^But remember that in Tolkien's time, one of the reasons for changing the story would have been the difficulty of representing some of it onscreen due to limitations in special effects. Although I suppose animated films wouldn't have had that problem.
Yeah that is why all the movies were animated but he also sighted the basic structure of the story and the fact that Arogon's love story wasn't part of the main structure of the book as a reason he didn't think it would work okay. So it sounds like to me he understood that novels and films are different and he pitied anyone who would have to make the changes needed to make it work as a film.
Now I love both for different reasons and I don't think there is anything wrong with that. I also like the movie Dune as well as the book so maybe I am just weird. Still as someone who has seen the movies I think I have a right to say I enjoyed them from start to finish.
Suffering from the same problems, yes. As bad? Nowhere near.
“What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one.”
Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death
I've finally seen the last Hobbit movie today. In watching the first movie, I couldn't help think of the prequels. The feeling of disappointment was familiar. The second continued the trend. The two trilogies don't share all the same problems, but it was so disappointing to see some of the prequel's defects pop up here: the sudden heavier reliance on CGI, the stilted romance, heavy-handed silliness, the way some concepts felt like poor copies meant to echo (or "rhyme") what we saw in LOTR. I thought the third was the best of them, though even that makes me cringe in recalling how ROTS was favored for its heavy action...which maybe does paper over many failings. I think the biggest similarity is in how far the movies fall below the expectations of many fans of the original trilogies. The best thing, as others have said, is how much material there is to work with now for edits.
The blue elephant in the room.
That's why I had a sinking feeling for a lot of part three: so much of the stuff I didn't like was integral to the story. Stuff like Bard's son acting as his bow, Thorin dying on ice away from the rest of the action after a drag out fight with Bolg Azog, etc. I was feeling pretty good after part one which had most of its junk fairly segregated from the good/important parts.
Hal 9000 said:
That's why I had a sinking feeling for a lot of part three: so much of the stuff I didn't like was integral to the story. Stuff like Bard's son acting as his bow, Thorin dying on ice away from the rest of the action after a drag out fight with Bolg Azog, etc. I was feeling pretty good after part one which had most of its junk fairly segregated from the good/important parts.
How the heck did that work?
RicOlie_2 said:
Hal 9000 said:
That's why I had a sinking feeling for a lot of part three: so much of the stuff I didn't like was integral to the story. Stuff like Bard's son acting as his bow, Thorin dying on ice away from the rest of the action after a drag out fight with Bolg Azog, etc. I was feeling pretty good after part one which had most of its junk fairly segregated from the good/important parts.
How the heck did that work?
He set the arrow on the kid's shoulders and then launched it at Smaug from there. It was a little less goofy on screen.
I’m just here because I’m driving tonight.
Tack said:
RicOlie_2 said:
Hal 9000 said:
That's why I had a sinking feeling for a lot of part three: so much of the stuff I didn't like was integral to the story. Stuff like Bard's son acting as his bow, Thorin dying on ice away from the rest of the action after a drag out fight with Bolg Azog, etc. I was feeling pretty good after part one which had most of its junk fairly segregated from the good/important parts.
How the heck did that work?
He set the arrow on the kid's shoulders and then launched it at Smaug from there. It was a little less goofy on screen.
I really liked that part, despite its goofiness. And though the fight between Thorin and Azog is painfully bossfight-ish, there may be a way to get rid of Azog completely from the movie: The movie could be from the point of view of Bilbo, who gets knocked out during the battle and misses the fight. He recovers afterwards and finds Thorin dying on the battlefield. It's more similar to the book in that way.
You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)
Tack said:
It was even goofier on screen.
FTFY.
Ceci n’est pas une signature.
NeverarGreat said:
It's more similar to the book in that way.
I'll never understand why people insist on trying to make a movie more like a book. It's a movie.
Shut up Fink...you're not funny...but you are a dim witted fool...
Well that came out of nowhere...
Who the heck is Fink?
Where were you in '77?
SilverWook said:
Who the heck is Fink?
Frank your Majesty said:
Tack said:
It was a little less goofy onscreen.
FTFY.
I meant what I said, your Majesty.
I’m just here because I’m driving tonight.
Well, I think, when you described it, it didn't sound as goofy as it turned out to be in the movie. The fletching would have decapitated his son and there's no way to ram the broken bow this far into the wood that it would withstand the enormous pulling force. It was just very very silly.
Ceci n’est pas une signature.
Here's a nice Video Essay about the Hobbit Trilogy:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?x-yt-ts=1422503916&x-yt-cl=85027636&v=paIZIitI8iY#t=42
Rogue One is redundant. Just play the first mission of DARK FORCES.
The hallmark of a corrupt leader: Being surrounded by yes men.
‘The best visual effects in the world will not compensate for a story told badly.’ - V.E.S.
‘Star Wars is a buffet, enjoy the stuff you want, and leave the rest.’ - SilverWook
It might be, but I don't chase down videos that people post here without spending two seconds to fix the link first.
GOOD DAY SIR
NeverarGreat said:
The movie could be from the point of view of Bilbo, who gets knocked out during the battle and misses the fight. He recovers afterwards and finds Thorin dying on the battlefield. It's more similar to the book in that way.
Some of the less-than-legal one film edits floating around have gone this route, and it simply doesn't work. The main character getting knocked out and missing a huge chunk of climax might work in a book (though I'd argue it doesn't) but in a film it's hugely deflating. Especially when it's the climax of so much story. I'm all for being true to the book, but this is one of the few instances where the changes were an improvement. The fight is a bit overblown but at least it was something.
Imagine if Aragorn got knocked out during Helm's Deep, then he wakes up and Gandalf is like "Oh you missed it, we saved you."? Or that episode of Game of Thrones Season 1 where they did this exact thing with Tyrion?
SpenceEdit said:
NeverarGreat said:
The movie could be from the point of view of Bilbo, who gets knocked out during the battle and misses the fight. He recovers afterwards and finds Thorin dying on the battlefield. It's more similar to the book in that way.
Some of the less-than-legal one film edits floating around have gone this route, and it simply doesn't work. The main character getting knocked out and missing a huge chunk of climax might work in a book (though I'd argue it doesn't) but in a film it's hugely deflating. Especially when it's the climax of so much story. I'm all for being true to the book, but this is one of the few instances where the changes were an improvement. The fight is a bit overblown but at least it was something.
Imagine if Aragorn got knocked out during Helm's Deep, then he wakes up and Gandalf is like "Oh you missed it, we saved you."? Or that episode of Game of Thrones Season 1 where they did this exact thing with Tyrion?
I thought the Tyrion episode was a clever way of avoiding an expensive battle scene, and I didn't think it was deflating at all. The point of such a thing would be to refocus the story on a single character, so if it feels deflating to miss the battle, that is only because there has been too much emphasis on battles and secondary characters already.
You probably don’t recognize me because of the red arm.
Episode 9 Rewrite, The Starlight Project (Released!) and ANH Technicolor Project (Released!)
NeverarGreat said:
I thought the Tyrion episode was a clever way of avoiding an expensive battle scene, and I didn't think it was deflating at all. The point of such a thing would be to refocus the story on a single character, so if it feels deflating to miss the battle, that is only because there has been too much emphasis on battles and secondary characters already.
I can see your point in the GoT example. It did save their budget, and it did focus down on Tyrion. That battle, however, didn't have many other characters to be concerned with. The reveal that Tyrion survived and that Robb had taken Jamie prisoner is more important, character wise, than what happens in the battle itself.
In The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings in general, the secondary characters are part of what makes the movies so great. To have Fili and Kili die off screen, to not see Thorin fall, or to miss Bard and Thandruill working together to push the Orcs out of the city just wouldn't feel right. Those are important character moments. I do think that any fanedit of The Hobbit needs to work harder to push Bilbo to the forefront, but I don't think those secondary characters can lose the end of their arcs in order to do so.
This is apparently new?
http://www.theverge.com/2015/11/19/9764016/peter-jackson-the-hobbit-movies-terrible-explanation
The blue elephant in the room.
I was watching that video the other day. Interesting stuff.
Of course I’m now blanking on what the official reason given back in late 2012 was to do three movies instead of two. I want to say the reasoning was simply “why the hell not do three instead of just two?”
At least, that’s how I recall it.
21 hour days? Jesus. A sobering thing for wannabe filmmakers who think they’d have a “fun” job. Now, the $25,000 question: wait for the big six film boxed set that might FINALLY retain the damn theatrical extras, or buy the two boxed sets of the EEs and just be satisfied? Hmmm…
“What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one.”
Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death
Sorry to bump a fairly old thread, but I think that the prequels and The Hobbit are very different in terms of quality. For one thing, the acting in The Hobbit was fantastic, particularly Martin Freeman as Bilbo, who I think is perfect casting. The acting in the prequels, well, you can’t even call it that, it seems as if George Lucas told them to be as wooden as possible with dialogue, only letting them act when they aren’t even speaking. The CGI in The Hobbit is also pretty good, albeit a little cartoony, but far better than the visuals in AOTC and ROTS (I actually feel that the effects in TPM mostly hold up, for the time). The characters are also very fun, especially in An Unexpected Journey, which is by far my favourite of the three. The action scenes are pretty great as well, apart from anything involving Legolas. All in all, while I don’t really like Desolation of Smaug or Battle of the Five Armies, they are far better than even Phantom Menace (which I feel is a good, not great film, trapped inside a mediocre one) and if I were to rate all of them, it would go like this:
An Unexpected Journey: 3.5/4
The Desolation of Smaug: 2.5/4
The Battle of the Five Armies: 2.5/4
And the prequels:
The Phantom Menace: 2/4
Attack of the Clones: 1.5/4
Revenge of the Sith: 1.5/4
The prequels, by the way, were not the worst films ever made.
Not enough people read the EU.