What do you think of the Bakshi cartoon?

[Morthoron]

Originally Posted by Aaron

The cartoon is terrible, Boromirr is portrayed as some sort of Viking and his death is robbed of any emotion. The live action sections are cringeworthy and seem like one long drug trip. Sam is robbed of any of his depth, you never once suspect that he has hidden reserves of courage and toughness.
And don't get me started on Saruman.
An abortion of an adaptation.

Now see, I think referring to Bakshi's film as 'an abortion' is perhaps a bit too strong of a description. Like I said in a previous post, it suffers from being dated, certainly, but I think it remains truer to Tolkien in many instances than does Jackson's interpretation, and to greater effect (as mentioned previously, Frodo defying the Nazgul at Bruinen Ford, the Nazgul in Bree, etc.). It has it plusses and minuses (perhaps much more to the negative than positive), but it was a valiant effort given the circumstances, and one should at least laud Bakshi for the attempt. Having seen the film upon first release, I can say with certainty (dimmed by age perhaps) that it was welcomed by those hungry for Tolkien material (just as the publication of The Silmarillion was a year prior), and more folks were upset that Bakshi never finished the sequel than were annoyed by his rotoscoping.

One could be a bit more harsher on Jackson, given his far greater budget and almost limitless access to technology. In fact, I consider Jackson's inane interpolations and ego-driven script maunderings to be far greater sins than anything Bakshi did.