LotR1-FotR-Seq04

[davem]

Originally Posted by The Saucepan Man

But I do feel that expecting Jackson to explore in any detail theories concerning the nature of evil in a film of this nature is expecting rather too much from him. For better or for worse (and I make no comment on that for now), it is just not something that the majority of his intended audience would be expecting from the film.

Good thing Tolkien wasn't as obsessed with giving his 'audience' only 'what they expected', then, or we'd just have gotten a sequel to TH: another whimsical children's book, no LotR, no Sil, & no LotR movies either, for that matter.

Still, Tolkien was an artist & followed his muse, Jackson seems to have followed the audience & to have given us very little beyond stereotypically pretty pictures & a deal of gruesome imagery.

Apart from what he lifted (inaccurately for the most part) from Tolkien, did anyone actually learn anything from watching Jackson's adaptation - & before you say that wasn't what the movies were about, could anyone have learnt anything from them - was there anything to learn?

[The Saucepan Man]

Of course Jackson and Tolkien were working with different aims and motives and coming from different directions. I quite willing to accept that. But I don't accept that this invalidates Jackson's acheivement.

Originally Posted by davem

Still, Tolkien was an artist & followed his muse, Jackson seems to have followed the audience & to have given us very little beyond stereotypically pretty pictures & a deal of gruesome imagery.

Jackson is an artist, in his own way. Admittedly a very different type of artist to Tolkien, but an artist nonetheless. And he provided me (and, it would seem, many others) with a great deal of enjoyment. I expected very little else and, thus, was satisfied. Perhaps I am just easily pleased, but I do not regret being so.