[Salacia Deloresista]

I don't think Tolkein would be angry with the movies. Much of his studies were mythologies, stories that by nature change with the re-telling. Peter Jackson was re-telling a legend when he made the Lord of the Rings movies, and I think that Tolkien, with all his knowledge about how the stories develop over time, would have expected many changes. I think he would have been disapointed about the missing characters, just as any parent would when one of his children was left out, but insulted at the re-telling of The Lord of the Rings, which he himself considered to be a recording of pre-existing myths? I think not.

One of the greatest apeals of The Lord of the Rings is not that it has an extremely exciting plot, but that when you read the books, you feel like you can actually travel to Middle Earth. The fact that the movies carry over that sense of realism in my humble opinion makes up for any shortcomings in plot. The focus of the books wasn't plot, in any case. It was Middle Earth itself, the land, the history, the culture of the people living there. The creators of the movies took that aspect of the books to heart, and every detail of set, costume and even in most cases the behavior of the actors brings to life the wealth of characterization that Tolkien wrote, not just for the main characters, but for the land itself, and the history leading up to the climax of the War of the Ring. I prefer to think of the movies as one big fan-art project, not dissimilar to a John Howe painting. The analogy makes sense in my head; whether it makes sense to anyone else, I can't say. What I mean is simply that we shouldn't be so quick to condemn the movies for failures in the plot line, and forget that they were made with the best intentions at heart, and made in a way that was meant to pay tribute to Tolkien, not rip off his work. Just look at the differences in interpretations between The Lord of the Rings movies and the Harry Potter movies, and you'll see what I mean.

Sorry for the digression.

~Sally