I'm Curious...

[dipsas]

The Two Towers was on TV here last night. I couldn't help but watch parts of it. The first time I saw this movie was in the theatre, and I loved it, not because I thought it was perfect rendering of the books (which it certainly wasn't) but because it was quite a powerful experience to see how others had visualised at least parts of a story and a

Comments

[ashavah]

I can only think of one example of me actually doing that, that being Troy vs the Iliad, and I found it really intellectually stimulating. I really enjoyed exploring the differences between the two and trying to nut out why changes were made. Not only that, but I still enjoy the movie despite all the changes (and the subsequent disdain of many of my classmates! ;-D).

[dipsas]

Troy is another good example of the same thing - though I bet a lot more people get stuck trying to get through the ships' catalogue than Tolkien's preface... (I liked the movie Troy too, though I thought killing Agamemnon was a bit over the top. And even if one's a classical purist - what Classical literature would there be if we rejected rewrites and different angles on Homer's material? We would have to toss out most of both Vergil and Ovid, for one thing.

[ashavah]

Exactly. I can understand why they made most of the changes. (I have a theory that most of the major changes that were made were ways of getting Hector out of nasty situations without the intervention of the gods e.g. Ajax is killed because that was the only way to get Hector out of that duel without him being whisked away by a god or losing his honour.)

And yeah ... that darn ship catalogue! I only made it through because I had to read it for class. ;-)

[maple_clef]

I think the only thing I've ever read after having seen the film adaptation was The Shawshank Redemption; in that case, I was glad to have seen the film first, as the ending had much more of an OH! so that's what he was up to! impact. But I appreciated the novella too for fleshing out certain aspects of the story and characters

[dipsas]

I think that anyone who reads LOTR having seen the film is likely to have got round to doing so eventually regardless of whether or not the film had ever existed...

That's probably true. If we generalise a little (I do realise there will be exceptions and that this is somewhat snarky) someone who's only intrested in the fast pace and the action isn't likely to go looking for more of it in a book that thick and that peculiar - they'll wait for the sequel, or the extended extended dvd version; someone who's drawn into Tolkien's world via the movies but for its imagination will probably be more tempted by the stacks of LotR editions in their bookstore. And like you say - would have been so anyway.

[agatha_s]

I'd been a fan of The Lord of the Rings for a long, long time before the movies, but The Two Towers was my least favourite part of the novel: I always desperately wanted to read about Frodo and Sam and I would go through the part about the other half of the Fellowship very quickly. The movie made me care about what was happening to them. The battle of Helm's Deep had been a completely unimportant part of the book to me, and in the movie it was a terrifying, memorable scene. The only thing I didn't like was the scene with Legolas on a "skateboard." It was embarassingly silly.

I've noticed that many people who saw the LOTR movies first and then read the book hate Tom Bombadil because they see him, in a way, as an intruder.

The only book I can remember reading after watching a film version is Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice: I read it after watching a few episodes of the BBC series and it felt exciting to revisit the familiar scenes, but with the ability to see into Lizzie Bennett's mind.

[dipsas]

...but The Two Towers was my least favourite part of the novel: I always desperately wanted to read about Frodo and Sam and I would go through the part about the other half of the Fellowship very quickly.

Ooooh, that's exactly the way I read the books until I was well into highschool - and I was first introduced to them at the tender age of seven or six. Discovering the magic of those parts I had more or less skipped through before, that's still one of the most dramatic reading experiences I've had.

[privatemaladict]

I often felt the same way in the books - I always wanted to get to Sam and Frodo as quickly as possible. On later readings, I started to enjoy the other bits more, but I'm still much more interested in what happens to Frodo and Sam.

And I have to say, the Tom Bombadil bit annoyed me all along. It seemed to just slow the book down - and Tom himself irritated me. You'd think someone who's been alive since the beginning of time would write better poetry!

[privatemaladict]

I, like you, read the books before the movie and I agree with you about "The Two Towers". I still really enjoyed it, but a lot of the changes really irritated me. I thought it was the weakest of the three movies. In the others, most of the changes made sense in terms of going from book to movie, and didn't annoy me. But in this one, the changes seemed rather pointless (don't even get me started on what they did to Faramir!) Still, I love the trilogy. All in all Jackson did a great job - we can't expect him to be perfect all the time!

[dipsas]

...In the others, most of the changes made sense in terms of going from book to movie, and didn't annoy me. But in this one, the changes seemed rather pointless...

Hmmm - I've never thought of it like that before, but it may very well be that you've got a point. I liked the second one better than the first because it has many of those things that Jackson does really well - like the battle scenes. The orcs welling out from Isengard, like a black flood stretching over the landscape; now that's good stuff. :)

[privatemaladict]

Yeah, that was pretty awesome... I think I preferred the first one because it has so many of the really beautiful scenes - the loveliness of the Shire, and Lothlorien, and Gandalf "dying" and the journey on the river... There's also that little bit with Gandalf that wasn't in the book, when the moth comes to him while he's on the tower - of all the "additional" things Jackson put in, that one's my favourite. The battle of Helm's Deep was pretty damn awesome though - I found that bit kinda dull in the book, I just don't find battles all that interesting. But in the movie it was breathtaking.

Let's face it, whatever the flaws in the trilogy, Jackson did one helluva fantstic job.

I think I want to watch the triolgy again now. :)

[kit_the_brave]

Boy, I don't think I've ever seen a movie first and then read the book. If there is a book version of something, I always manage to find the book first. :)

I really like the books and the movies, but I almost don't think of them as the same story. I think of the movies as more of an homage to the books.

Oh, and I take it back - I read Tolkein's short piece about Aragorn's eventual death after I saw the movies, and I thought what? Arwen does not come off well at all. :(

[dipsas]

I think of the movies as more of an homage to the books.

Mmm, I agree; that's a good way of putting it. And it's amazing how everything looks the way one's imagined from the books.