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Originally Posted by Aldarion
Second, think about contemporary rap music (I use the m-word with reservations). Rap was originally improvised by the performer like jazz solos, and only when it became pop music did it become so produced.
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I did think of M&M playing Aragorn in my planned remake of the movie & now I think I may be on to something. If we had Britney as Arwen & Madonna & Galadriel we could have he makings of something....
As to
Bb's points re Boromir - I agree up to a point, but I also think Boromir is a perfectly believable character in his own right, & if he serves as a foil for Aragorn that may serve the purposes of the plot that merely shows Tolkien's greatness. In other words, I could see Boromir working as a character in other stories, without an Aragorn figure to give him relevance. Both characters are valid & believeable, & so is the clash between them. I don't think Boromir's death & the effect it has on the others would be as moving if he was merely a means of showing Aragorn in a positive light. After all the interactions between many of the characters could be presented in the same way - to what extent is Gollum used to bring out elements in Frodo's & Sam's characters? Or Sam to bring out elements in Frodo's (or Gollum's) character.
Is Boromir so 'disposable' a figure? I have to lean towards the 'psychological' interpretation of him. He is a complex character in his own right
as well as being everything you say in terms of what he brings to the fore in Aragorn. We're all 'foils' to others in our own way, but that doesn't make us any less 'real', or any more 'disposable'.
Also, yes, his funeral echoes an ancient funereal tradition, & no doubt that was intentional on Tolkien's part, but given the circumstances of the plot & the situation the characters found themselves in, it was also the only logical way to 'dispose of the body'. What else were they going to do with him? As for using him 'narratologically' I'm uncertain - Tolkien simply didn't have things planned out in that kind of way. From the early drafts its clear he hadn't decided
what was to happen to Boromir - & as
B88 has pointed out his original intention for Boromir was very different. It seems to me that his death & the mode of his funeral came to Tolkien not much before he actually wrote it. There's a danger in confusing art with artifice & I think Tolkien was motivated by the former.