Epigramcracker,
I agree with your general perceptions. I like Viggo as a person, and was impressed with the things he said (and were said about him by the other actors) on the DVD commentaries.
It’s great that the production took the care to consult weapons makers. Equally that they got a jeweler to make the versions of the rings. Even more getting potters to create unique dishes, pipes, and so on. As a trend, one can’t do anything but applaud this concern for detail.
Howsoever, a film has a limited budget, and obsession with one aspect which is a known quantity to the detriment of subjects that are less familiar to the director can raise costs without making a better film.
To my taste nobody’s much the wiser for armor quality. On film, it all looks about the same. Theatrical fencing is very difficult, however. I’m a fencer, as it happens, and to look realistic the actors must be good, and be well-trained. When this happens, it makes very exciting film. Examples which come to mind (though I haven’t seen them for awhile) are the Highlander series, and the Three Musketeer movies.
Viggo – for all his dedication – was swinging the sword on Weathertop as though he were scything hay. It’s not exciting – largely because the viewer can intuit that it isn’t realistic. Fault Jackson for not allowing sufficient preparation, and for not recognizing that to wield such a heavy sword Aragorn would have a huge, powerful chest and massive arms. His sword should have been replaced with aluminum (It probably was “authentic” steel). And also, for Mortenson’s build – with something considerably shorter.
The movie defers absolutely to “experts” in one area, while being blind to failings in other areas needing expertise. Jackson relies on others for expertise where a Hitchcock or a Kubrick would know how to make the judgment call themselves.
The result is a film with unexpected lapses. Where he had insight – allowing the hobbits time get to know one another during the production was an inspiration – the result is hugely successful. Where he didn’t have insight, he was at the whim of his advisors: Gollum is excellent, but other parts of the 3D animation were much less so. Rivendell is quite good, but Moria looks like a 3D Quake gamer’s interpretation of a particularly difficult game level, rather than a mine.
When a movie is dull and aimless – as TTT was – especially considering the relative success of the earlier movie – one has to ask “Why was the book version changed”? Part of the answer must be that they lacked material – that the first movie shouldn’t have cut out the Old Forest or Tom Bombadil or the Barrow-Downs – at least not all three. And probably it should have ended at Rivendell (or perhaps Moria). Then there’s less need to add action scenes: Aragorn falling off cliff, elves joining Helms Deep battle, Frodo being abducted to Osgiliath, Frodo confronting the airborne Nazgul.
If Jackson, wife and the other writer had had the insight and brilliance to add material of the same caliber of Tolkien’s – that would be one thing – but they were really struggling – as evidenced by the DVD commentary that script changes came so often that sometimes the actors didn’t have time to read them. So Jackson should have left the adaptations out.
