So ends the Third Age.

Here reprinted by permission of the author, namely me, is my opinion of Peter Jackson and all of his post Aussie-slasher works.

This was stimulated by wandering through the science fiction and fantasy section of Borders, and seeing, I kid you not, "The Backstory of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings For Dummies" on the shelf. I postulate that, in fact, the movies were made from that volume, rather than anything actually written by J.R.R.


My Heart May Be Full of Bile, But Viggo Mortensen's Mouth Is Full of Choad: A Review of Peter Jackson's The Two Towers
by E. Worthington, Esq.

Perhaps the second thing which should have aroused my anxieties concerning the film The Two Towers was the fact that the screenplay was written by director Peter Jackson's wife, Frances Walsh. (The first thing, of course, was the abysmal paucity of merit in its prequel, The Fellowship of the Ring.) Now, it is of course possible that a screenwriter could be hired out of sheer nepotism and still, by chance, possess some modicum of talent. Unfortunately, we were not so lucky in this instance. Ms. Walsh is a member of the 1% of the population who could genuinely benefit from a junior college English class, the kind where they teach you about metaphors for 17 weeks or so. Hmm . . . let's think for a moment, shall we, class? Just based on the fact that The Lord of the Rings is a novel of the fantasy genre, perhaps the theme might be, to hazard a guess, Good versus Evil.

Very well, this established, some keywords for Good: intelligence, morality, honor, dignity, nobility . . . these are words which we fervently wish we could apply to the film's representations of Tolkien's characters. To our dismay, however, every single one of them has been transformed, through Ms. Walsh's magical keyboard, into a shaggy, uncouth caricature of him or herself. (I would suspect her of having accidentally mistaken the Harvard Lampoon's Bored of the Rings for the original text, and adapted that into a screenplay, were there any trace of the collegiate satirists' wit, style, and ingenuity to be found in the script of the movie.) The most glaring example of this is the conversion of Aragorn, who is (according to Tolkien - I assume most would accept him as an authority in this matter) over a hundred years old, and the descendant of the ancient kings of Middle-Earth. He is above and beyond the normal man: his wisdom is second only to that of Gandalf and the Elven elders, his strength and resilience are unparalleled, his greatness of soul undoubted.

But, hey presto! Suddenly he is a swaggering biker-movie escapee, with his head thoroughly soaked in canola oil. One scene, which it pains me to recall, is a particularly good exemplar of this. He strides into Theoden's great hall, shoving the doors open violently, and shakes the excess grease from his head like a dog, spattering the guards with droplets. The expression on his face could only be described as sulky. From dignity to the puerile pique of offended machismo: what a marvellous imaginative journey Frances Walsh has made.

Of course, she cannot bear the entire weight of the blame. And she doesn't need to -- there's plenty to go around. Someone other than her had to have decided to cast Viggo Mortensen in the role of Aragorn. I say, blame Peter Jackson, who really should have known better. Even the unknown, inexpert actors whom he hired to star in his 1987 alien-invasion tour-de-force Bad Taste had more than two-and-a-half facial expressions, which upon careful observation is the most that can be credited to Mr. Mortensen.

In a like manner, the personality of almost all of the characters has been drained out of them by this film. Theoden, instead of reviving his strength of will, and desire to have some control over his own destiny (as evinced by his decision to go to Isengard and confront Saruman), just gets highlights and a bad case of yellow-belly. Essentially, he changes not at all, and is the same wimpy loser he was when Wormtongue ran the show.

Faramir, whose decision to let Frodo go his way was in direct contrast to his brother Boromir's weakness in the face of temptation, as Tolkien had it, is now a second Boromir, attempting to take the ring from Frodo and then realizing the error of his ways. David Wenham is obviously a competent actor, and was actually well cast in the role of Faramir. The part which was written for him is a travesty, but he can't be faulted for that. But the portion of the film dealing with Faramir is poor not only from the perspective of plot accuracy, but also simply as filmmaking. Much time is taken to show Frodo and Sam struggling on foot through the wilderness, but when Faramir takes them to Osgiliath, and then brings them back to Ithilien, mere seconds of travel time are allowed. It is a mind-bending continuity error, to say the least.

But to the issue at hand. The essential problems with this film are then, first, the lack of understanding of the underlying point of the story, and second, the gross plot changes which are apparently made at random. Granted, a director who has to work with Hollywood is compelled to make some changes, some allowances for a shallow, puerile audience, in adapting literature to the big screen. Two different media require different methods. Well and good. For example, the omission of Tom Bombadil in the first movie is understandable; there is no practical way to present that segment of the story in a format which a mass market audience would appreciate. Omitting the entire journey to Isengard, however, not only seriously retards the development of the plot but deprives this same audience of one of the most exciting and interesting episodes of the story.

And some changes seem self-defeating. The addition of a battalion of Elvish warriors who arrive at Helm's Deep just in time to save the day is not only stupid in and of itself, but takes so much screen time that other things have to be edited out. Instead of sending Elves from Rivendell, why did they not simply include Aragorn and Eomer's heroics, or the dark trees, the Huorns from the heart of Fangorn forest? These things are exciting, adventurous, atmospheric, and lend themselves very well to portrayal on film. Not to mention, they were actually imagined and written by Tolkien, who in case you've forgotten (as Peter Jackson and his lovely bride seem to have done), actually wrote this story in the first place.

Not only have they eviscerated the plot, but along with it they have sucked out any actual soul or meaning which was to be found and replaced it with the very worst of teenage "culture," if such a word can be applied in this context. But, as I expected nothing better, I am not disappointed. So much for standards.