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Message in a Battle
The WP has a tale titled The Messages in a Battle about the recent growth of computer-generated battle scenes in movies, now that you don't have to pay all those extras. RotK clearly wouldn't have been much of a movie if the battle scenes hadn't been so good.
"..While the battle scenes were very eye appealing, I think that all of the actors did a wonderful job..."
Yeah, the orc 300th in from the left of the screen did an awesome job - definitely a star of the future.
You wasted your karma bonus on _THAT_????
We have all these movies now where CG-generated characters are used to fight and kill each other in every gory fashion imaginable, but why don't we have any movies where thousands of people get together and make love, not war? A massive orgy comprising of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, CG-generated characters in the scope and scale of Lord of the Rings would be an unforgettable moment in moviemaking history. Perhaps it would inspire the nations of Europe to solve their rapid depopulation problem -- we could have a summer of love all over again.
I was quite disappointed when that scene in the Matrix 2 turned out to be a mere scantily clad rave in a cave, all done with paid actors.
RotK clearly wouldn't have been much of a movie if the battle scenes hadn't been so good.
Duh. And in other news, Titanic wouldn't have been much of a movie if the ship hadn't sunk, Pearl Harbor wouldn't have been much of a movie if the Japanese hadn't attacked and X-Men would have been pretty bad if none of the characters had special powers.
Sure, there are a couple of hobbits winding their way to Mount Doom but Lord Of The Rings was always about epic battles - it's a bit hard to have an ultimate "good vs evil" struggle without a major conflict or two.
When people talk about these movies, they they talk about the battles within the mines of Moria, at Helm's Deep, at Isengard, and at Minas Tirith. They don't talk about Gandalf's fireworks at the Shire, or Frodo vs Gollum at the volcano's mouth. It's the major fight scenes that get us talking and it's those fight scenes where the real money is spent.
Of course Return Of The King wouldn't have been much of a movie if the battle scenes hadn't been so good. Neither would any major sci-fi or fantasy film you care to mention if equally bereft of seriously meaty action. Duh.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg