Well Knight of Gondor I was going to PM you but your box is full *hint hint*. As for your belief keep it up!<P><BR>Saucepan man, you are my new best friend. That is my big pet peeve about TTT (aside from the death of Haldir). Arwen an immature teenager and Elrond a grouchy, overbearing, selfish tyrannical father. In the book it said their parting would be bitter and in the tale of Aragorn and Arwen in Appendix A it says "She loved her father dearly". It seemed to me in the movie that Arwen wasn't too entirely thrilled to have her dad around. No dear love there! and speaking of grouchy ill temepered Lords of Rivendell, what happened to the description of ELrond being "kind as summer"? There was none of that in any movie so far.

In the book, <I>Morgoth's Ring</I>, it states that the Elves, as a race, took longer to mature than Men, having reached their full stature at 50 years. By that time, most Men are waning, or already are in their dotage. <P>I applaud Arwen's strength and integrity in keeping with the choice that she made, even though it would eventually bring her pain. She wasn't living for the moment at all. She knew full well the consequences of choosing to become Mortal, and marrying Aragorn. She knew that she would be leaving her entire family, and eventually, her beloved would leave her too. Not many of us can consciously make that choice and stick to it. That strength is given to a chosen few, and Arwen was one of them.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:<HR> Well Knight of Gondor I was going to PM you but your box is full *hint hint*. As for your belief keep it up! <HR></BLOCKQUOTE><BR>Can we please stop bringing this up. I also tried to PM KoG, but that door was shut so I let it lay and would have continued to do so if it wasn't brought up again.<P>I, and I'm sure I'm not the only one here, found KoG's comments, especially towards Mr. McKellen, offensive. Institutionized prejudice is still prejudice. It's like me justifying a hatred for Jews on the basis of being a Nazi.<P>H.C.

McKellan's sexual orientation is off-topic under virtually any circumstances, and even more so in this thread concerning Liv Tyler's performance as Arwen. Let's not ruin a perfectly legitimate topic with back-and-forth. <P>Further posts touching on this touchy subject or cheerleading one side or the other will be swiftly deleted, as they're already leading to personal friction and off-topic debate. In fact, I may go back and zap a few of these most recent posts. <P>Let's keep it on-topic and civil, folks.

When I first watched FotR I had no idea of her past movie history. She did a pretty good job with the elvish and looked ok. The only reason I had at that time was that she took Glorfindels part! (not like Frodo NEEDED her help...)Then my friend told me about this movie she had just seen (since I don't watch movie's like that I had no idea! And that made me REALLY MAD!!!! Then I saw a picture of her without her elvish makeup and COULD NOT BELEAVE IT!!! So if we are talking acting job... Ok, not my favorite, but if we are talking her as a person, NO WAY!<P>It seems to me that we are letting the people who are in character affect what we think about the character its self! <P>TTFN

Just taking a second to clear the air here, and hope that I do not stir up further personal attacks for daring to hold to my outdated opinions that God is God and says that homosexuality is a sin. First, my apologies to accidentally redirecting the topic to homosexuality. This was not my intention, and I apologize for that. I do not, however, apologize for my beliefs and opinions, and I submit that anyone who uses such derogatory terms for me is the one who is close-minded and intolerant.<P>Here's what I said previously: I don't expect you guys (and gals) to agree with me, but the reason I'm not happy that Ian McKellen is gay is because I'm a Christian, and according to the Bible, homosexuality is a sin. I know that's not the issue at hand, I just wanted to clear that up.<P>Does that sound so terribly offensive?<P>A note about my private message box: A few people have mentioned before that my PM box was "full" - I took this to mean that they had sent a lot of messages, but when I looked, I was puzzled that nothing was there. It took a while to get through my head that there was a LIMIT on how many messages I could have in my box. So I have cleared it out now, and anyone who wants to PM me and bad-mouth me or something, go ahead. Be assured I am not, by any means, ducking anyone as H.C. implies.<P> <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:<HR>No one seems to be complaining that Hugo Weaving played a drag queen in Pricilla Queen of the Desert.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>Hey, I never knew that. But I never seen that movie, nor heard of it. But I don't like it...nor that Sean Bean was in a porn film, nor that David Westhelm or whatever his last name was (I keep forgetting) played a drug addict. It just ruins the concept of the characters for me, at least a little.<P> <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:<HR>Well Knight of Gondor I was going to PM you but your box is full *hint hint*. As for your belief keep it up!<HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>Thanks man, and PM away now!<P> <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:<HR>I, and I'm sure I'm not the only one here, found KoG's comments, especially towards Mr. McKellen, offensive. Institutionized prejudice is still prejudice. It's like me justifying a hatred for Jews on the basis of being a Nazi.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>Please don't stoop to personal attacks just because you are prejudiced towards me and my opinions, H.C.<P> <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:<HR>Further posts touching on this touchy subject or cheerleading one side or the other will be swiftly deleted, as they're already leading to personal friction and off-topic debate. In fact, I may go back and zap a few of these most recent posts. <P>Let's keep it on-topic and civil, folks.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>Understood, and agreed, Mr. Underhill. I hope you don't mind if I posted this last post to clear the air, and my name. <P>Once again, sorry for misdirecting the tone of this discussion, and let’s not carry any judgmental attitudes away from this discussion based solely on personal stances. <P>Regards,<P>Knight

I promise to be absolutely intolerant of the next 'I'm sorry but here's my completely irrelevant moral opinion' post.

KofG, there are many people (and churches) that believe in God and are Christians that don't think homosexuality is a sin. Please don't pretend you have no choice in your believes. I'm not personally attacking you, but you can't justify a prejudice based upon a higher authority.<P>H.C.

So anyway, speaking of Elves.....<P>Hugo Weaving is a fantastic actor and, I think, plays the part that was given to him wonderfully. You can argue that he's not handsome enough to really look like Elrond (and I would agree) but that is of secondary importance. His anguish at Arwen's (fake) departure in TTT was heartbreaking to watch.<P>There is no doubt in my mind that it is the script and the direction that is lacking here.<P>Liv Tyler also suffers from a bad script. However, I think her task was easier than Weaving's. The script already established Arwen as the 'face' to Elrond's 'heel'. (Apologies for my wrestling terminology there! That means 'good guy' to 'bad guy') She had a much easier opportunity to endear herself to the audience, but still came across as helpless and broken down.<P>I think Tyler should have been able to put in a more accomplished part, regardless of the carelessness on the part of the filmmakers.

Hmm I thought Arwen was ok...well at least a lot better than many people have made out (i.e. all the jealous Aragorn-groupies at my school ).<BR>I agree, Hugo Weaving was really good with what he was given.

Found this at OneRing.<P><A HREF="http://greenbooks.theonering.net/quickbeam/files/091503.html" TARGET=_blank>For The Love Of Arwen</A><P>H.C.

Ahhh what a nice article...hang on, it isn't really an article. What should I call it?<BR>I think I agree with most of what Quickbeam said.

(Uh, Liv was in other movies? ...Oh.) In terms of her portrayal of Arwen, my only (exceedingly trivial and unfair) gripe is that I wished they had cast somebody with a bonier face; more about that later.<P>But first let me say, I thought her performance regarding the entire "appendix-A-part-V" scene was magnificent; sensitively acted, reserved, mature (relatively speaking) and to my mind very effective. I was quite moved, more so the more I see it.<P>I had little problem with the TTT conversation after Aragorn's interrupted nap. It was reserved and carefully done. I've read complaints about the lack of passion in that scene. I thought it was appropriate that the scene was sad rather than passionate. <P>Eh, but I always imagined elves as having very, very bony faces. Bloom (excuse me) was perfect or nearly so in terms of boniness. But he was the only one. Blanchett came close. The rest... what's with all those pudgy-faced elves???<P>(Yes, it's trivial and shallow. So shoot me.) Anyway, if that's my only complaint, apparently I was quite happy with Liv's performance.

I personally don't feel that Liv Tyler should be judged on her previous roles - it's completely irrelevant her playing Arwen. <P>All I'd seen of Liv Tyler's roles before LotR were Armageddon and bits of One night at McCool's, but when I was watching both FotR and TTT, neither of those roles so much as entered my head. <P>I think Liv Tyler's performance as Arwen wasn't great - but I put this down more to what the directors did - bad lines for her, etc. The first times I saw the movie I was too busy wondering why they changed what they did to really pay close attention to her acting. <P>I think part of the problem for Liv was that it was harder for her to get into Arwen's character, as Tolkien never developed it as much as the others. She didn't have as much material to work from, just some paragraphs in the actual book and a part in the appendices. <P>Also, taking on the task of playing such an ethereal character such as an elf, almost other worldly, must be pretty daunting and difficult in itself.

I never knew she did movies like that...Besides LotR I've only seen her in Armageddon. I just don't like her because she plays Arwen, WHO SHOULD NOT HAVE SUCH A BIG PART IN THE MOVIES!!!!!

To clarify for those of you that have not followed Liv Tyler's career:<P>"Movies like that" are movies in which Liv Tylers has played characters that are radically different from Arwen's character: some of them do feature nudity and/or sex. These aren't porn flicks, or Girls Gone Wild-type cinematic excursions (though even if they were, I don't think it should matter). <P>I think my main purpose in starting this thread was to see if there is more prejudice toward Liv Tyler's acting background, because she is a woman. <P>Among Tolkien fans, I have noticed a general trend of actresses not being taken seriously because they've appeared topless in a European art-flick or something along those lines, and somebody was right to point out that no one seems to remember that Hugo Weaving played a drag-queen, or that Viggo Mortensen consistently lights up the silver screen as a sexy womanizer. <P>But I have since discovered that the reason most Tolkien fans do not take Liv Tyler seriously has little to do with her previous roles and more to do with her skills, and her maturity or lack thereof.<P>Basically, people seem to treat her as an actress first and foremost. Personally, I welcome this approach and am glad that my initial ideas have been proven wrong. <P>And for the record: I think that those few people that brought Liv Tyler's personal character into discussion, even if it was an afterthought, should have refrained from doing so. We are only aware of Tyler through her acting, to make assumptions about what she's like as a person and whether or not anyone of us would like or dislike her personally is a bit presumptuous, in my opinion.<p>[ October 05, 2003: Message edited by: Lush ]

I'm not sure. I particularly find her to be quite a good actress, her facial expressions just bring me to tears, and she is a very attractive woman, but I just love how she portrayed Arwen. Not only was the character given life, but she was perfect as the Queen of Gondor.<P>Honestly, who wouldn't use Steven Tyler's name to get them ahead? As much of a cliche (blah, blah) it is, she used it to follow the career she's dreamed of. I don't find it disrespectful, I would say It's taking the initiative.<P>As for the nude scenes... Honestly, Sean Bean has showed off his... assets in quite a few movies, Orlando Bloom, Viggo Mortensen, Elijah Wood are all sex symbols, and more we've probably not heard of.