Long live the King
Return of the King review. For the purposes of this post, I'm gonna put on my One Ring. To read it, you should put on your own One Ring... or you can just click and drag over the "blank" text area. If you happen to get stabbed by a Mordor blade while doing this, I'm afraid you're on your own.
(Copyright Notice: "One Ring" invisible posting (TM Cal)
In short, I liked ROTK better than The Two Towers, but I have yet to decide whether I preferred it over Fellowship of the Ring.
Since anyone can go to Rotten Tomatoes for professional reviews, I'll just give some overall impressions of my entire ROTK experience.
We (JT, Joy, Hanlin, and Drew) showed up at Mercado 20 for the 12:01 am showing. I got there first, at around 9:45 pm, and noticed that there was no line for our theater (13), and soon found out that because our tickets had been bought that day rather than well in advance, we were in the "slacker" theaters - slightly smaller screen, fewer people - but, the unexpected bonus was that we didn't have to wait outside in the cold for an hour. So, we went inside, scoped out some nice seats just the right distance away, and just hung out for 2 hours. Played some cards, made comments on the various advertisements (for some reason there was a lot of laughter at the "Relationship Place" website billboard), noted Switchfoot's "Meant to Live" being played on the theater speakers, took power naps, and ate loads of dried mangoes and some high quality chocolate truffles that Hanlin got from his boss. Finally, the movie started...
The good
- mostly very accurate compared to the text. I re-read the novel the week and a half before the movie got released, so most of the details were fairly fresh in my mind. Generally speaking, most of the non-accurate stuff in the movie were problems of omission rather than of commission, where Peter Jackson et al. decided to leave out some parts in order to make the movie a bit more streamlined. I'll comment on those parts in "The missing".
- I tend to be impressed with attention to little details. For example, in TTT, in the section where Eomer's company demolishes the Uruk-hai who took Merry and Pippin prisoner, there's a shot of one of the Rohirrim turning backwards on his horse and shooting an arrow through an orc. I believe that this was a very difficult feat of combat back in the day. The Helm's Deep siege weapons with the metal hooks on the sides to "latch" onto the walls, the shield barrier the orcs put up to block the battering ram in TTT, great attention to detail. ROTK was no different - I was impressed with simple things like Gandalf riding his horse up stairs, which really isn't easy. Also stuff like the psychological impact of a frightful fire-breathing battering ram, and the catapults used by each side (one troll-driven, the other using inertia and a huge sling).
- the stuff that was changed from the book was generally okay. Didn't mind the addition of the Gollum-trying-to-introduce-discord-between-Frodo-and-Sam, or the moving of the sword-forging to this movie - made sense in context.
- lots of Gandalf. He got shortchanged in TTT.
- I'll buck the trend of people picking Sam as their favorite character in this movie to throw my support behind King Theoden. I loved the way he could glance at the battlefield, then give directions to his lieutenants about how to divide their troops. I got inspired by the speech, and chills when he ran down the line clanging each spearhead with his sword. I admired the way he was able to muster morale even with the line of oliphaunts bearing down on them. I empathized with the look of resignation and disgust he had on his face right before he got taken down by the Witch-King and his dragon. What a great character.
Scenes
- Chilling: Smeagol's transformation into Gollum (love that catfish sashimi!), Shelob crawling on the rocks over an unsuspecting Frodo, Shelob smoothly webbing Frodo's stunned body in midair, catapults of Gondorian heads being shot into Minas Tirith, Nazgul dragons snatching helpless soldiers and dropping them
- Grandiose: initial look at Minas Tirith (blows Edoras out of the water, in my opinion), signal bonfire chain, field full of 6000 Rohirrim, oliphaunts in combat (shades of "The Empire Strikes Back" and the AT-ATs on Hoth)
- Cool: Oliphaunts/mumakil in battle, stomping horses (did anyone else feel sorry for the horses? Stomp on men all you want, but leave the horses alone!), Legolas taking down a mumakil single-handedly (at first I thought he had unrealistic Spiderman-like powers to cling to moving objects, but later people told me he was hanging onto arrows)
- Heartwrenching: Denethor stuffing his face while his only remaining son rides to apparent death, Sam's face when he sees Frodo succumb to the seductive power of the Ring, Frodo's parting from the other Hobbits to journey to the Grey Havens. Side note: apparently Billy Boyd (Pippin) wrote and sang the song himself during the Denethor/Faramir scene.
- Heartswelling: Sam's proclamation and subsequent carrying of Frodo up the side of Mount Doom, Theoden's speech, the battle-cry and charge of the Rohirrim into the orcs, the Eagles arriving to tangle with the diving Nazgul, "My friends... you bow to no one."
The could-be-better
- although it doesn't really show up in the book... how come Gandalf doesn't use any magic aside from the flashlight to drive away the marauding Nazgul? I kept waiting for a fireball. In The Hobbit, Gandalf appears to use lightning.
- Viggo Mortensen plays a better Ranger than a King. His voice and general presence didn't seem commanding enough when he was making his speech outside Mordor. Also, he just doesn't look regal enough when he's all cleaned up at the crowning ceremony - his hair's too neat. He pulls off gritty backwoods warrior well, though. On the other hand, Gandalf pulls off both majestic and gritty well, and I think Sean Bean as Boromir also had a very regal presence.
- Legolas looks like a woman at the crowning ceremony. I'm serious. It was disturbing.
- hm, not much else that's not covered in "the missing".
The missing
- Saruman was completely cut out. I knew this going in, but it was still disappointing. When the crew rides up to Isengard, Gandalf is supposed to have his showdown with Saruman where he denounces him as a Wizard and breaks his staff. For those that haven't read the books, the basic gist is that wizards are a different class of beings that are "sent" to Middle-Earth for specific purposes, and Saruman, by deciding to seize power for himself, has betrayed his purpose as the White Wizard, which is why Gandalf is sent back as the new White Wizard. As for his eventual taking over of the Shire and death, I'm relatively ambivalent about that ever being committed to screen... after he gets taken down at Isengard, the events of the scouring of the Shire are relatively irrelevant to the main movie plot of the Ring.
- Lots of supporting characters get cut out, which is understandable due to the immense number of people to keep track of already. Still, it would have been cool to see people like Prince Imrahil, Elladan and Elrohir (the sons of Elrond), Halbarad and the other Dunedain rangers, etc.
- The Mouth of Sauron isn't shown, but he is cast, so he'll probably show up in the Extended Edition.
- Faramir and Eowyn's romance in the House of Healing... I'm not sure how that will fit into the scope of the movie, even though it will probably show up in the Extended Edition. They do seem to kind of fall off the face of the (middle) earth though.
- Eomer doesn't do much. Hopefully this'll be recitifed in the Extended Edition. There was even a scene in the trailer of him holding his dead uncle's head on the battlefield and crying, but it didn't show up in the theatrical cut.
I'll post more thoughts if I have them later, but those are some to start. Comment away!
Return of the King review. For the purposes of this post, I'm gonna put on my One Ring. To read it, you should put on your own One Ring... or you can just click and drag over the "blank" text area. If you happen to get stabbed by a Mordor blade while doing this, I'm afraid you're on your own.
(Copyright Notice: "One Ring" invisible posting (TM Cal)
In short, I liked ROTK better than The Two Towers, but I have yet to decide whether I preferred it over Fellowship of the Ring.
Since anyone can go to Rotten Tomatoes for professional reviews, I'll just give some overall impressions of my entire ROTK experience.
We (JT, Joy, Hanlin, and Drew) showed up at Mercado 20 for the 12:01 am showing. I got there first, at around 9:45 pm, and noticed that there was no line for our theater (13), and soon found out that because our tickets had been bought that day rather than well in advance, we were in the "slacker" theaters - slightly smaller screen, fewer people - but, the unexpected bonus was that we didn't have to wait outside in the cold for an hour. So, we went inside, scoped out some nice seats just the right distance away, and just hung out for 2 hours. Played some cards, made comments on the various advertisements (for some reason there was a lot of laughter at the "Relationship Place" website billboard), noted Switchfoot's "Meant to Live" being played on the theater speakers, took power naps, and ate loads of dried mangoes and some high quality chocolate truffles that Hanlin got from his boss. Finally, the movie started...
The good
- mostly very accurate compared to the text. I re-read the novel the week and a half before the movie got released, so most of the details were fairly fresh in my mind. Generally speaking, most of the non-accurate stuff in the movie were problems of omission rather than of commission, where Peter Jackson et al. decided to leave out some parts in order to make the movie a bit more streamlined. I'll comment on those parts in "The missing".
- I tend to be impressed with attention to little details. For example, in TTT, in the section where Eomer's company demolishes the Uruk-hai who took Merry and Pippin prisoner, there's a shot of one of the Rohirrim turning backwards on his horse and shooting an arrow through an orc. I believe that this was a very difficult feat of combat back in the day. The Helm's Deep siege weapons with the metal hooks on the sides to "latch" onto the walls, the shield barrier the orcs put up to block the battering ram in TTT, great attention to detail. ROTK was no different - I was impressed with simple things like Gandalf riding his horse up stairs, which really isn't easy. Also stuff like the psychological impact of a frightful fire-breathing battering ram, and the catapults used by each side (one troll-driven, the other using inertia and a huge sling).
- the stuff that was changed from the book was generally okay. Didn't mind the addition of the Gollum-trying-to-introduce-discord-between-Frodo-and-Sam, or the moving of the sword-forging to this movie - made sense in context.
- lots of Gandalf. He got shortchanged in TTT.
- I'll buck the trend of people picking Sam as their favorite character in this movie to throw my support behind King Theoden. I loved the way he could glance at the battlefield, then give directions to his lieutenants about how to divide their troops. I got inspired by the speech, and chills when he ran down the line clanging each spearhead with his sword. I admired the way he was able to muster morale even with the line of oliphaunts bearing down on them. I empathized with the look of resignation and disgust he had on his face right before he got taken down by the Witch-King and his dragon. What a great character.
Scenes
- Chilling: Smeagol's transformation into Gollum (love that catfish sashimi!), Shelob crawling on the rocks over an unsuspecting Frodo, Shelob smoothly webbing Frodo's stunned body in midair, catapults of Gondorian heads being shot into Minas Tirith, Nazgul dragons snatching helpless soldiers and dropping them
- Grandiose: initial look at Minas Tirith (blows Edoras out of the water, in my opinion), signal bonfire chain, field full of 6000 Rohirrim, oliphaunts in combat (shades of "The Empire Strikes Back" and the AT-ATs on Hoth)
- Cool: Oliphaunts/mumakil in battle, stomping horses (did anyone else feel sorry for the horses? Stomp on men all you want, but leave the horses alone!), Legolas taking down a mumakil single-handedly (at first I thought he had unrealistic Spiderman-like powers to cling to moving objects, but later people told me he was hanging onto arrows)
- Heartwrenching: Denethor stuffing his face while his only remaining son rides to apparent death, Sam's face when he sees Frodo succumb to the seductive power of the Ring, Frodo's parting from the other Hobbits to journey to the Grey Havens. Side note: apparently Billy Boyd (Pippin) wrote and sang the song himself during the Denethor/Faramir scene.
- Heartswelling: Sam's proclamation and subsequent carrying of Frodo up the side of Mount Doom, Theoden's speech, the battle-cry and charge of the Rohirrim into the orcs, the Eagles arriving to tangle with the diving Nazgul, "My friends... you bow to no one."
The could-be-better
- although it doesn't really show up in the book... how come Gandalf doesn't use any magic aside from the flashlight to drive away the marauding Nazgul? I kept waiting for a fireball. In The Hobbit, Gandalf appears to use lightning.
- Viggo Mortensen plays a better Ranger than a King. His voice and general presence didn't seem commanding enough when he was making his speech outside Mordor. Also, he just doesn't look regal enough when he's all cleaned up at the crowning ceremony - his hair's too neat. He pulls off gritty backwoods warrior well, though. On the other hand, Gandalf pulls off both majestic and gritty well, and I think Sean Bean as Boromir also had a very regal presence.
- Legolas looks like a woman at the crowning ceremony. I'm serious. It was disturbing.
- hm, not much else that's not covered in "the missing".
The missing
- Saruman was completely cut out. I knew this going in, but it was still disappointing. When the crew rides up to Isengard, Gandalf is supposed to have his showdown with Saruman where he denounces him as a Wizard and breaks his staff. For those that haven't read the books, the basic gist is that wizards are a different class of beings that are "sent" to Middle-Earth for specific purposes, and Saruman, by deciding to seize power for himself, has betrayed his purpose as the White Wizard, which is why Gandalf is sent back as the new White Wizard. As for his eventual taking over of the Shire and death, I'm relatively ambivalent about that ever being committed to screen... after he gets taken down at Isengard, the events of the scouring of the Shire are relatively irrelevant to the main movie plot of the Ring.
- Lots of supporting characters get cut out, which is understandable due to the immense number of people to keep track of already. Still, it would have been cool to see people like Prince Imrahil, Elladan and Elrohir (the sons of Elrond), Halbarad and the other Dunedain rangers, etc.
- The Mouth of Sauron isn't shown, but he is cast, so he'll probably show up in the Extended Edition.
- Faramir and Eowyn's romance in the House of Healing... I'm not sure how that will fit into the scope of the movie, even though it will probably show up in the Extended Edition. They do seem to kind of fall off the face of the (middle) earth though.
- Eomer doesn't do much. Hopefully this'll be recitifed in the Extended Edition. There was even a scene in the trailer of him holding his dead uncle's head on the battlefield and crying, but it didn't show up in the theatrical cut.
I'll post more thoughts if I have them later, but those are some to start. Comment away!
posted by Bob at
6:48 PM
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