Forever?

[Rimbaud]

So why didn't they buy the movie rights to one of the thousand & one Tolkien rip off fantasies out there & film that? If you're going to adapt a work of literature do it properly.

The argument is moot, then, if you would rather they had not been made.

I think what SpM and myself are trying to say, with our jaunty practical caps on, is that there is no way the books could have been translated to the screen in the manner you describe - not with the responsibility of the large budget, and constraints on running length and the necessity of appealing to a younger audience (the perception thereof being of limited attention spans for something without a special effect).*

This is not to say that even under these regulations, the films are unimprovable - I would love to see a complete re-edited version, cut to my whimsy, but such changes that could have been made whilst staying within the requisite profit zone would not bring about the dramatically differen motion picture you outline.


*This is not to hold that these regulations are accurately posited, nor to justify the commercialisation of sub-creation, merely to state that they and that exist in the major release cinematic oeuvre.