Well, let’s see. I worked on Friday. Went to services Friday night. Picked up Jake and went to services Saturday morning and then home for a Lord of the Rings movie marathon. Worked Saturday night, because my HR department is once again behind schedule on Open Enrollment. Finished the movie marathon this morning, took Jake home this afternoon, and am about to have dinner and then work some more.
Well, we had fun watching the three extended LOTR movies in a day and a half. We watched two yesterday and one today. I taught Jake about Movie Legolas’ Captain Obvious moments, and we couldn’t stop laughing about how the actor who plays Elrond is always so angry. Except when he gave his daughter to Aragorn, after which we decided it was Arwen that was making Elrond so happy, because he smiled when he gave her away.
We are now both ready for The Hobbit, and the next time I want to watch all three movies, I will start earlier. I don’t see that happening for a few years, however. It’s been about that long since I last saw the trilogy.
Time to reread the novels so I can get the bad taste of some of the Peter Jackson scenes out of my head. I’m probably going to have to reread The Hobbit immediately after seeing the film, knowing how much he’s going to be making up. Really, did he have to make Deneothor such a selfish bastard that he’d not call for help from Rohan? And did he have to ignore the ages-old friendship between Rohan and Gondor in order to make it seem more dramatic when Theoden decided to help rescue Gondor? I could understand it if what he did improved the story. But it did not.
Oh, well. I’m sure I’ll have plenty to bitch about after I get home from seeing The Hobbit in a few weeks.
Good as the movies are, the books are so much better. Particularly The Hobbit. Trailer I saw of the latter, the Bilbo character looks nothing like the Bilbo of the trilogy movies. Pity. But suspect it will still be worth seeing.
And what about Faramir kidnapping Frodo and forcing him along (even if he had a change of heart and let him go later) — when the book goes to great pains to show that Faramir was not at all that sort of man?
Every departure from the book in the movies made the scenes less good and less moving than Tolkien wrote them. The one possible exception is the elves at Helm’s Deep, which did not occur in the books at all. As Legolas notes in the book, the Elves and Dwarves of the North had no need to march to Rohan to seek battle; war was coming to their borders.
AND I missed several good characters from the book who were not in the movies, particularly Elros and Elrohir, the sons of Elrond, Halbarad the Ranger, and the Prince of Dol Amroth. Especially the Prince, who, with Gandalf, takes command of Minas Tirith after Denethor abandons hope in mourning for Faramir (and don’t get me started on the movies’ hatchet job on Denethor). Why do Hollywoodheads always “improve” the story from the book and succeed only in making it worse?
Yeah, Rahel, that part really bothered me. Plus the whole bit about Aragorn not wanting his inheritance. About the only thing they did right was Boromir.