I mean, they could have gotten someone like Gabriel Byrne to play Frodo, but…. I’m sure legions of gay and female fans appreciated a pretty young face leading this ensemble cast. So here’s a list of some of the major things that were changed:īook Frodo is 52 when he sets out from Bag End. Sure, Merry’s blade of Westernesse is vital to the book later on, but are you really going to be able to explain its ancient lineage in five seconds in a movie? No. What remains is what is absolutely vital to the cinematic story (don’t me. The encounter with the wight in the Barrow-downs is also gone. We don’t get to meet Gildor Inglorion or Glorfindel. The house at Crickhollow is gone, as is dinner at Farmer Maggot’s house (along with Farmer Maggot for the most part, and his entire family). The Old Forest and Old Man Willow are out. So there’s no Tom Bombadil or Goldberry, no Fatty Bolger, no Gaffer Gamgee, no Bob and Nob, and no Ted Sandyman. So a lot of detail from the book version of The Fellowship of the Ring was dropped to make the story a little more streamlined and have fewer characters that need to be introduced (and fewer actors that have to be cast, flown in, housed and fed, costumed, and credited). Why do they have to throw that pretty gold ring away?” Remember, they’re made to appeal to both nerds and to Jeff and Phyllis from Fargo. So they make them for the lowest common denominator, which means that when film adaptations come out– especially adaptations of something with as much detail as The Lord of the Rings- things get lost in translation. Studios invest vast amounts of money into blockbusters in the hopes that they’ll have a giant return on their investment. They’re not opaque art house films with a limited appeal. That’s the nature of these big budget spectacles. He was also making a film that Jeff and Phyllis in Fargo could enjoy without having to read the books. And while your average Tolkien nerd can tell you why Glorfindel is awesome, why the song of Beren and Luthien that Aragorn sings in the extended version is important, and why the Eagles couldn’t take the Hobbits to Mordor, the director wasn’t making a film just for the Tolkien nerds. That’s a lot to do, and so something has to give somewhere. When you’re working with a fantasy world, you have to introduce the world, the races (in this case: elves, dwarves, hobbits, orcs, wizards, ents, and Uruk-hai), the differences between the people of different countries (the Shire, Bree, Rivendell, Lothlorien, Rohan, Gondor, Mordor), and your McGuffin. You have to introduce the plot and give everyone a reason for being there and going out to do the thing. If you have an important character, you have to spend time introducing them, developing their character, and generally giving them a reason to be there. Where a book is free to have all the details the author can think of (and that the editor will allow for), the nature of filmmaking requires that its storytelling be much more efficient. But this ignores the fact that books and movies are very different art forms. The book is more detailed, it doesn’t drop or combine characters, it has the complete plot, it contains all the little side quests and other little things that add depth to the world, etc., etc. The number one complaint that readers have when it comes to film and television adaptations of their favorite books is this: “The book was better”. As there are so many changes from the film trilogy to the books, I’m going to break this up into three parts- one for each movie.īut first, let’s talk about cinematic adaptations. But I expected that, and overall I didn’t mind them. Fortunately, New Line was right to trust Peter Jackson with this precious story, and The Fellowship of the Ring has been the first part of my favorite set of films ever since.Īnd yeah, there were changes. You can bet I was standing in line for a few hours on December 19, 2001, because after months of anticipation after the first teaser trailer came out, and after loving the books for years, I was ready. It’s been nearly twenty years since The Fellowship of the Ring premiered.
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