Frodo: Please, what does it always mean, this... this "Aragorn"?
Elrond: That's his name. Aragorn, son of Arathorn.
Aragorn: I like "Strider."
Elrond: We named the *dog* "Strider".
A discussion of Lord of the Rings - The Return of the King. If you're a pervy hobbit fancier, this is the place for you.
*goes to the Appendices*
Faramir is thirty-four when we meet him, and was born three years after Aragorn left Gondor.
Having seen RotK twice now, I feel I can say confidently that I would've been just as happy without about twenty minutes of battle scene. I was thinking about the Scouring, and how while I realize why it was left out I miss the insight it gave us into post-Mordor Frodo, and then I thought "but then I would've had to watch another battle scene" and absolutely quailed.
I also gained some sympathy for whoever it was - Nutty? - who said they were rooting for the much-more-sensible orcs. I definitely noticed more this time that the defenders of Minas Tirith were, er, not so bright. (And Denethor's guards are the worst guards ever. "Hey, it's a guy on a horse with a random short dude with him! That's cool.")
I just figured the guards recognized Gandalf--he had been to the city not too long before, searching for information about the Ring.
You know, I like the battle scenes in ROTK much more than I like Helm's Deep, which is the really interminable one for me. Sure, I could cut some of the Pelennor Fields without difficulty, but given the chance, I'd halve Helm's Deep and then halve it again. Or, alternatively, just use it as my pee-break time. I like the different levels of the Pelennor Fields battle: the orcs on the ground, the Rohirrim on horses, the Nazgul swooping over the city, the giant flaming battering ram, the army of green dead dudes arriving on the ships (though I wish their arrival didn't come right in the middle of the Eowyn vs. the Witch-King scene), the Oliphaunts trampling everything in their path. I especially like how the green dead dudes just totally clean up once they arrive, sweeping over the city like magic scrubbing bubbles.
I ended up feeling like it was one big battle scene with the occasional cutaway to have Pippin make the point that War Sucks or because Oh Right, We Need A Frodo And Sam Update. I am very much looking forward to the EE, where I hopefully will be able to stop feeling like everything but the battle scenes was kind of shortchanged.
I mean, they were good battle scenes. Just... enough. I got the point.
I especially like how the green dead dudes just totally clean up once they arrive, sweeping over the city like magic scrubbing bubbles.
Heh - I noticed that in my second viewing. Yeah, that *was* good.
I am the very model of a (memfault) Numenorean. (Thanks to Nutty, I'm almost 100% sure.)
"Third-Age," and wasn't it Jessimoon?
Thank you! Yes, and yes.
Maybe it's because I've seen TTT many more times than RotK, and lots of behind the scenes clips of the filming of Helm's Deep, so it's almost like a large choreographed dance for me now. RotK seems much more scattered. More viewing and extras needed, obviously.
I'm Gandalf and his shirking of responsbility-which since I just took over a directing job doesn't seem entirely fair.
Ted's a shirking shirker.
Pass it on...
A Lord of the Rings drinking game. (Also check out her review of RotK and also Cold Mountain, which makes continual comparisons to RotK.)
Ted's a shirking shirker. Pass it on...
I was going to, but it was too much responsbility.
Oh frell, are we still white-fonting?
But mostly, the problem is this: I've seen Samwise Gamgee carrying Frodo Baggins up the slopes of Mount Doom. I've seen Faramir, captain of Gondor, ride to what he believes will be his death merely to earn the love of his father. I've seen Peregrin Took leap onto a burning pyre to save a dying man he doesn't know in repayment for a debt owed that man's dead brother. I've seen an entire world shrink into molecules of fading hope and acts of selfless love. After that, how can the troubles of one Confederate soldier and one Southern belle amount to even a hill of beans in this crazy world? Nothing they can say could upset me.
Now I'm really mixing my movie-geek metaphors. Does it make me a completely irredeemable nerd that The Princess Bride helps me explain why The Lord of the Rings makes me unable to get worked up by Cold Mountain? Does it make me irredeemably "biast"? I know neither of these things is a newsflash. I'm sorry that I cannot be more objective, but I only know how to tell you how a movie makes me feel. And as prejudiced as the reasons may be, I couldn't feel a lot for Cold Mountain.
Well said.
