MY MOVIE SHELF: The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 86 Days to go: 58

Movie #354:  The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Well, I’ve survived it. Again. We’ve come to the end of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and I couldn’t be more grateful. The subtitles really do help a lot in the understanding (and even enjoyment) of the films, but 1) that shouldn’t be a requirement for a film in (mostly) my native language, and 2) they’re still pretty ridiculous, as far as films go.

The enormity of the task Peter Jackson and company took on and accomplished is not to be swept aside, for it was gigantic and ambitious. That he managed to film three such huge, world-spanning, epic films all at the same time is a feat that will likely never be matched. The special effects throughout the films were impressive and innovative to a stunning degree, and creatures that existed only digitally blended seamlessly into the landscape with human actors. I don’t mean to undercut it at all. That’s why The Return of the King won all the Oscars. I personally wouldn’t have given it all the Oscars, but I can understand why it got them. I don’t really begrudge it that.

What I do begrudge it, however, is the story. Maybe this is largely the fault of author J.R.R. Tolkien, or maybe it falls to the filmmakers, but there are enormous holes in this mess. Like why isn’t the giant, climactic battle of Gondor the actual climax of the film? There’s another hour or more after all is said and done with this battle they’ve been building to for two films. The evilest of evil dudes, who can’t be killed by man, is dead (we’ll get to that in a bit), and the land of Men is saved, and Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen) has returned to be rightful king, and still there’s a ton left to do. In fact, right around the time this battle to end all battles winds down, Frodo (Elijah Wood) and Sam (Sean Astin) are escaping the tower of Mordor together, only to still be about a hundred miles away from the damn mountain as the crows (or shall we say eagles? EAGLES!) fly.

Speaking of that tower of Mordor, why did the Orcs take Frodo up there? Why didn’t they leave him cocooned in spiderweb to be eaten by whatsherface? Just one more pointless obstacle for these hobbits to face? I mean, entire countries have been won and lost in at least three battles since those two split off from the rest of their fellowship, with everyone and their brother traipsing back and forth across the entirety of Middle Earth a dozen times or more, yet they’re still making their way. Slowly, but surely, with a half-dead Frodo, who’s now been stabbed nearly to death three times, will lose a finger before all is said and done, and still can’t just die in the lava of Mount Doom like he most definitely should. (Oh yeah, and how is it that Gollum, voiced by Andy Serkis, can fall down a bottomless gulch and still beat the fucking hobbits to the mountain?? What the fuck?!?) So why is it, exactly, that these magical eagles — the eagles from Deus ex Machina-land who show up  over Mordor to lend assistance to the final army in the final (no really this time) battle — couldn’t have taken the ring, or Frodo, or the entire fucking fellowship into Morder to drop the ring into Mount Doom? Oh, no reason. Are you kidding me??

And as far as that final battle goes — the real, actual final battle, not the one they build up to like it’s the climax of anything — why are the ghost fighters not there? Why did Aragorn release them early? Why didn’t he just employ them from the start? I mean, ghost fighting probably would’ve been pretty impressive, but in actuality all you see is a green wave of death going over the opponents and then it’s over. So why didn’t they just start there? Send the eagles to drop the ring, send the ghost army to take out all the orcs, and be done? Why have we sat through three neverending movies when it could’ve been over in a moderately-lengthed one?

I have to say, the murder of that unkillable witch-king was pretty impressive with Eowyn (Miranda Otto) all, “I am no man!” (Or it would’ve been, if it had come at the end like a normal climax.) But even that was telegraphed from about a thousand miles away. I didn’t even know her name the first time I watched these things, but when Gandalf (Ian McKellen) makes a huge point about the fact that “no living man can kill him,” it wasn’t hard to figure out the rest. I mean, gee, is there a woman of substance in this whole thing who isn’t an elf? Oh yeah, that one, who already foreshadowed how good she is with a sword two movies and, like, seven and a half hours ago. It must be her. Because in Middle Earth, when it comes to any single woman actually doing anything, THERE CAN BE ONLY ONE. (Wait, that’s Highlander. Whatever.)

Then, finally, to compensate for neither of the two previous movies having an ending at all, this one has approximately five. There’s the fade to black after Sam and Frodo collapse on the rock in the sea of lava, but then it fades back in to show the eagles (!!!) picking them up, like no big deal. Then there’s Frodo waking up in Rivendell, and having all the members of the fellowship share a good chuckle over their rousing good time of many months worth of hardship and death, and fade to black again. Then, wait, Aragorn has to be crowned and say something kingly, followed by Legolas (Orlando Bloom) giving him an arched eyebrow at the mysterious figure hiding behind an Elvish banner, like WHO COULD IT BE?? Oh, it’s Arwen (Liv Tyler), miraculously not dead, and her and Aragorn start making out something fierce. Luckily, Eowyn has started eyeballing Faramir (David Wenham) now. And everyone bows down to the hobbits. Fade out AGAIN. Except, no, now Frodo takes up the end of the tale, and the hobbits head back to the shire thirteen months after leaving and share a drink while Sam goes to talk up some chick he likes. Fade out AGAIN. No, wait, now Frodo is talking about how misplaced he still feels, and he finishes up the writing of the tale a full four goddamn years after the whole thing started. Apparently Bilbo (Ian Holm) is still alive, so he accompanies him to Rivendell to go to the Undying Lands, only Frodo goes to, and gives the book to Sam. Then SAM winds up the telling of the tale and goes home to his wife, despite desperately needing to make out with Frodo, like, the entire movie, and takes his happy little family into his hobbit hole door. At long, long last, the end.

And it’s the end for me too. At least as far as The Lord of the Rings is concerned. I will never have to watch it again as long as I live. But I still have scores of movies left on my shelf, and I will continue on with them in the morning. Hopefully, I haven’t lost faith with all of you yet.

 

MY MOVIE SHELF: The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 88 Days to go: 59

Movie #352:  The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

Here is where I lose all of you who’ve come on this journey with me, for I hate The Lord of the Rings movies. I think they are tedious and overlong and hard to follow. I think if you didn’t read the books when you were young (which I didn’t), then you can’t possibly understand all that’s happening here. There is too much, and it is too tiresome.

The Fellowship of the Ring, for what it’s worth, is the one I hate the least (or the one I like the most, if that construct better suits you). It starts off with a ton of exposition and there is a lot of getting nowhere going on, but there are some good battles and high drama. (Although, without watching with subtitles on I wouldn’t know who half these people are. And didn’t, the first — and only other — time I saw the film. Even with subtitles on, how the hell am I supposed to know what “Crebain from Dunland” is? Those are not words that mean anything. You might as well speak nonsense at me for three hours.) This being my first exposure to any of Tolkien’s work, too, there was a certain amount of majesty and wonder in the rendering of the different beings from the different worlds. Elves and dwarves and hobbits were all new to me, so I did, once upon a time, enjoy being introduced to them. That time quickly passed, however.

As I said, I did not read the books as a child (or ever), so I had no prior associations with any of the characters. I came at the films completely fresh, which means that I was not predisposed to like or dislike anyone and I did not know any of what was coming and all allusions to events past or present are lost on me. I can only take what the movie gives me, and what I can decipher from it. To be honest, I think it leaves me at a bit of a loss, but that’s a failing on the film’s part.

I never really cared for the hobbits. They were always sort of gross creepy creatures, if you ask me, and the constant close-ups of Frodo (Elijah Wood) and his nasty fingernails weren’t doing him any favors. Other than the trick of making them so much shorter than everyone else, I have no interest to them. So the main, central sympathies of the film, and the champion relationship between Frodo and Sam (Sean Astin), is lost on me. I don’t care. Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen), is quite interesting, however, and  from the moment he appears as the shadowy figure they call Strider (which does NOT help me follow who any of these billion people are), I rooted for him. I also like that he has some sort of tortured romance with Arwen (Liv Tyler, whose name I didn’t quite catch the first time through because Tolkien likes to use words that all sound exactly alike — I’m looking at you Sauron and Saruman), not that we really got into that at all. It was just kind of teased, hung out there like a carrot for me to follow through three of these damn movies.

There’s a badass scene of Galadriel (Cate Blanchett) imagining her power if she took hold of the ring, and Gandalf (Ian McKellen) sacrificing himself to that fiery thing in the mines was quite moving. I also really like the sort of rise and fall of Boromir (Sean Bean) as he goes after the ring one minute and then defends the hobbits from the orcs the next, dying (as Sean Bean is contractually obligated to do in every role he takes) heroically. But all those are sort of contained to this one film. They exist entirely within it, unlike almost everything else going on. And there’s a lot going on. For all the battles, all the trekking, all the losses and all the triumphs and all the grim resignation to the task, nobody gets anywhere. Frodo is practically stabbed to death twice in this one film, and still nothing happens. They take forever and a day to get to the part where the fellowship is formed, and then by the end of the film it’s completely broken apart. Sam and Frodo are in a boat on their own, Merry (Dominic Monaghan) and Pippin (Billy Boyd) are captured by orcs, and Aragorn, Legolas (Orlando Bloom) and Gimli (John Rhys-Davies) are a rag-tag assortment of warrior species off to maybe rescue them.

And just when you think something’s about to happen, and they’ll finally get on with this journey of theirs, the movie ends. It’s not an end to the story, mind you, just and end to the film. They’ve dragged it out as far as they possibly can, and now you have to wait another year before you find out if anyone ever actually gets anywhere on this quest.

Luckily (or unluckily) for me, I don’t have to wait a year, for the next one is upon us. Let’s see how much more I can hate The Two Towers, shall we?