Need everything be so dramatic? It all goes to the extreme. The company shelters in trees in the book, so in the movie they're in trees which domino to the edge of a cliff. Do trees domino like that? Why did they choose such a precarious location? In the book they're on some delicate heights, so in the movie at least twice someone dangles by one hand, and both times someone else ends up dangling with them. It wasn't enough to be on delicate heights, nor for one person to dangle. But TWO people dangling? That's cinema. Similarly Gandalf+Elrond is insufficient so enter Galadriel and Saruman, plus double-take intimacy between Gandalf and Galadriel -- am I watching the trailer for Mary Magdalene? And I know what's coming -- overwrought Legolas cameo + Evangeline Lily. This is definitely excessive, and a sad admission of the state of things, specifically since Jackson's first trilogy. This drama seems all but mandatory now, for broad watchability. Or did Jackson himself change? Either way Tolkien must be insulted. It's still wonderful, but severely dramatized, and lacking the earlier trilogy's purity. Then again, The Hobbit is intrinsically less dramatic. But that's why people love it. It's lighter on its feet. These movies are so dark! I like the darkness of The Lord of the Rings relative to The Hobbit, in their literary manifestations, but in film the latter darkness is contrived.
No comments:
Post a Comment