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The LOTR Movie Site
March 15, 2000

About the Movie ... and Most Movies in General
Steve Davis

I've been devoting a bit more thought to the main purpose of this movie.  Although all of us die-hard Tolkien fans would want this movie to be a full representation of all of the Lord of the Rings in its 30 hour glory, this obviously isn't going to happen. Various changes sound as though they are being made, or are seriously being considered, that would depart seriously from Tolkien's idea. In fact, it would be impossible to cram all of the action in LOTR into a four hour movie...obviously, some parts must be cut. If they're cut, then it's not true LOTR anymore, but a good representation of it, or a very good movie based on it.

For this movie looks VERY good. It will definitely be a big financial success. (If it doesn't, I'm leaving America and moving to New Zealand, and living in the abandoned Helm's Deep set. ;-) ) However, will it be a 'Tolkien' success? That is, will it inspire more people to go out and read the Lord of the Rings? Will they think..."Man, that was a good movie....I bet there's lots of stuff in the book that got left out of the movie...wonder if Tolkien wrote any other books?"...and head out to get their own copy of LOTR? If so, then this movie is a whopping success, almost no matter what they do to the characters. (But please, change them as little as possible.) Or will viewers say "Wow, neat movie. Now I don't have to read the book." That would be a shame, if it wasn't a very accurate represtentation of the movie. (Maybe at some point Gandalf needs to wave a copy of Lord of the Rings around and say "We want YOU to read this!") So....that will be the true definition of the movies success.....picture the viewers holding a LOTR book in their hands, saying "To read, or not to read?"