Peter Jackson Explains Why the ‘Hobbit’ Movies Are Such a Huge Mess

[The Sixth Wizard]

I was going to post that video as I just came across it on Youtube. It's definitely sad what became of the Hobbit as a film.

Honestly, I think the idea that the original LOTR movies need to be remade because of the long list of nitpicks above is pretty bunk. We simply cannot expect a film series to be meticulously faithful to a book series. I get that this is a Tolkien fan forum but we can't have our cake and eat it too. Most fantasy films, and films in general to be honest, are rubbish. There has never before or since been a fantasy epic which received LOTR's level of care, love, financial input, polish and still managed to be largely faithful to the source material while becoming a cultural phenomenon.

Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials series, for example, had the Mulefa, a fantastical race of elephant-like creatures, cut out in the stage version and characters accordingly deleted. It still received good reviews, as far as I'm aware. Imagine how bad the LOTR films could have been with half the budget, half the run time and nobody who really understood the source material?

I think adaptations have to be faithful to the spirit of the source material, not the detail. This video, which includes a discussion of the LOTR movies, has shaped my opinion here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ek2O6bVAIQQ

What is the spirit of the LOTR series? Basically, it's about small, brave, humble people triumphing over large, important, arrogant, powerful people. It's about pity and mercy, with violence as a last resort. And it's about having an adventure in a world which feels enormous.

This is why I feel the extended cuts of the LOTR trilogy are detrimental to the trilogy's experience. There are several moments in the extended edition which justify violence and fetishise it, much more than in the theatrical release. Think of Aragorn decapitating the Mouth of Sauron, who hadn't lifted a hand to attack him. Think of how Saruman dies like a comic book character, falling on to a spike. There is also an exchange between Gimli and Legolas where they talk about their kill counts after Helm's Deep. Rightly, these scenes were cut.

This sort of stuff is still there in the release (Legolas's exploits at surfing and Muma-killing particularly annoy me) but overall I think the spirit I mentioned above is pretty well preserved. The lines which stick with us from LOTR are Gandalf's "pity is what stayed Bilbo's hand", Sam's "I can carry you", and Theoden's sacrificial speech at Pelennor. We have the Hobbits, who, although they have to be sidelined sometimes by the epic stuff for the sake of cinema, are still central to the plot. We have quiet, serious moments and an ending emphasis on homecoming (I have come to terms with the fact that the Scouring of the Shire had to be cut - you can't have a second sub-climax in a nine hour epic). Basically, the spirit is retained.

The Hobbit movies, needless to say, were trash, because they didn't have any of the spirit of either book. Strangely, despite their long running time, the world of The Hobbit felt smaller after watching those movies. Once you see too much of a world, it starts having to repeat itself and the magic is broken. And the tone of the series is completely off. It doesn't know if it wants to be an epic, an adventure tale, a light-hearted comedy, or musing on greed. It doesn't know which characters are important. It's a mish-mash of rubbish. Let's just forget it happened.

[Nerwen]

Originally Posted by The Sixth Wizard

I was going to post that video as I just came across it on Youtube. It's definitely sad what became of the Hobbit as a film.

Honestly, I think the idea that the original LOTR movies need to be remade because of the long list of nitpicks above is pretty bunk. We simply cannot expect a film series to be meticulously faithful to a book series. I get that this is a Tolkien fan forum but we can't have our cake and eat it too.

I believe this may well be the most anti-film Tolkien fan forum on the internet... and I've still never seen anything like that list before. It's... amazing.

[Inziladun]

Originally Posted by The Sixth Wizard

We simply cannot expect a film series to be meticulously faithful to a book series. I get that this is a Tolkien fan forum but we can't have our cake and eat it too.

Personally, I just didn't want the cake.

The LOTR films were made with care, critically acclaimed, yeah yeah yeah.

Doughnuts are really tasty, but they're full of empty calories that I don't need in order to live.
That's PJ's films for me: in one word, unnecessary.

[Kuruharan]

Originally Posted by The Sixth Wizard

I get that this is a Tolkien fan forum but we can't have our cake and eat it too.

I think we should be allowed to want a different kind of cake.

Perhaps in this instance a cake that doesn't have so much stupid trash in it like elves at Helm's Deep, Faramir trying to take the Ring back to Minas Tirith until a Nazgul suddenly shows up, Théoden being reluctant to go aid Gondor, Denethor being a cowardly lunatic, the list goes on and on.

I have yet to see a sound justification as to why changes like these were needed to successfully adapt the novels to film.

[Morsul the Dark]

There was clearly a lot chsnged in LOTR book to film but on some level adaptation is expected they're just too different in mediums. The book (if ever done again) should be a series on par with Game of Thrones.

The Hobbit is a different animal. It really only needed one film, even two would have been stretching but ok. I watched the first in theatres knowing it was a trilogy and never watched the other two.

It wasn't an adaptation. It was a story based on the characters. It wasn't even entertaining which is the worst bit. The Bashki cartoon was more faithful.

[Morthoron]

Originally Posted by Kuruharan

I think we should be allowed to want a different kind of cake.

Perhaps in this instance a cake that doesn't have so much stupid trash in it like elves at Helm's Deep, Faramir trying to take the Ring back to Minas Tirith until a Nazgul suddenly shows up, Théoden being reluctant to go aid Gondor, Denethor being a cowardly lunatic, the list goes on and on.

I have yet to see a sound justification as to why changes like these were needed to successfully adapt the novels to film.

I don't want sh*t all over my cake, thank you.

[Nerwen]

Originally Posted by Kuruharan

I think we should be allowed to want a different kind of cake.

Perhaps in this instance a cake that doesn't have so much stupid trash in it like elves at Helm's Deep, Faramir trying to take the Ring back to Minas Tirith until a Nazgul suddenly shows up, Théoden being reluctant to go aid Gondor, Denethor being a cowardly lunatic, the list goes on and on.

I have yet to see a sound justification as to why changes like these were needed to successfully adapt the novels to film.

Can I give the perspective of someone with actual media experience and training? In my view, many of the changes from book to film are justified due to the need for time compression and visual drama. This is, of course the "different mediums" argument in a nutshell, and I think it's fair as far as it goes.

But the things you're talking about- no. TTT (the film) especially has some strange storytelling decisions in it which I can't defend artistically and which I think might have more to do with the production history than anything else. I didn't realise this until recently, but it seems originally Jackson & Co. wrote the script for LotR as two films, meaning, presumeably, that everything in TTT (the book) was either cut or moved. And then when they did get the green light for three films, I suppose the middle part had to be sort of Frankensteined out of a.) the other scripts, b.) the Appendices and c.) thin air. I think the result is still a decent film, but arguably the fact they got away with it that time set an unfortunate precedent.

As an example of a major change I think was quite justified: giving Glorfindel's role to Arwen. Yes, I know you're all going to scream- but the fact is the "Glorfindel" section occupies such a tiny amount of screentime that there would have been no time to do anything with the character anyway. It would have been quite weird to introduce an apparently significant character only to have him disappear after a minute, never to be seen again. (Tolkien, by contrast, had a lot more time/space to work with).

I think much of the hostility to the "different mediums" argument from book fans comes from the way it has often been used as a supposedly irrefutable blanket defence of, well, everything. Also, perhaps, the fact that some of its proponents want to have their cake and eat it- some people who don't think the films should be like the books ("different mediums, guys") will happily bash the books for not being more like the films ("all those boring descriptions"). This was particularly noticeable in "The Hobbit" honeymoon period, when one heard quite a lot about how Jackson had "treated the material with more respect than Tolkien ever did"- because apparently JRRT wrote the book as a children's story by mistake.

[Galadriel55]

I have been recently introduced to a Finnish adaptation of LOTR. It was made with little budget, no CGI, no fancy action scenes, but really good acting and many book dialogues. I thought it was brilliant. But the thing is, there's also very little plot. Most of it is described in narration. It's the exact opposite of PJ movies: long slow dialogue scenes are connected by plot summary narration. No proper movie nowadays would make such choice. But what we get is very good acting, nearly pure Tolkien dialogues, theme and character exploration - and I think that's what many of us want to see when we think of a good screen adaptation. So hope is probably better placed in low budget fan films than in large scale productions.

[Zigûr]

Yes, for me a lot of the "spirit" is found in Professor Tolkien's particular use of language, which for me at least is rather "music to my ears", and the dignity and high seriousness of much of the work. These are elements I don't think the films capture at all well. For instance I find a little lightness of heart from the Hobbits in the book highly preferable to the film's tendency to have Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli crack jokes or for characters like Denethor to be presented as grotesque and vulgar (which makes him annoying rather than tragic).

Ultimately however the adaptation is just an adaptation, and to me the book is the "real" thing, so it almost doesn't matter to me anymore because no adaptation is going to be able to give me what the book gives me - because it's not the book.

Over the years this train of thought has led me not towards wanting more faithful adaptations of source materials I already like, but rather towards a view that there is a certain kind of adaptation, typically the 'straightforward page to screen' one, which is quite pointless beyond making me aware of the source material, which I inevitably prefer.

[The Sixth Wizard]

I found this interesting article which suggests that JRRT would support Jackson's adaptation had he been alive to see it. At least, he would have been less hostile towards the trilogy than Christopher Tolkien turned out to be.

http://www.theonering.net/torwp/2013...-of-the-rings/

I think we need to remember that JRRT was already a practiced borrower and integrator of different sources - old English myths, Scandinavian myths, stories of civilisational conflict, mixed with his training as a linguist. I wouldn't say he was the Jimmy Page of fantasy, but obviously he drew on many sources and he was open to revisions and re-tellings of his stories to some extent. He revised Gollum's chapter in The Hobbit, for example, as part of his effort to integrate his two main works with each other. And before CT collated the Silmarillion, there was no set backstory to Middle Earth outside of what's written in LOTR. He said he was trying to create a sort of English national myth, a story which was more like history than fiction. Why wouldn't he be in favour of its realisation on the big screen?

As a side point, I will never understand why George RR Martin allowed the Game of Thrones show to be made before he finished his novels. Surely he must have known that he wouldn't finish A Time for Wolves by the end of the HBO series. It's a travesty that the ending to our generation's fantasy epic will be spoiled by a couple of hack showrunners who have to invent the characters' dialogue and actions from a list of plot points. I guess that's what the offer of a truckload of money will do to an author. But JRRT's seminal work is forever complete and self-contained - no movie trilogy, however terrible, can undermine it as an experience. Luckily, Jackson's first effort was pretty good.

As an example of a major change I think was quite justified: giving Glorfindel's role to Arwen.

Definitely have to agree with that, especially given the modern world's gender politics. If the films were totally faithful, Eowyn's cameo in ROTK would be just about the only female appearance in the entire series. Remember that she gets hitched to a stranger almost immediately afterwards! There's Galadriel too, but she isn't exactly a relatable character for women.

I think we should be allowed to want a different kind of cake.

Perhaps in this instance a cake that doesn't have so much stupid trash in it like elves at Helm's Deep, Faramir trying to take the Ring back to Minas Tirith until a Nazgul suddenly shows up, Théoden being reluctant to go aid Gondor, Denethor being a cowardly lunatic, the list goes on and on.

I think I can justify a few of those changes. Movies need more explicit, character-driven tension than books, story arcs with clear conclusions, whereas I think that space can be filled with exploration and worldbuilding in written form, because we experience the story in each character's mind rather than as a vista. The enjoyment of meeting Faramir in the novel comes from learning about his people and history, and we don't need him to desire the ring to keep us entertained. But it would undermine the dread surrounding the Ring to see him resist it in the film. We've already seen Galadriel, Gandalf and Aragorn bypass the temptation of the Ring at that point - how can we fear its corruption if some guy we just met resists it as well? It gives our heroes another challenge beyond "pit-stop at the Forbidden Pool" for TTT.

The same goes for Theoden, unfortunately. Narrative tension must be driven by characters. The book's excitement comes from material constraints - can they muster enough of the Rohirrim and travel to the Pelennor in time? There is less sense of geography in a film, where characters can travel hundreds of kilometres between scenes, without page-turning establishing a feeling of time passing, so we need something else to establish the same narrative roadblocks. That's why we need Denethor refusing aid, Theoden refusing to help, Faramir's rout, and Gondor's military failure all building towards the final triumph. The long list of failures makes final success more vivid - Theoden's initial reluctance ramps up his change of heart and bravery in the battle as well. Think of the movie Ents initially deciding to take no action, for another such example. I do agree that Denethor was a badly-written caricature, though.

To me, the most annoying, but not deal-breaking features of the films are a) tonal shifting between gritty realism and video-game action and b) character setbacks which are particularly contrived.

For the former, think of Legolas riding an Oliphaunt minutes after we've watched hundreds of skilled riders fail to take it down. We want our characters to do heroic things, but we want their feet on the ground when they do it. We can accept Eomer throwing his spear through the Mumak's handler, as a once-off, because he still seems mortal while doing it, but Legolas's antics were a step too far. If he simply shot it through the eye from a distance, PJ could have still hit the hammy "still only counts as one" dad-joke and our credulity would be intact. Maybe even make it a bit of character development since the fight scene in FOTR, where Legolas has to try three times to hit that cave troll in the neck (that would actually be a cool idea ... I wish I was on set for these movies). Another example was the Bridge of Khazad-dum bit, with the pillars conveniently swinging like a pendulum for our heroes to leap. What was so likeable about LOTR was how we could see the rain on the Uruks' helmets and the rust on their blades, how we felt the pain of Boromir being pin-cushioned and Frodo losing his fingers. We were viscerally engaged, on the ground, in the action scenes, despite their heroic elements. It goes without saying that Hobbit CGI trilogy was all video-game, and no grit.

For the latter, I think of Frodo deciding to tell Sam to "go home" as a plot contrivance in ROTK, and Aragorn falling off a cliff, Skyfall-style in TTT. I get that these movies needed something interesting to happen in the middle of their three-hour runtime, but those two examples stood out for me most as cliched or out-of-character. I was also a bit annoyed that Pippin and Gimli were painted as quite so stupid and comical, respectively. Then again, the uniform, demonstrative heroism of every Walker in the novel is a bit boring too (don't shoot me for that one). I would cut a few scenes and lines as egregious in all three films, like Pippin dropping the suit of armour in FOTR to set off the goblins. Again, these aren't massive quibbles, because they don't really affect the core elements of the story. They don't affect the communication of the themes of the work, unlike in The Hobbit, where Bilbo is nonsensically sidelined for large parts of a story supposedly about his courage and self-development.

I think we can definitely tell when dialogue has been written by an author rather than a screenwriter, and the more authorial source material, the better (assuming they're a decent author and not Suzanne Collins). You can just imagine how certain lines would have been written had there not been written dialogue to parse from the novel in LOTR. "I would cut off your head, dwarf, if it stood but a little higher from the ground" would become something like "don't make me behead you, dwarf". Gandalf's fantastic dialogue would be eviscerated. This is what makes me fear most for A Song of Ice and Fire, actually, as the showrunners have finally expended the last dregs of source dialogue now, and I think the difference will be (ahem) stark next season.

[Morsul the Dark]

I'll defend the Pippin Armor Well scene.
The book has Pippin deliberately drop a stone in the well. It never sat well with me that that somehow alerted the goblins and orcs. The armor on the other hand a loud banging clanging ruckus makes much more sense to me.

[Galin]

Originally Posted by Morsul the Dark

(...) It never sat well with me that that somehow alerted the goblins and orcs.

But all it takes is one goblin going to the well once too often.

Also one can never go to the goblin versus orc argument (orc/goblin same exact thing) too often! Beware of thread hijack. It can happen.

[Nerwen]

Originally Posted by Morsul the Dark

I'll defend the Pippin Armor Well scene.
The book has Pippin deliberately drop a stone in the well. It never sat well with me that that somehow alerted the goblins and orcs. The armor on the other hand a loud banging clanging ruckus makes much more sense to me.

You know what, though, to me that's a perfect illustration of what works in a novel vs a film, with neither necessarily being superior.

In the book, Pippin idly drops a stone down the well in the guard-room; they hear the ominous "tom-tap-tom" hammer, and hope nothing will come of it. This seems to be correct, they go on their way, and only later when they get ambushed in the Chamber of Mazarbul does it become clear that the goblins- or as it may be orcs- which are of course the same thing- or are they? were alerted.

In the film, the well is in the Chamber and the stone is replaced by an armoured skeleton which makes an awful clatter and causes an immediate response from the denizens of Moria.

Both of these are fine with respect to their different formats- a novel can afford to move slower and spend more time building up atmosphere; a film has to be quicker and (often) more spectacular.

[Galin]

(...) And before CT collated the Silmarillion, there was no set backstory to Middle Earth outside of what's written in LOTR. He said he was trying to create a sort of English national myth, a story which was more like history than fiction. Why wouldn't he be in favour of its realisation on the big screen?

I believe Tolkien was open to the idea at one point, until he saw a film treatment filled with (in his opinion) unnecessary alterations and large scale point-missings, illustrated by his comments in the "Zimmerman letter". After that, I think he closed the door, and only later gave way due to cash fears, plus feeling that he had "once" made a sorta-agreement with his publisher (cash or kudos), concerning which he was later reminded of more than once, by his publisher.

(...) But JRRT's seminal work is forever complete and self-contained - no movie trilogy, however terrible, can undermine it as an experience. Luckily, Jackson's first effort was pretty good.

I think the first three were mediocre, and bad in plenty of places. Add three later awfuls. And I wonder what the author of The Wizard of Oz would have to say about media colonization. In theory your first statement might be true. Even one of the Unwins tried something similar with Tolkien: the book is inviolate no matter what some filmmaker does with it on screen... that said, I think films can undermine book experiences in ways and measures, which is why I would advise folks read Tolkien's books before seeing Jackson's films.

[giving Glorfindel's role to Arwen] Definitely have to agree with that, especially given the modern world's gender politics. If the films were totally faithful, Eowyn's cameo in ROTK would be just about the only female appearance in the entire series. Remember that she gets hitched to a stranger almost immediately afterwards! There's Galadriel too, but she isn't exactly a relatable character for women.

What I wouldn't agree with is Arwen needing to take Glorfindel's role to have a larger role in the films, nor did her entrance need to be altered in the way it was altered, once that decision was made.

In any case, Jackson's stated reason here was basically that there were too many introductions at this point, including a character that would drop out of the story. An arguable film concern, which again, does not lead only to his specific choice of how to address that concern.


And so on and so forth, mediums are different. Lather, rinse, repeat

[The Sixth Wizard]

Even one of the Unwins tried something similar with Tolkien: the book is inviolate no matter what some filmmaker does with it on screen... that said, I think films can undermine book experiences in ways and measures, which is why I would advise folks read Tolkien's books before seeing Jackson's films.

Yes, I agree with that strongly as well. That's why I fear for George RR Martin's tale. Almost nobody will have experienced the ending in its unadulterated form once it is finished. People had forty years to enjoy LOTR as a novel standing alone, but ASOIAF isn't going to be given that grace. Ah well.

[Nerwen]

Originally Posted by Galin

What I wouldn't agree with is Arwen needing to take Glorfindel's role to have a larger role in the films, nor did her entrance need to be altered in the way it was altered, once that decision was made.

In any case, Jackson's stated reason here was basically that there were too many introductions at this point, including a character that would drop out of the story. An arguable film concern, which again, does not lead only to his specific choice of how to address that concern.

Ah, I didn't know that was his stated reason- but as you see it occurred to me anyway. So there must be something in it.

Originally Posted by Galin

But all it takes is one goblin going to the well once too often.

Also one can never go to the goblin versus orc argument (orc/goblin same exact thing) too often! Beware of thread hijack. It can happen.

Is that a threat?

[Nerwen]

Originally Posted by The Sixth Wizard

Definitely have to agree with that, especially given the modern world's gender politics. If the films were totally faithful, Eowyn's cameo in ROTK would be just about the only female appearance in the entire series. Remember that she gets hitched to a stranger almost immediately afterwards! There's Galadriel too, but she isn't exactly a relatable character for women.

Oh, I don't know about that... *points to avatar* But then I'm a rather strange woman...
My point really is that though that particular change is often assumed to be all about gender politics, it really has just as much to do with narrative economy.

I think I can justify a few of those changes. Movies need more explicit, character-driven tension than books, story arcs with clear conclusions, whereas I think that space can be filled with exploration and worldbuilding in written form, because we experience the story in each character's mind rather than as a vista. The enjoyment of meeting Faramir in the novel comes from learning about his people and history, and we don't need him to desire the ring to keep us entertained. But it would undermine the dread surrounding the Ring to see him resist it in the film. We've already seen Galadriel, Gandalf and Aragorn bypass the temptation of the Ring at that point - how can we fear its corruption if some guy we just met resists it as well? It gives our heroes another challenge beyond "pit-stop at the Forbidden Pool" for TTT.

I'm going to disagree here- I think if the film had actually let Faramir be more like the rather atypical character in the book, it would have been believable- it's just that Film Faramir is written as very much Generic Man. Also, his arc simply ends up repeating his brother's (until the end). It feels rather redundant to me.

The same goes for Theoden, unfortunately. Narrative tension must be driven by characters. The book's excitement comes from material constraints - can they muster enough of the Rohirrim and travel to the Pelennor in time? There is less sense of geography in a film, where characters can travel hundreds of kilometres between scenes, without page-turning establishing a feeling of time passing, so we need something else to establish the same narrative roadblocks. That's why we need Denethor refusing aid, Theoden refusing to help, Faramir's rout, and Gondor's military failure all building towards the final triumph. The long list of failures makes final success more vivid - Theoden's initial reluctance ramps up his change of heart and bravery in the battle as well. Think of the movie Ents initially deciding to take no action, for another such example. I do agree that Denethor was a badly-written caricature, though.

But you see what I mean about repetitiveness? How many characters, or groups have that same "nope... nope... shan't.... wait, changed my mind, here I come!" arc? As you say, it's certainly the easiest type of obstacle to establish in a movie, and I just think the writers fell back on it too many times.

For the latter, I think of Frodo deciding to tell Sam to "go home" as a plot contrivance in ROTK, and Aragorn falling off a cliff, Skyfall-style in TTT. I get that these movies needed something interesting to happen in the middle of their three-hour runtime, but those two examples stood out for me most as cliched or out-of-character.

Well, I can see the reasoning behind wanting Frodo isolated at that point- but yes, it was clumsily handled. Aragorn-over-the-cliff is quite unnecessary and doesn't even really help build tension (or whatever it was meant to do). But that's a feeling TTT tends to give me, that there's a bit of underlying anxiety showing through: "Help, what if the audience gets bored here? I know, let's spin the Plot Complication Wheel™"

I was also a bit annoyed that Pippin and Gimli were painted as quite so stupid and comical, respectively. Then again, the uniform, demonstrative heroism of every Walker in the novel is a bit boring too (don't shoot me for that one). I would cut a few scenes and lines as egregious in all three films, like Pippin dropping the suit of armour in FOTR to set off the goblins.

Hey! That was one of my favourite bits! Besides, are you regarding it as one of the changes? Borderline, I should say- the original incident happened earlier and involved a stone, but the result was the same. And the thing with Pippin (in either version) is that he is quite a silly kid to begin with, but develops.

Agreed on Gimli. My least favourite aspect of the entire trilogy. Maybe if John Rhys-Davies was actually, you know, funny...

Again, these aren't massive quibbles, because they don't really affect the core elements of the story. They don't affect the communication of the themes of the work, unlike in The Hobbit, where Bilbo is nonsensically sidelined for large parts of a story supposedly about his courage and self-development.

What, you expected a film called "The Hobbit" to be about a hobbit? Think outside the box, man!