March 27, 2002

Fellowship Should Have Won Best Screenplay
Richard P.

OK, there is no way that Fellowship should have won best adapted screenplay.... for the simple reason that it isn't. OK, so the general feeling and story were brought accross, but in the end, the script as compared to the book... well!!! One of my friends was inspired to read the book and then moaned at me about how little like the book the film was, thats not really good adaption is it??? What Peter Jackson did was to take the basis of Tolkien's story, and present that, much of the detail simply was not there... now you can point to all the little additions of history into the film, but hardly any of them make sense to someone who has not read the book (for instance Aragorn's random comment, "This was once the watch tower of Amon Sul"; what does that mean to the uninitiated???).

The whole idea of a good adapted screenplay is that you don't have to have read the books to know the whole story....... or at least, that is my perception of a good adapted screenplay. Fellowship was not that....... it was an amazing film, it inspired people to go out and read Lord of the Rings, but in essence that is the oposite of what a good screenplay should do..... how many went out and bought Jurassic Park after wathcing the film???

Don't get me wrong... Peter Jackson should have got Best Director, and Fellowship should have won best film (and Sean Bean should have been in Best Supporting Actor but never mind)... but best adapted screen play???

No way, and I'm glad it didn't get it.