How to do a LOTR movie.
j...@uclink3.berkeley.edu
a movie of Tolkien's Lord of the Rings. This is my personal idea as to
how such a movie should be made. Feel free to agree or disagree.
First, you can't do it all in one movie without completely
desecrating what JRRT has produced. If he did the Third Age in four
books, then you have to do it in four movies. If done correctly, the
first movies would easily attract enough money and audience to be able to
reproduce themselves.
Second, there should be no singing, unless it is the part of the
book where Tolkien decided that a brief soundtrack was necessary. Even
then, music is negotiable. But I have seen all three animated films of
the Trilogy, and the one thing that really annoyed me (besides the
overall quality of the films themselves) was that whenever the movie
actually began to be interesting, the main characters would immediately
break out into some damn ditty whose general sugar-coated lyrics and
music would make me want to vomit. In a way, I felt that what I was
watching was a children's cartoon, not a serious representation of a
quite adult piece of literature.
The child approach is the approach to avoid in the movie. We are
seriously looking at PG to PG-13 rating here, which means that Disney
can't have it, unless it goes under the Touchstone label. The movies
have to be a little scary, but I think that should embody what JRRT was
thinking; that this was a conflict of good versus evil where some
political undertones exist, and not simply a group of shiny leprechauns
with rings fighting against a dark bogeyman that resembles an eyeball.
The director and the screenplay writer should be die-hard fans of
Tolkien, and they should be completely uncompromising as far as the story
is concerned. What really pissed me off in the Bakshi film was that
Frodo and Sam encountered Treebeard and the Ents in Ithilien, and not in
Fangorn. To me, this completely made their existence negligible. What
made the Ents significant was that they saved the West by first sacking
Isengard, and then coming to aid Rohan at the Hornburg. Were it not for
them, Rohan would not have gotten to Minas Tirith in time, being too
intent on mopping up the remainder of Saruman's forces.
Basically, the original story should not be changed, except to
fill any time (or financial) constraints which may arise. However, the
story does not need to be changed. Simply using what Tolkien has written
and applying a camera to it would be enough. Imagine this scenario for
the final secondss of The Two Towers:
We see Pippin and Gandalf riding off east towards Minas Tirith in
the direction of the red rising sun (symbolic of Sauron perhaps?).
Immediately the scene switches to the dark corridor near Cirith Ungol
where we see Sam, with the Ring, haulin' ass after the Orcs that have
just grabbed Frodo (Keep in mind that Two Towers would constantly be
switching from West to East and back again). But, as he's just about to
catch up to the Orcs and perhaps save his master, a climax that would
have everyone in the theater on the edges of their seats, the gate comes
crashing down, Sam cannot stop himself in time (or just doesn't see it),
and falls to the ground after knocking in to it. At that moment, the
screen goes black and the credits begin, leaving everyone thirsty for
more, and of the realization that they have just witnessed one of the
biggest cliffhangers since when Empire Strikes Back ended and everyone
was wondering how their favorite villain could have fathered their
favorite hero. Here, they would be wondering whether Frodo would bite it
or not, and whether Sam could fulfill the quest by himself.
Either way, it would be a good set of movies. Oh, yeah, they
would be live-action also, not animated. That would help.
Tell me what you think,
Jason C Carnevale
Iler Ryan
I too have thought a lot about a LOTR film(s). I disagree about your
views on music though. Altough the music did get a bit annoying in the
animated versions music is obviously essential to any film. I'd like to
see Tom Bombadil (sp?) singing and dancing around. How about Leonard
Nemoy as Elrond? I could sit here forever thinkning up a cast list to no
avail. To any directors, produces, writers out there. Write up a
proposal and get this thing on the move! :)
Ryan Iler
James B. Witker III
Iler Ryan <il...@server.uwindsor.ca> wrote:
It'll take a while, but I promise we're trying...
Jamie
Mark Rabuck (GD 1996)
: > I'd like to
: > see Tom Bombadil (sp?) singing and dancing around. How about Leonard
: > Nemoy as Elrond?
Let's have a little fun. Who would you NOT want to see in a film version
of LOTR?
Just some ideas...
Leonard Nemoy as Bombadil
Bobcat Goldthwait as Gandalf
Ahh-nuld Schwarzenegger as Pippin
Jack Nicholson as Frodo
The possibilities are endless...
--
Mark W. Rabuck | Et quid erat, quod me delectabat,
116 Bishop St. Apt. B | nisi amare et amari?
New Haven, CT 06511 | --Augustine, _Confessionum_, II.2
Iler Ryan
> Date: 5 FEB 1995 13:40:56 GMT
> From: Mark Rabuck <mwra...@minerva.cis.yale.edu>
> Newgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
> Subject: Re: How to do a LOTR movie.
HEY!! Yer scare'n me man. :) I could really see "Ahh-nuld" as
Pippen though. Just use a funny lens to make him look like short and
stocky...
Ryan Iler
Iler Ryan
> Date: 5 FEB 1995 01:49:34 GMT
> From: James B. Witker III <jbw...@lulu.acns.nwu.edu>
> Newgroups: alt.fan.tolkien
> Subject: Re: How to do a LOTR movie.
>
You say "we". In what way are you assosciated with the film
industry? I'd love to hear some of your ideas. I am a film student
myself and such things are of obvious interest to me.
Ryan Iler
MARKO PERIC
>
>Let's have a little fun. Who would you NOT want to see in a film version
>of LOTR?
>
>Just some ideas...
> Leonard Nemoy as Bombadil
> Bobcat Goldthwait as Gandalf
> Ahh-nuld Schwarzenegger as Pippin
> Jack Nicholson as Frodo
>
>The possibilities are endless...
>
How about:
Jim Varney as Denethor
Rodeny Dangerfield as Aragorn
Christopher Lloyd as Gandalf
Robbin Williams as the Nazgul Lord
Marko
**********************************************************************
| Marko Peric, |
| mpe...@stu1.cs.upei.ca |
|********************************************************************|
| "A mudslide will rise to meet you, gathering snow as it falls, |
| sweeping across the ocean like a tidal wave, and rise from the |
| ashes like a phoneix, to sting you with its tentacles!" |
**********************************************************************
pbk...@ibm.net
>>of LOTR?
>>Just some ideas...
>> Leonard Nemoy as Bombadil
>> Bobcat Goldthwait as Gandalf
>> Ahh-nuld Schwarzenegger as Pippin
>> Jack Nicholson as Frodo
> Jim Varney as Denethor
> Rodeny Dangerfield as Aragorn
> Christopher Lloyd as Gandalf
> Robbin Williams as the Nazgul Lord
How 'bout?
Rosanne Arnold as the Lady Arwen
James Earl Jones as Legolas
Michael Douglas as Gimle
The guy who plays "Scotty" as Samwise Gamge
Pee-Wee Herman as Elrond
Manual Lewis as the Gaffer
'Shaq' O'neil as Farimir
Gary Coleman as Theoden, Lord of the Mark.
Who do we really not want to be Gollum?
Who do we not want to be Bilbo?
Chad Ryan Thomas
We'd better put an end to this thread soon, or I'll start having nightmares.
Chad Ryan Thomas
****************************************************************************
|"The realm of fairy-story is wide and deep and high and filled with many |
| things...but its very richness and strangeness tie the tongue of a |
| traveller who would report them." -- J.R.R. Tolkien |
| |
|"A fairytale, a sonata, a gathering storm, a limitless night, siezes you |
| and sweeps you away." -- George McDonald |
****************************************************************************
david....@co.hennepin.mn.us
>Who do we really not want to be Gollum?
Macauley Culkin.
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
David Emerson
..In every wood, in every spring, there is a different green...
Martijn Dashorst
newsgroup readers. Please cross-post to alt.movies.spielberg and alt.fan.tolkien,
so we can all follow this thread without checking both groups. (The activity in
alt.movies.spielberg is "very" low).
---
This article is a reply of a posting in the alt.movies.spielberg newsgroup
The statement was, that Spielberg was the only director who could do Tolkien's
LOTR justice. In a follow-up it was stated that George Lucas had bought the
right to perform the "make" of the book.
---
This subject is very interesting! I've had a while ago with some of my
friends a discussion about this very subject.
We thought that there would be more director's needed to perform such a
huge task. But Spielberg and Lucas were the first we thought of.
Here's my two p. worth:
Gandalf : Sean Connery (with long beard)
Saruman : Commander Pikard (Star Trek the Next Gen.)
Gollum : Dany de Vito (needs to loose a couple of pounds)
Aragorn : Val Kilmer
Any other permutations are welcome.
Martijn
---
+--------------------------+------------------------------------------------+
! MWE Dashorst ! e-mail: dash...@cs.utwente.nl !
! student ! www: http://www.cs.utwente.nl/~dashorst !
! Faculteit Informatica ! tel: 074-439303 !
! Universiteit Twente ! motto: "Reduce wint het van je" !
+--------------------------+------------------------------------------------+
"Sometimes I think the surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere
in the universe is that none of it has tried to contact us!"
Calvin & Hobbes
Bob Turley
As for Gandalf what about Sir Micheal Horden (exellent in BBC radio
play) I think he's still around?.
--
Bob
SAVOIE M
>From: b...@erebor.demon.co.uk (Bob Turley)
>Subject: Re: How to do a LOTR movie.
Put a bit of hair on Mr Stewart and you _have_ Elrond.
Cheers,
Mark
Chris Stevens
Organization: IQuest Network Services
X-Newsreader: WinVN 0.91.6
In article <3iq90p$l...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>, acro...@aol.com
(ACrossett) says:
>
>OK...
>
>CHRISTOPHER LAMBERT as Aragorn;
>SEAN CONNERY as Gandalf
>ANTHONY HOPKINS as King Theoden
>CHARLTON HESTON as Denethor
>LOU DIAMOND PHILLIPS as Legolas
>ARMIN SHIMERMAN as Gimli
>MAX VON SYDOW as Saruman
>KATHLEEN TURNER as Galadriel
>MALCOLM MacDOWELL as Wormtongue
>VAL KILMER as Faramir
>MEL GIBSON as Boromir
>IAN ANDERSON as Tom Bombadil
>EMMA THOMPSON as Goldberry
>JENNIFER LIEN (from _Star Trek: Voyager_) as Eowyn
>KENNETH BRANAGH as Elrond
>RUSH LIMBAUGH as the Mouth of Sauron
>WALLACE SHAWN as Gollum
>??? as the Hobbits
>
>ADC
Ian Anderson as Tom Bombadil....excellent
Andrew Chalupka
(Martijn Dashorst) wrote:
> This subject is very interesting! I've had a while ago with some of my
> friends a discussion about this very subject.
> We thought that there would be more director's needed to perform such a
> huge task. But Spielberg and Lucas were the first we thought of.
>
> Here's my two p. worth:
> Gandalf : Sean Connery (with long beard)
Yep...this is my choice as well. Actually, I've always pictured Gandalf as
looking like Sean Connery.
> Saruman : Commander Pikard (Star Trek the Next Gen.)
That would be Patrick Stewart. Yeah, that would be good. They'd have to
give him hair, though...
> Gollum : Dany de Vito (needs to loose a couple of pounds)
This is a joke right? Gollum was originally a hobbit...no way Devito could
"fit" the part (pun intended)
> Aragorn : Val Kilmer
Not bad...but I think Christopher Lambert would be a great Aragorn. He's
got the 'strange accent' and lots of sword-fighting experience. He would
be pretty convincing if you ask me...
Andrew
--
e-mail: chal...@bnr.ca
"There's nothing wrong with shooting ... as long as the right people
get shot." -- Dirty Harry
Bob Turley
would make good hobbits (John Rappaport etc.( I think))
Bob
Louis Epstein
: You ask .... ??? Hobbits, ever see 'Time Bandits', those chaps
If you mean David Rappaport,he committed suicide some years ago.
az...@gti.gti.net
>From: acro...@aol.com (ACrossett)
>Subject: Re: How to do a LOTR movie.
>OK...
>CHARLTON HESTON as Denethor
I still think Ray Walston (My Favorite Martian) would make a great Denethor,
especially in his madness
Louis Epstein
: In <3j03nt$9...@tzlink.j51.com> lep...@j51.com (Louis Epstein) writes:
: >
: >Eric (Red...@ix.netcom.com) wrote:
: >: In <D4MJ5...@dorite.use.com> kb...@iquest.net (Chris Stevens)
: writes:
: >
: >: [long list o' names deleted]
: >
: >
: >(Alec Guinness unknown?Peter Cushing unknown?)
: >
: >
: following what I said before....who?
: sorry for such a repost, but yes, I know Alec Guinness was in SW, among
: countless other movies, same with Peter Cushing...but who do people
: really remember from SW (who are big stars now)?
Hawwison Fudd.
Mark Rabuck (GD 1996)
: sorry for such a repost, but yes, I know Alec Guinness was in SW, among
: countless other movies, same with Peter Cushing...but who do people
: really remember from SW (who are big stars now)?
Perhaps not Peter Cushing. He died last year.