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Friday, January 9th, 2004 12:16 am
Here I lay down my various musings, criticisms, squee's and snark.

No. Really, I'm pretty sure that's a corset in that shot, though it's a low corset or some such, or at least corset-like lacings up the back...

I'm blaming a lot of the snark on mother dearest who saw the movie with me and had a tendancy to giggle at the *worst* moments ever. Total "lets throw a bucket of ice and totally kill. the. moment" type things and she doesn't even understand what she's doing wrong. urg.

However. GORGEOUS movie. Eye-candy up the wazoo and some lovely performances.

And: Eowyn kicks ASS. and she does so mightily.

Also! Gandalf!! The staff and the sword and just SO many different kinds of ass-kicking! (instead of being just *shiny!*...which, come to think of it, there was an astonishingly large amount of...)

In fact, everyone got to kick a little ass...except, that is, for Frodo; who just went "gurk" most of the time and lost half a finger to Gollum to boot.

Poor guy, no wonder he went over the sea.

Oh, and the hobbit love? DUDE. So canon.

Also, I think I see where the Aragorn/Legolas is coming from, but it feels one-sided, especially with that Aragorn/Arwen kiss.

And the Obligatory Neat Elf-Trick? Satisfactorily impressive.

WHY DID THEY SHAVE ARAGORN FOR THAT ONE SCENE?!?!?! ::weeps:: what WAS that?! And the weird hairdo's. I mean, I understand that he needs to look more kingly but...WHY?!

And beating down the gates of Minas Tirth with an overly large phallic symbol. ::facepalm::

Speaking of which, that scene where Elrond presented the sword to Aragorn? urg. umm... bad pacing and dude but that sword looked HUGE.

supposed that was the point tho.

The music overall was superb and matched well. That one where Pippin was singing? Just *heartbreakingly* used, especially matching the soldier's sacrifice to the Denethor's gluttony. (unfortunately this was one of the times that mother decided to snicker. god DAMMIT.)

My one major quibble was the violins used for the spider scene. It just didn't work for me, in high contrast to the near-perfect silence of the scene right after where the spider lurks over Frodo, which was impressively effective.


Did anyone else think 'Harry Potter!' when they saw the spider?

Also, I got distinct Aragorn-as-Harry during that whole 'hope of the people' scene (they both even do that 'stare with a sword' pose with the movie posters!) and a bit of the 'faith of the people' thing in a Gandalf-as-Harry way in the Gandalf and Pippin scene at Minas Tirth.

Nevermind that I also got Phantom Menance flashbacks in the 'pitch Gollum into the dark pit' scene...

and also: did David Eddings mooch off plot or *what*?? what's the timeline for this stuff??

Then again, isn't LotR the granddaddy of all adventure novels?? huh.

The movie, as a supplement to the books, would be *fantastic*. But as for storytelling itself as a movie? It leaves just that half inch to be desired...just a bit too much facination with signal fires, and I'm still a bit hazy on *why* Denethor was being SUCH an ass (I mean, you know and you *feel* it, but there's also a very abrupt feeling to it all), and it was really weird just seeing the green blur of undead fighters swarming into the city with not enough connection to the characters we know that's fighting inside...

However. Marvelous movie, I probably would have gotten the soaring feeling I was looking for more had I been with a better audience but hey, beggars can't choose. I'll probably need to see this again, or see the whole thing on extended edition...

Oh! Did anyone else post any thoughts about RotK and wouldn't mind sharing a link? I know I skimmed aLOT of cut-tags this past month, but I'm not sure where to start looking...
Saturday, January 10th, 2004 03:44 am (UTC)
Thanks.

Lol, very much so. The only way that it could have possibly been more obvious is if they had t-shirts proclaiming their love. You know, 'I ♥ hobbits' or 'I killed a ringwraith/oliphaunt/fought against a really big eye/died looking like a pincushion for some hobbity lovin and all I got was this t-shirt.' Something like that. I think signs or banners would have worked nicely too.

and the "let me be on my knees for the hobbitses" and bringing that whole crowd rippling down

Yes, the whole 'you bow for no one' thing, when you know that Aragorn is really adding on 'because you are the prefect height when you are standing and I wouldn't mind taking advantage of that' in his head. Just because he got a shower in no way means that his mind is clean. Sick, dirty old man.

This movie has completely redefined the phrase 'gaze longingly.' It has set the standard for which all other movies must now try and reach. They will, of course, fail horribly.