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| TolkienMovies.com Review of The Two Towers So. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, is finally here. In a sentence, I guess I was dissapointed a little, but having seen it twice I liked it much better the second time around. I guess it is the hype that builds up in one's own head, to the point where one expects it to be just SOOOO GOOOOD that it defies reality, so naturally one will be dissapointed if it's anything short of that. And I guess the most enjoyment I will EVER have out of these Movies, is the time when I first saw the very first Teaser on the Internet, after my initial thrill at learning that someone is making a motion picture of LOTR (which, coincedentally, was a couple of years ago and started my daily routine of visiting TOLKIEN MOVIES). Seeing Sam and Frodo, and the Ringwraiths, and a quick shot of Aragorn - my mind was racing. It really opened up the imagination and put the hype in 'hype'. These movies are not the books. These movies can never be the books. Infact, I think it really IS impossible to make LOTR into a movie, as much as I would like it. The magic, the feel, the atmosphere - it just isn't there. BUT (and this is a big but), these are TRULY AWESOME MOVIES in their own right. And I guess the bottom line is that someone who is as intimate in Tolkien's writing as I am can never really enjoy these movies to the full. However, like I said, Peter Jackson has still done a marvelous job, and there is something here for everyone, for the Purists and the Ignorants, and those in-between (like me). There are a lot of small (and some big) changes to the story, and the characters, that really put it down in my estimation, but the good things about TTT make them of little significance. Like every scene with Gollum, or the Balrog battle, or even Helm's Deep to an extent (again, the hype in my head over-shadowed this otherwise awesome spectacle). Here is a rundown of the things that I, personally, was not happy with: - Theoden. I had always pictured him as an old man, even after he is 'cured'. Like Gandalf. Here he turns out to be no more than a middle aged man. The look of a character is just as important as what they say or do. - The pace. It 'flows along nicely', or it is said everywhere else, but to me it just seems plain rushed. The Extended Version should smooth it out a bit, but as with FELLOWSHIP, it will not fully correct the rushed feeling (everything in the book cannot be included in the movies, but in my estimation they could have added a lot more. To me, LOTR is also about reflection, contemplation, the little details, and just sheer sitting back and enjoying the wonder of this alternate universe in it's own right without the fast gripping storylines, that tend to be more prominent here. A finer balance would have made the movies better, with the added bonus of making them 'feel' like books, if ya know what I mean). - The story of the Ents. I missed Treebeard and the other Ents having a proper 'Entmoot' in that large dipped circle of land surrounded by trees. I missed the hobbits hanging out with Quickbeam. I missed the rousing of the Ents, and the long march to Isengard, in the dusk, and the smoke of Isengard trailing into the heavens in the distance. See what I mean? Here we are just treated to several minor scenes of Treebeard practically just walking around Fangorn with the hobbits on his shoulder. There were several other things I was unhappy with, but it all boils down to one thing. Time constraints, the biggest problem faced by Peter Jackson in transferring Tolkien to the screen. And that is what I am REALLY not happy with. By that I mean MORE MOVIES, then we would have been closer to the real LOTR's story. Six Two and a half hour movies would have been ideal. Peter Jackson should have been allowed to have more time. New Line should have granted that. And PJ, some of the changes and alterations were necessary, but not all of them. If those qualms were addressed, we would have had a much better series of films. |
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