04-14-2003, 12:21 AM | #101 | ||||
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Harvey Weinstein took the studio-centric, profit-motivated approach while the contract was still with Miramax: he argued for two films, around 2.5 hours in length each, and threatened to take the rights to another director if Jackson couldn't find another studio to fund the project within a week and a half - even though Jackson was the one who proposed the project to Miramax in the first place. Weinstein is still listed as an executive producer and receives a percentage, despite the fact that after the thing was shipped to New Line, he had absolutely no involvement with the film. Weinstein did not have a single say on the content of LOTR. Mark Ordesky was the one at New Line who got Jackson off the ground and argued for expanding the thing into three films. To make such a move out of a profit motive is ridiculous, because the production and marketing costs have just spiked by 50%, and if the first film isn't successful, you have two flops coming down the tubes instead of one. Such a move would not make a penny of economic sense if it were done out of profit. Peter Jackson does not get a huge cut out of all this, other than a standard director's salary and royalties. The biggest benefit of LOTR's success, for him, is that in the future studios will be more likely to fund his other dream projects similarly. Take, for instance, the $200M that he's rumoured to be given to work with King Kong. Most of the more significant changes from book to film can't even be attributed to him directly. Philippa Boyens, as a reputed Tolkien scholar, was hired by Peter Jackson to help adapt the film. She is responsible for a good number of changes that were made. The amount of profit the film makes has virtually no impact on her monetary income from this. But let's address your unfounded assumptions about the movie business. So just because a director wants to see a story come to life, like many fans do - and he has the means to do it himself - he's suddenly subject to accusations of doing it for profit? That doesn't make sense, especially considering that directors and production companies (in this case, Wingnut) get a very meagre share of the profit compared to Hollywood distributors. The "it was done for money" argument is silly and ignorant. Don't use it. Quote:
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04-14-2003, 12:23 AM | #102 | ||||
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04-14-2003, 12:23 AM | #103 | ||||||
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My take on any adaptation, regardless of how religiously dedicated I was to the source material, is that it has to be a good film first and a good adaptation second. A good film that isn't a good adaptation is still a good film, and is worth watching. A bad film that is a good adaptation is still a bad film, and isn't worth watching. Niether case applies, because for the record, I think LOTR is a pretty darn good adaptation. Though it's a far better film. Quote:
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As for going into film... no comment.
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04-14-2003, 12:40 AM | #104 | |||||
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[QUOTE]Originally posted by IronParrot
GW: Tolkien didn't know enough about film to make a qualified decision, and furthermore, LOTR was indeed unfilmable while he was alive. Things have since changed. But he did know about the story, and what parts of the story were most important. Which is more important: the story, or the film? Quote:
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BTW, let me congratulate you. You are truly a master of the subtle insult. Quote:
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As for the rest of that post, I won't touch it, mainly because I am ignorant of the film-making things discussed there.
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04-14-2003, 12:47 AM | #105 | ||||
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squinteyedsoutherner:
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Tolkien has a certain vision of his book. Tolkien also has a certain vision of a hypothetical film based on his book. His suggestion that Helm's Deep is expendable belongs to the latter category. My understanding is that we're discussing whether or not Jackson was true to Tolkien's vision of the book, not Tolkien's vision of a hypothetical film. If we're discussing the latter, then there's no debate: of course Jackson wasn't true to Tolkien's vision of the film, because it's his job as a director to have a cinematic vision of it himself. Tolkien wasn't in the director's chair, and wasn't qualified to be anyway. Quote:
From all indications, Jackson didn't like Tolkien's version - in the context of filming it. The basic argument here is that Tolkien's version would not work in a film, and as a film director, he is qualified to darken the tone accordingly. Once again, I bring up time constraints as the primary root of the changes. Time compression means a faster-paced film. That means a faster-paced first act. That means the events of Book I, Chapters 1 through 9 can't be as comfortable and easygoing for Frodo and company as they are in the book. If this journey is quickened and less comfortable, the mood of the settings has to be altered in order to match. Quote:
Artistic merit, however, is inherent. It also refers to the film as an independent entity, so this does not cover anything to do with adapting the source. To sacrifice artistic merit in order to pump up the entertainment value for a specific demographic is a mistake. It's true that artistic merit is also subject to debate and criticism; however, the focus is still on the intrinsic qualities of a given film, and not how much certain people do or do not like it. The best films, of course, have a high degree of both entertainment value and artistic merit. As the former will never apply to everybody, it might as well apply to as many people as possible, as long as it is not at the expense of the latter.
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04-14-2003, 12:58 AM | #106 | |||||||
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[QUOTE]Originally posted by IronParrot
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[QUOTE]A good film that isn't a good adaptation is still a good film, and is worth watching. A bad film that is a good adaptation is still a bad film, and isn't worth watching.[QUOTE] Just wanted to point out that if you flip it over: A good film that is a bad adaptation is still a bad adaptation, and does not stick to the story. A bad film that is a good adaptation is still a good adaptation, and remains true to the story. A bad film that is a bad adaptation is a complete waste of time. (NOTE: None of these were intended to portray PJ's Movies, and were nothing but a sidetrack from my feeble mind.) Just for the record, I think that a bad film that was a good adaptation would be worth watching, if I were familiar with the source material. But as I freely admit, I'm ignorant on the matter of film. -shrugs- And as a natural result thereof, my opinion doesn't count. P. S. Have you seen the BBC Narnia productions? Would you qualify them as bad films? Quote:
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04-14-2003, 01:03 AM | #107 | ||||||||
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If it's not explicitly stated in the body of the text itself, it's open to analysis, no matter how the author intended it. Tolkien probably didn't intend most of the things we noticed about his work, and his intentions-to-possible-analysis ratio is almost as low as the likes of Shakespeare or Moses. Quote:
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04-14-2003, 01:12 AM | #108 |
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It's late, don't have time to say much, but I will say that I don't really know how you're defining "reverence". That sounds like respect yes, but that is not what I am talking about.
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04-14-2003, 01:37 AM | #109 | |||||
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No, but seriously, some of the content in films both original (Citizen Kane, Casablanca) and adapted (The Godfather, Lawrence of Arabia) have enough under-the-surface matter in them to fill a couple of doctoral theses. In my graduating year in high school, on the English exam, I wrote an impromptu essay on Casablanca instead of talking about any of the works I studied in class. I fell just short of 100% because I forgot the names of two of the three screenwriters. Quote:
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Compare the similar BBC productions of Shakespeare to, say, the Franco Zefferelli Romeo and Juliet. The latter is a film. The former is a rendition of the stage play in a soundstage with cameras rolling. As for whether or not a film is worth watching: Well, I keep picking on Harry Potter, and that's probably not fair. It's a pretty decent film in itself, though a lot of its flaws can be attributed to sticking too close to the source, despite what else has been trimmed. They practically wrote a four-hour screenplay for it, shot most of it, and ended up cutting so much out that some transitions don't make as much sense as they should. One of the things that actually always annoyed me about The Fellowship of the Ring (theatrical version) is that Galadriel says her staple line, "I will diminish into the West, and remain Galadriel" - but at that point, the name Galadriel has never been mentioned in the movie, so the line makes no sense. But it's a beautiful line and I'd be up in arms if it weren't there (and I'm sure you would too), so they could have at least mentioned her name earlier. This was fixed in the DVD, thankfully. The Wizard of Oz is, of course, my favourite example of a wonderful movie that is, at the same time, a horrible adaptation. The latter does not bug me when I watch the film, because I recognize it as a distinct entity. Quote:
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An incredible number of people who worked on LOTR - from screenwriters like Philippa Boyens all the way down to the Maya modellers in Weta Digital's CG labs - were already familiar with the book prior to being hired for the film. Peter Jackson wouldn't have taken the effort to hunt down John Howe and Alan Lee, his still-painting Tolkien-visualization equivalents, if he didn't want the film to be as best a representation of Tolkien as possible - even if he has to make logistically-motivated sacrifices. On the subject of definitions, it looks like "respect" is being defined as "do what Tolkien says", something with which I wouldn't necessarily agree.
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04-14-2003, 01:10 PM | #110 |
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Whooweee...it takes a long time for those of us in the "ignorant movie-going masses" category to read through all this point/counterpoint stuff.
Speaking of definitions, let me give you my own working definition of "Tolkien's vision." For me it means, "does the work capture the key themes and emotional tugs of the story?" as opposed to "is it a scene-by-scene mirror of the books?" So this is why I look at "inventions" of Jackson's, such as his decision to have Merry and Pippin distract the orcs at Amon Hen and lead them away from Frodo as a brilliant big screen vehicle for streamlining the plot AND effectively communicating one of Tolkien's most important themes. Is it "in the book,"? Nope. But does it capture the very essence of Tolkien's work? Yep. And if you people think the importance of self-sacrificing friendship IS NOT part of Tolkien's vision for the tale, then I give up. Last edited by Black Breathalizer : 04-14-2003 at 01:14 PM. |
04-14-2003, 05:15 PM | #111 | |
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04-14-2003, 06:33 PM | #112 |
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Can I join you, GW?
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04-14-2003, 07:06 PM | #113 |
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Certainly.
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04-15-2003, 11:26 AM | #114 |
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.............and let me add my own to your arguements Iron Parrot, you truely are on another planet. Aragorn is a fictious character created by Tolkien. He begins and ENDS with Tolkien. He does not exist in some 4th dimension of infinite possibility where he might have said "I don't want to be king" - where he may wear pink leg warmers and hang out at gay bars in Bree - where he may be taking tap dance lessons in his spare time. Your arguements are laughable, and if you truely believe them, then I can understand why the film's changes don't bother you, afterall, just think of the possibilites.
Last edited by squinteyedsoutherner : 04-15-2003 at 11:38 AM. |
04-15-2003, 03:26 PM | #115 | |
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I think I'll join you, GW, BoP and Squinty.
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04-15-2003, 07:03 PM | #116 | |
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This is the reason why Arwen and Aragorn's romance is resigned to the appendix. Tolkien thought of it after he was ready to crown his king and wasn't willing to rewrite his earlier stuff (yet again) to include it in the same way Jackson has. |
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04-15-2003, 07:06 PM | #117 |
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Tolkien spent over a decade writing and rewriting and editting and rewriting.
Also, Black Breatheliser, don't pretend we're stupid. He said that it was relegated to the appendices because it did not fit in with the rest of the Lord of the Rings.
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04-15-2003, 08:04 PM | #118 |
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We keep going around and around but I've yet to have any of you book purists really address the central question of this thread:
What central themes of the books did Jackson supposedly mess up on? And pleeeeeeze don't give me yet another "geez, Gimli was comic-relief" examples. Let's talk THEMES! |
04-15-2003, 08:09 PM | #119 |
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Are you saying that the developing deep friendship and loyalty between two individuals who at first thought themselves enemies isn't part of the theme of friendship you cite so often?
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04-15-2003, 11:33 PM | #120 | |
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And CHARACTERS. Tolkien himself said that that was one of the most important things. And it was about HOBBITS. Both of these are poorly adapted. Seriously, BB, why do you feel the terrible urge to make everyone think the same way you do? I also noted you left the challenge to your "PJ was truer to Tolkien than Tolkien was" coment untouched...
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