to be shaving on that journey.
Continuity: In one of the final scenes of the movie, Frodo is writing in the book "There and Back Again," adding his own story. As he is finishing, he clutches the wound he received from one of the Nazgul in "The Fellowship of the Ring." In the hand that he uses clutch the wound, he still holds the quill pen. At the same time, Sam is entering Bag-End. When the camera angle changes, Frodo is still clutching the wound, but the pen has found its way into the ink jar.
Audio problem: In the scene where Gandalf enters the chambers of Gondor to speak with the Steward of the throne, the sound of his staff striking the floor matches the action in sporadic patches only. In the shot where he departs, that specific sound is consistent.
Continuity: When Gollum drops the lembas from the ridge, you see the leaves it was wrapped in fluttering away, and the wafers fall roughly straight down. However, when Sam finds it later, the lembas is still mostly wrapped in the leaves, with only a few morsels broken off and laying around unwrapped.
Revealing: In the scene where the paciderm animals of Mordor are introduced in the battle, there's a shot that pans the front of the line of them. One animal has wood connecting its larger tusks, complete with barbs jutting out from the wood. As the orcs flee to regroup behind the animals, several run through the contraption unharmed.
Continuity: In the scene where Frodo is helped by Galadriel in Shelob's lair (in the "dream sequence") he lays on the ground. In his hair on HIS right side (viewers' left) is what appears to be some clovers or leaves or grass. The camera cuts to Galadriel then back to Frodo, the thing in his hair is gone. The camera cuts to her again and back to Frodo, the thing is back in his hair.
Continuity: In the scene where Frodo is tied up in the Tower, part of his face and hair is partly covered in spider webbing - the only opening is his face where Sam parted it to see that he had "died". After a few scenes of orcs, the next shot shows that Frodo has clean hair/face and his hands are still tied up.
Continuity: When Gandalf enters the castle of Rohan, the shot of his back shows him holding his staff in a vertical position. When the shot turns to his front, he is holding his staff in an horizontal position. The shot turns to his back, and the staff is again in the vertical position. Then the shot turns again to his front, showing his staff in a horizontal position.
Continuity: The scene where Pippin and Gandalf are talking about "the end" in Minas Tirith, during the battle of Pelenor fields. In one close-up shot, Gandalf's sword blade is shiny and silver. In the next shot, it's coated in black orc blood, then in the next shot, it's silver again.
Continuity: In the scene where Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli enter the cave where the dead army resides, Aragorn pulls a torch seemingly from nowhere (especially interesting considering that his horse, and consequently all supplies, have run off in the scene before).
Continuity: When Aragorn, Legolas, Gandalf, Gimli etc, ride up to the gates of Mordor, the main characters go up to the gate on their own to demand it opens. The trails the horses leave on the way towards the gate are different to those that you see in the shot when they retreat after the gate ha
Wait a minute. I got it. You could play with your magic nose goblins.
I recall hearing from a couple of sources that Tolkien actually did intend for Middle-Earth to be the same earth that we stand on right now. After all, he was trying to provide a mythology for the Britons, whom he felt did not have a grand mythology in the same way as the Norse or the Romans. The only source that I can find at the moment is from here, but it does contain the following:
I'm sure that I can dig up more sources from "Letters of J.R. Tolkien" or other books should you require more evidence.
You're right that there aren't any elves, Maiar, or Valar around nowadays, but remember that they all reside in Valinor now, beyond the reaches of men. Sauron was defeated, Saruman's spirit was blown away by the wind from the west, and who knows what happened to the Ents, Trolls, and Orcs. The Fourth Age was the Age of Man, and here we still live.
No, of course it's not real, but it's still a wonderful fantasy - far beyond anything the movies showed you. My fellow readers of The Simarillion and The Bible would understand what I'm talking about when I say how much Tolkien's work paralleled Biblical creation.
Sometimes, you just have to go with the least bad of the available options.
Gee, sounds like a US Presidential election!
MORTAR COMBAT!
MySQL Mistake #8: Failure to close connections properly will bite you in the ass during a Slashdotting.
Actually, the likely problem here is that the site is making use of PHP's ability to hold the connection to the database open, rather than doing an open/close on every query. This saves the overhead of establishing the connection on each page view, and is often a good thing.
However, each instance of Apache will open and hold the connection, so if you have a config that allows more Apache child processes than you've allowed concurrent connections under MySQL, you see this. The aggravating thing is that neither Apache nor MySQL are necessarily swamped when this happens -- you've just got more Apache processes than the configured number of concurrent MySQL connections.
Its a big trilogy
To my understanding (from the extended DVDs), so big, that it took three completely separate locations for filming (aside from the studio sets), combining to stretch out over 14 months. For a single person to (follow me here), direct this massive undertaking, and painstakingly boil it down the the parts that matter requires great directing skills.
It has very nice CG
For which the pencil-to-paper decision making goes all the way back to 1997. Again, Jackson was the goto guy that approved this stuff. For someone to put together a team (Weta) that brought about the Ents (prior to which, few artists were able to render to any likeable levels), and the unbelievably detailed Lothlorien, again, takes great directing skills.
Theme music is great
Well, it didn't come off of a CD. Again, much time was spent by (of all people) Jackson, in choosing the music and directing its specifics with RE to the movie.
But is this worthy of a "Best Director" award?
I can't think of a single movie made in the last decade that is as massive an undertaking as LOTR was. Jackson was the man that directed all of it. Even if you don't appreciate things like its character development, or the music, for one person to be the nexus for this creation, IMO (and clearly, many other lowbrow movie fans), certainly demands recognition.
Q: What do you think about American Culture?
A: I think it's a good idea.
(adapted from Gandhi)