Re: TTT

["Peter T. Chattaway" <petert at interchange_ubc.ca>]

*** SPOILERS ***

On Fri, 20 Dec 2002, Don Smith wrote:
> One thing that struck me as I was mulling over the experience of
> watching the film is that this one is much more plot-driven than the
> last one.  That is, the last one of course was largely about getting
> Frodo from one place to another, but it stayed focussed on him and the
> small circle of people around him.  This movie widens the canvas
> considerably, and just like in astronomy, if you have a wider field of
> view, you can't see as deep.  Victims of mathematics.

Interesting analogy.  To that, I would add that the first film followed a
very clear linear trajectory -- Frodo starts in the Shire, goes to Bree,
goes to Rivendell, goes to Moria, goes to Lothlorien, etc. -- whereas the
new film, in some ways, seems to stay put, or run in circles, and that
hurts the new film's momentum.  There's some minor motion from Edoras to
Helm's Deep, but Merry and Pippin spend the entire movie in the forest,
Frodo and Sam spend the entire movie Somewhere Just Outside Mordor (except
for that one sequence in which they are dragged *away* from Mordor!), and
the people of Rohan basically just sit and wait for the Uruk-Hai to attack
them.  The first film took us from one new location to the next -- some
dark and terrifying, like Bree, and some full of grandeur, like the
Argonath, and some a bit of both, like Moria -- and the new film doesn't
really have anything to match those scenes.  Osgiliath is an empty ruin
that lacks the grandeur of the halls of Moria or the character of the
Argnoath, the Dead Marshes are, well, just marshes filled with dead people
(unlike, say, Bree, which feels like a dangerous but active community),
and Helm's Deep is more functional than anything else -- it is designed to
hold off attacks, and not for any larger artistic architectural purpose.

> The Ents didn't look at all like I had imagined them, myself, but I
> could accept them.  Especially when they got all hasty at the end.  Hoom
> hom!

Man, I *love* that shot of the Ents striding towards Isengard.

> > . . . the humor was well-placed i think.
>
> Yes!  And there was one bit that absolutely floored me: in the first
> movie, my least favorite line was "no one tosses a dwarf".  It felt
> anachronistic and out of place.

Yeah, though "What's this? A ranger caught off his guard?" was even worse.  
Not only was it a bit too movie-ish, it *also* made no sense in terms of
what was happening then within the narrative.  I mean, Arwen *knows* there
are five Black Riders not far from Aragorn and his group -- indeed, they
almost catch up to Arwen when she rides off with Frodo -- yet despite all
this urgency, she takes time out to play "Guess who?" with her loverboy?

> But in this movie, there's one point in Helm's Deep when Gimli tells
> Aragorn "you'll have to toss me", and it's done with such panache, that
> it *completely* redeemed that line in the first movie.  *Loved* it.
> "Don't tell the Elf."  Great stuff!

Yes!  Not just humour, but humour that develops character!  What a
wonderful indication of Gimli's trust in Aragorn, his willingness to place
honour in battle over personal pride, and his continuing sense of dignity
even as his relationship with Legolas is beginning to thaw ...

--- Peter T. Chattaway --------------------------- peter at chattaway_com ---
 If true love never did exist how could we know its name? -- Sam Phillips
          Happiness happens but I want joy. -- Marjorie Cardwell

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