I finally watched The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

MeridianFlight

MeridianFlight

New Member
I had seen Two Towers and Return of the King before, but I hadn't seen the first movie. This is perhaps not the best approach to watching the Lord of the Rings Trilogy, as it makes it a little interesting to try and discern everything beginning midway through the story (especially if you haven't read the books either).

The CGI was kind of disappointing though. Return of the King looked absolutely amazing, and there were scenes in Fellowship that looked like they shared Serenity's budget. For instance, when the Fellowship of the Ring is making its way through the mines, or Aragorn and Boromir are slashing away at the octopus-like creature near the door to the mines (...I thought I was watching the Sci-Fi channel for a second).

Anyway, I really enjoyed it otherwise, which is interesting, because I was told that The Fellowship of the Ring was rather slow (...with the essential backstory and sweeping shots of New Zealand). I'm stoked to watch Two Towers and Return of the King again, now that I'm familiar with the characters.

Are the books worth reading? I'm not huge on fantasy, but I really do like the movies. Are the movies a faithful adaptation?
 
I just finished watching Two Towers again.

The scenes with the Ents attacking Saruman's tower looked weird. They're walking trees.

The battle for Helm's Deep was spectacular though. It'd be nice if the documentries on the History Channel had these type of production values.
 
I haven't personally heard of a movie that has done a book justice - LOTR would be my closest choice. Really hard to reproduce imagination onto a screen.

After reading the book you will see the differences and you might have a conflict or two about the validity of Peter Jackson's decisions about what to change/leave the same.

Book <-to-> Movie differences (a couple)

1.) Hobbits journey out of Hobbiton up to Bree is quite different
2.) Liv Tyler's part is 90% made up - it is Elrond's son, Glorfindel that was the primary elf involved in rescuing Frodo at Rivendell (and down the storyline)
3.) The Ents actually decide for themselves to go fight Saruman. Jackson's version makes them out to be slow and stupid - book makes more sense on this
4.) Faramir does NOT take Sam and Frodo back to Osgiliath after the Hidden Cave by the waterfall. He passes his judgement then and there and frees them to go on their way. He proves his quality right away and doesn't falter. His character doesn't require the depth of redemption that Jackson implied...he stays true.

yadda yadda yadda. If you want to see the whole list, just go to the major website and look around for a couple of seconds, it's worth it.
 
[7F]EhUd said:
I haven't personally heard of a movie that has done a book justice
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That's part of the problem right there. A movie should never be identical to a novel, and vice versa (even though Black Hawk Down was certainly an exception). A book is there to tell a story, and has a point. A movie adaptation of a book should tell the same story, most possibly in a different way, while still portraying the same point.

It's like saying the Superman and Spiderman movies stunk because they didn't follow the comic book story. Just because a movie doesn't follow a book word for word doesn't mean it's a bad film, and in fact I don't think it should do that at all. Part of the reason is because they're meant to be read or seen differently. It's a different way of portraying an art, and a point (a book, or a movie; whatever form it happens to be portrayed in).

How successful would Pirates of the Caribbean be if they just filmed the ride/play (or whatever it is) at Disney World? Sure, they're capturing the real event in a very realistic way, but to watch that on a movie would be incredibly boring. I think the creative directors have to take creative license and change the story up a bit in order to make a good transition (from whatever they're transitioning from).

I just don't think we should expect adaptations to portray their originals too closely.
 
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I liked the books, I've seen the first two movies, and I must say that LoTR: FoTR the movie was quite boring. However, I liked The Two Towers and I am planning on seeing the extended edition of LoTR: RoTK at my friend's house.

It's like saying the Superman and Spiderman movies stunk because they didn't follow the comic book story.
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Yes, that's true; however Spider Man 2 stunkified anyway.
 
Granted, FoTR has to start the story out, but being chased by ring wraiths, fighting ring wraiths, troll fight, 60 foot flaming demon, Gandalf dying and fighting Uraki. Boring stuff?
 
Plankeye said:
Granted, FoTR has to start the story out, but being chased by ring wraiths, fighting ring wraiths, troll fight, 60 foot flaming demon, Gandalf dying and fighting Uraki. Boring stuff?
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I'm with you. I don't know how anyone could find any of the films boring. Sure, there is a lot more character development in FotR, but that's because Tolkien wrote it that way. You're supposed to get to know the characters first so that everything that happens has more meaning and you feel more emotionally connected.

The absolute biggest diversion from books to film is the way in which the movies were shot. In the novels, all of these things were not explained at the same time. Instead, we follow Sam and Frodo's entire journey separately from other storylines. I quite like how Jackson did this to make the films more captivating for the short term effects of a movie.

P.S. I would NEVER recommend skipping the first novel/film and watching it later. There really is no value to that at all.
 
I would strongly recommend watching the special edition Director's versions. There is about an extra hour in each one that adds alot more the movie. The extra features are already incorporated into the movie so you are not just watching clips at the end.
 
Well, yes, in retrospect, watching Two Towers and Return of the King before I saw the Fellowship of the Ring was a mistake, but this was over a year ago. I have a disdain for most "universes" that feature magic and fantasy elements, so I originally rented Two Towers to watch the battle sequence at Helm's Deep (which, if I remember correctly, I had read in a review that characterized it as one of the greatest ever captured on film). I cared little for the characters or the story.

Jumping into Two Towers didn't make empathyzing with the characters easy, especially since I had missed their introductions in The Fellowship of the Ring. However, after watching Return of the King, I really began to dig the story, so I decided to eventually (which is now) watch The Fellowship of the Ring.

Two Towers and Return of the King were (naturally) much more enjoyable now that I had seen The Fellowship of the Ring. When I saw Return of the King before the Fellowship, I wasn't familiar with the roles and importance of Boromir and Aroyn....Arryi...Ar...Liv Tyler's character.

I still have a disdain for fantasy movies that go crazy with magic and elves, but I have to say, after seeing the Lord of the Rings in its entirety, I believe I may like it better than either Star Wars trilogy. Crazyness.
 
Plankeye said:
Granted, FoTR has to start the story out, but being chased by ring wraiths, fighting ring wraiths, troll fight, 60 foot flaming demon, Gandalf dying and fighting Uraki. Boring stuff?
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Ok, so one fifth of the movie is covered. Maybe one fourth.:confused:
 
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