A sad experience

[Eönwë]

Originally Posted by Azaelia of Willowbottom

I think that the trick is to see that you're not exactly the same anymore...but the movie is going to be exactly the same. But that that's allright, and it shouldn't have to be anything different than it is in that moment. Instead of trying to see it through old eyes, watch it through the new ones. I think that the dissatisfaction happens when you try to reconcile what you know it SHOULD be with what it is.

I think I understand what you're saying. And I think that when you watch the movies, because they're always the same and they already are "made", whereas the books are in you're mind, they seem different.

I would say that because you're always changing, things appear different and you perceive things differently and focus on different things. With the book, because it allows you to form your own pictures, how you see Middle-Earth may shift, maybe so subtly that you can't realise it, but you see different things and read it slightly differently. The good thing about books is that because you as the reader are actively reading and imagining the story, it fits your imagination the way you want it to fit.

In the movies, however, it is not your imagination, but Peter Jackson's. It never changes. This means that even when your views shift slightly, you can't change the focus of the movie, as it is always identical. This is why I think that when you watch it, it can appear different.


That is my general outsider-view on the situation, because I saw the movies first, which means that my original ideas of the characters (except for Gollum- I had read the Hobbit before) were modelled on the movie characters.

So for me, the movies are a sort-of alternate Middle-Earth. If I just look at them separately, they are good, and I find that I can ignore most of the faults (though a few are just horrible, like the Gandalf vs. WK scene, which I would have hated even if I hadn't read the book first, and the Frodo - Flying Nazgul scene, to name a few).

They still do have some of the magic of the first time, but obviously, as I think Lalwendë meant, a little goes every time you watch it. But the music and the scenery does carry you (well at least me) into it. As alatar said, the setting, and your feelings towards it (For example, excitement when it first came out) are also quite important.


Also, remember: The movies were much better than any other LOTR movies ever made, and we often take that for granted.