Latest / Mythmakers / Did Peter Jackson Get It Right? - The Return of the King Movie Reconsidered

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Did Peter Jackson Get It Right? - The Return of the King Movie Reconsidered · Mythmakers

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  Hello and welcome to MythMakers. MythMakers is the podcast for fantasy fans and fantasy
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  creatives brought to you by the Oxford Centre. For fantasy, my name is Julia Golding. I'm
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  the director of the centre but I make my most of my living as an author and today I'm
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  joined by Jacob Renekker who has come back for a third visit so we can discuss the films
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  of Peter Jackson's version of Lord of the Rings and if it's number three, where have
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  we reached Jacob? Return of the King. Oh yeah, well you see he's obviously an expert because
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  he gets the question. I heard one and took me a second and I was like I'm just one, two,
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  K, yes, the Return of the King, yeah. So what we're doing in these podcast is looking
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  back with the perspective of the 20 years on. We're thinking particularly about the creative
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  choices because we're about the writing really of these and the filmmaking so we're thinking
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  about where the room is to do a different adaptation if anyone's going to take you on in the
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  next decade or so but also what actually happened back 20 years ago, the choice is the casting,
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  the perfect moments and so on. So first of all Jacob, this is a bit of a softball for you.
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  Where does this come in your line up at the films? Yeah, three.
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  Yeah, we mentioned this before that the first, it's hard with between the first and the
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  last and then the install mix that wraps up. So yes, I'm all say, I'll say first because
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  but only barely edging out fellowship. At this moment, I will say just right now and then
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  preserving the ability to change that in five minutes from now. Okay, so for me, it's my second
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  favorite but it has the majority of my favorite moments. So that may seem a bit counterintuitive
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  but there are also some bits I don't like in it. So you know, it sort of goes in the middle,
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  it's the seesaw point in the middle. So first question for you is what would you say about the
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  overall choices that they made in these things like how the new culture of Gondor was realised
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  and those long stretches in Mordor, the big things about the film.
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  Yeah, those were good. I mean, visually, of course, visually with Gondor, the set
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  was incredible. And I thought, yeah, those are the costuming as well, right?
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  It really seemed like a unified kingdom right there. So, yeah, so I appreciate it,
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  and that kind of in the the flightness, right, of all of that and the shininess of the
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  plate armor. Now whether or not, plate armor was something that Tolkien imagined is
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  for Gondor might be a bit of a debate, but at least there was that, you know,
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  saying a shininess, brightness, contrasting, you know, your scenes of Mordor with the dark,
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  you know, darker red redder palette there. So, yeah, so I thought it was a good contrast,
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  but even though you have Gondor, it's still not perfectly white and shiny, right? It's this
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  seems like it's decaying, right? Especially with the image of the tree there in that courtyard,
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  you kind of this white pristine, almost sterilized courtyard, but it's kind of falling apart. So,
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  I thought it did a good job of showing contrasting the, you know, a light and dark, but even with the
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  light, it wasn't and you know, kind of unsullied light. It was, you know, there cracks and fissures
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  showing that this is a kingdom that's clearly in decline, but juxtaposed to Mordor makes it,
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  I think, seem brighter by contrast, but still that you see bits of that Mordor, you know,
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  the kind of corruption that are there even in the kingdom.
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  Yeah, it's very much a bone white, isn't it? Yeah, right, right. It's the black and white
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  aesthetic to the the great hall, which sets the tone. And I think that it reminds me very much
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  of the Abbey's and the architecture of northern France, even though it's a sort of Mediterranean
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  feel, I believe, that they were trying to create, particularly places like Morsamie Shell,
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  which is clearly an inspiration for the way that Minnesteria sort of rises up. I think that,
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  think your back, I didn't think this at the time, but it's something I thought since.
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  One of the things which I feel somebody could do if they're going, they're trying to find a room
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  for how do I make this different is that Minnesteria stops very abruptly at the wall,
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  whereas in the book, there's a reference to the deep, not deep in more, but a wall around
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  the field, plus evidence of farming and that kind of thing. And if you think of something
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  equivalent in real human history like the field of Waterloo, some of the skirmishes took place
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  in farmsteads and places like that. So you could actually make it feel more real by actually
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  suggesting a city that is connected to something other than a big grassy plain. So that's the one
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  thing which didn't bother me at the time. And I know that it's much simpler to put CGI on a
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  landscape, which is just basically grass, but I did think that there's an element there where it
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  doesn't feel, it feels like a fantasy place rather than a real place as a result.
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  Yeah, no, I agree. And I think that for me in going back to two towers for a moment,
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  I think some of the most effective moments, we're just tiny moments where you have
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  at, right, where we got to Rohan, and you see villagers that are being terrorized, right?
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  And you can see these children being placed on a horse by a weeping mother. So it's kind of
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  every person who is, what is it like for, you know, quote, normal people to live in this world,
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  whereas usually we're having this heightened sense of characters, you know, it's your
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  arrogance, it's your gametes, your leg illnesses, your hobbits are kind of thrown in there, but still
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  they're kind of held higher as kind of larger than my characters. But then to see, you know, dirty
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  weeping mothers who are trying to save their children. For me, that was, I think, deepened the impact
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  of the nature of the threat and the evil that is actually happening here. And so you're
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  right with Gondor, if it's just they're all kind of inside of this fortress already, you don't get
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  as much of a sense. So I didn't connect with the people that lived in Gondor. I was it.
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  Yeah, I'm sure that's a time thing because there's wonderful material in the book, which
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  let's imagine someone's doing a miniseries as opposed to a film. There's the the father and son
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  that Pippin makes, Speregond, and so you see the war from the perspective of an ordinary soldier
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  who has an important role to play in saving Faramir and his son who has an important little role,
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  but a little important role to help carry messages and in the end, help save Mary by carrying a
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  message. But it humanizes the war and also Pippin goes with the son to see the arrival of the
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  armies and you get a sense of it being just more than, you know, Denathor and Faramir. I mean,
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  there's a bigger society. It makes Gondor and it's surrounding land seem bigger. So again,
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  this is only something you would do if you had the luxury of a bigger palette rather than a film
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  you've got to get people in and out. It's a massive amount of story to tell, but there does seem to
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  me to be some really exciting material that's not covered, which could could go in the miniseries.
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  There we go. There is such a thing in our lifetimes. So that's Gondor. What about the way more
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  Gondor is handled, because that I think is a real challenge because it's meant to be
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  hard and it's meant to be that, that just relentless suffering, but putting that into a film,
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  of course, means that you don't want your audience to suffer or just the sameness. I think
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  I would imagine it's like probably the most difficult thing to do. So what did you think of
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  the Mordor parts? Yeah, I thought they did a good job of intercutting the two bad struggles
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  that are happening. So I thought that that was a good use of intercuts to keep the audience
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  from getting bogged down in that oppressiveness of Mordor, because really that's I think the
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  sense that I got this time when I was watching it was a kind of a suffocation or oppressiveness,
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  because you can almost, the air is hot. It seems like, right? And so you're almost drowning in air
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  and the weight of what Frodo's carrying and yeah, so in one way, if you would have just focused
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  on the Mordor portion for longer portions, and yeah, I can see people like that becoming a bit
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  tedious, but I thought the way that they were kind of flashing back and forth between the two
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  events was good, as well as, you know, thematically as it's following some of those themes
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  of struggles, leadership, and then by contrast as well, right, with Eric Warren, as you know,
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  King and Leading mustering this giant army with Sam and Frodo. So visually going back and forth
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  between the scope and scale, because on the one hand, you have this massive kind of traditionally
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  epic battle feel where the stakes are actually lower than the smaller scale battle. That's where
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  the stakes are at their highest or almost, you know, cosmic in scope. And so seeing both of those
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  kind of going back and forth, juggling those, the dissonance between the, yeah, the weight of the
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  struggle and the degree of the stakes for both of those was something that was more pronounced in my
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  most recent rewatch. Yeah, I think that one of the things I appreciate is the quite daring,
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  but I think very good use of little touches of humour in the Hobbit story. I'm thinking of the
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  moment when Sam is going up the stairs to say Frodo from the tower, and he's making this sort of
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  noise, which echoes, and they're expecting this enormous warrior to approach, and it's just a little
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  little Hobbit, and he strikes a blow for his gaffer. I mean, those moments of heroic behaviour,
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  but with a lovely smile of the shy value, I think a really good way of doing it. There's another
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  moment when they get caught up in their mistaken for orcs, and they get caught up in the march,
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  and they're trying to escape from the column that's going to the battlefront, because they
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  asked the wrong way, and Frodo's sort of saying, hit me, hit me, and he's sort of, there's the comedy
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  of them having this moment where they're using their Hobbit intelligence to escape from it,
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  and it's so I think very beautifully done. I think granted, it's difficult material because of
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  its darkness, and it's actually just two characters, and then obviously golem at the end, but I think
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  that they did really well on that, so hats off to the script writers and the film people for
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  actually doing that bit. What's interesting compared to the book is there are some little moments
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  where they get pursued by named orcs in the book, which I always enjoy reading, because they also
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  give you a moment when Frodo and Sam over here, what might be going on outside, which I think is
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  a very good reading experience, but I can see why you may not bother with those, as you don't want
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  to string it out too much, it's hard enough, I can see the decisions that were taken there.
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  Okay, so Jacob, what are your perfect moments in the film, where you just thought, yeah, this is
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  everything it could have been. There's a few of those, there's one, visually,
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  when Frodo and Sam and Golem are towards the beginning of the film when they've left Oskilia,
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  and they're passing the statue of the defaced king, and the head of the king is laying on the
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  side there, and it's been replaced with some lion-bound rock that's just teetering there.
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  That was a great depiction of what's happening here in the combination that we saw with
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  Saruman, with this industry, metal, artificial, kind of serving the natural, more grand nature of
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  that world, and you see that statue, it kind of looks horrific, and then you see the head there
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  on the ground, but then Sam points attention to that, and says, look, the king has his crown once
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  more, right? That might be Frodo. I think it might be Frodo, isn't it? Is it Frodo? I thought that
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  Sam is mentioning that two Frodo, because there's that ray of light that strikes, and Frodo's kind of,
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  I think, Sullen, as he is for most of the film, from that point, I could be wrong.
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  This might be the tie-breaker question between us, right? Anyway, one of them says he's crowned again.
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  One of them says, yeah, yeah, yeah, right, right. So I think just that beautiful moment of hope,
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  and what's, you know, that you're anticipating this kind of like long slog, but then you have that moment,
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  and it just, yeah, was visually just, this time around, just kind of struck me as just kind of a
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  little note of hope to keep you going, knowing where they're going, and what's happening there. So I
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  was, that was one of mine. There's, yeah, a couple other ones, but I'd love to hear one of yours.
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  Okay, so I have this, I said this is one of my favorite film for best moments.
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  In there is definitely the charge of the hero. Just, I mean, the excitement, I can remember my
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  children when they were younger. Well, even now, I'm sure they get excited. Just waiting for
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  there are here him to appear on the horizon, and then that fantastic speech, which is from
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  Tolkien by Bernard Hill of Theodin, it's just such a wonderful moment of sort of raises the spirits,
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  and I think it's that time when film really works, you're caught in it, and you
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  right, you feel like you're riding down the hill with them because the camera work is on a track,
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  and it's going really quickly, and you feel like you're moving with them. I think that is one of my
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  favorite sequences. That's a great, yeah, that one's great, and there's a couple, the other
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  kind of army-related one of, you know, Erragorn's speech to the soldiers at the Black Gate,
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  is another one that always kind of... Oh no, I hate that. Was that one of you that you hated? That's my
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  fail. I mean, talk about, you're trying to get people to go on basically as sort of nightmare,
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  probably dying mission, and you say, oh, you know, there will be a day of shattered spears,
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  and you're going to be horribly killed. Then he says, not that day, and I just, I really dislike
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  that. We are all how in my family when that comes on. But that happens, oh. So for me, that is in the,
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  you should have stuck closer to Tolkien. But you like it. I mean, this is where you see,
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  we're trying the point of having a discussion. Is a discussion, right? You like that, do you?
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  Right. I do. Yeah, I do. I mean, it's a, yeah, it's a failed, you know, a failed mission,
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  it's a suicide mission, and just finding some sort of hope, right, that the day that you're
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  holding, right, by all the hold there, that you're standing for for for something. How do you
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  keep somebody's hopes up in the face of the hopeless? I think, yeah, I, I, I like it. I'm, but I'm
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  also easily persuaded by rousing political speeches. So that could, that could be part of it.
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  Then the, then his, you know, his, and then there's that pot, you know, there's after his speech,
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  but then when, when Eric going to say, you know, for Frodo and charging into battle, you know,
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  the first on the field to go into that. So I see that kind of as a continuation in my mind that
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  exists. There's that speech. And then, because then it cuts away from that, but then I see that
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  mentally as that speech. And then basically he's then charging into battle as kind of the climax
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  of that. But that's how my imagination works. So, okay, I got another good, not the favorite bits,
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  which is the lighting of the beacons. And this is partly to do with the fantastic Howard Shore
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  score that I'm depicted. And again, this particular film, I always associate very much with communal
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  watching in a family context with us all being really excited and involved. Unlike the, it's just
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  this film, I think has that quality to it. And there is a spot where the light is going to light up
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  on the horizon. As the camera goes across his fantastic New Zealand, middle earth landscape,
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  and you try and think, you know, where some poor guy up the top of the mountain with his
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  torch going to be next. But it's just got a feeling of the connect connects the two locations,
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  which is a very simple device, but it has that majesty to it and sense of the vastness of the
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  worlds. I just love that bit. And I'd love that piece of music. It's probably might be one of my
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  favorite themes from the whole of the trilogy. Yeah, yeah. And that's something that you can only do
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  in film, right? That is difficult to capture that same scope with the sound, right? So the visuals,
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  the sweeping visuals accompanied by that swelling score is something, yeah, that I think they leverage
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  really well in this film adaptation to give you a sense of the grandeur and the importance of
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  that particular moment. So yeah, agree. Agreed. I mean, I can go on. I can go on. I'll just do one,
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  yeah. There's so many, so there's several Sam and Frodo moments that are just incredible. But one
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  that I think visually and with the scoring that I think worked really well is when, you know,
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  so Sam and Frodo are just by themselves at this point, kind of the final stretch there,
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  and they're clawing their way up Mountain Dune. At that point, Frodo and Sam, you know, Sam's
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  kind of laying there and Frodo kind of gets up and he's clawing himself up and then he collapses
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  and Sam's coming up. But as Frodo is climbing up and kind of by himself now, you hear the shyer
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  pipes that start going in this bleak landscape is he's, you know, giving this last ounces of energy
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  and just that sound of the shyer pipes is also incongruous with these, you know, destructive,
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  oppressive, dark, suffocating surroundings and then Sam's lying in right when he comes in.
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  The, you know, I can't carry it for you, but I can carry you. But then you come with that
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  into the west kind of theme that comes swelling up behind him during that moment. So it's just
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  the use of yeah, the score there was deeply moving, I think really adds to that an already
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  powerful moment that was there right from from from the books, but just adding that that sound
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  and the kind of, again, linking and what they're doing the two of them here in this
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  desolate landscape from this verdant peaceful landscape of the shyer linking that with those
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  pipes is just really, really effective, I felt for me at least. I mean, we could just go on
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  raving about the good moments because there are plenty of them and I think that almost every
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  character has a really good moment. I'm thinking of Pippin singing. So I don't like the rather over
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  playing the John Noble Denner thought of the blood coming out of his mouth. That's the kind of,
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  yeah, we get it easy, but yeah. But the sweetness of the song with the montage of the
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  the cavalry riding towards a hopeless impossible aim of trying to retake Osgiliath. I think that's
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  that's very good. And Mary, of course, has his his moments in the battle helping out when he
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  also has her best moments. So, you know, there's some fantastic really, I think they've actually
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  have done those moments really well, the whole Palenau Fields aspect and the the way that the
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  narrative of the battle is told because battles are confusing and a lot of it in the book, of course,
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  is done as a song by the Bards of Rohan afterwards. So there's a they haven't, you know, in a sense
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  the they've tidied it all up into a narrative. And I think Peter Jackson does have a very good skill
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  of making it so we can follow from character to character in a battle. So you don't lose where you are.
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  And that is that's incredibly difficult to do, I'm sure. You know, I think that's
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  whereas in the Hobbit, if I can just sort of step out of lockdown, I found that the back of the
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  five arm is it just went on far too long. I thought some of the it was overblown. There were
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  too many battlefields, it just kind of it's went all over the place. This one, it seemed to be
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  server narrative purpose all the time, rather than here's another cool trick I can do with the
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  chariot. And the olephalms are pretty good. I think we mentioned last time that the legolas
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  downing the olephal was a good sequence because it was earned by the role he was playing in the
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  battle rather. Right, right. So let's think about some of the differences between the book and the film.
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  A bearing in mind, we are acknowledging you can't do everything. But it does start,
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  there's two multiple starts and multiple ends, which I think we should talk about. Of the starts,
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  I think the very first start is with smegel and eagle fishing from a boat, which is a surprising start,
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  which I think is quite a good way of surprising the audience. I do remember finding the violence
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  of actually quite an extended scene of somebody throttling somebody else quite difficult,
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  particularly watching it with a family. It was one of the scenes I would, here comes the mum. I
• 24:29
  would skip that and also skip Sheila just because of the nightmare factor for the kids. Sheila,
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  I think, is earned. The smegel and eagle thing because it's man on the hobbit on the hobbit
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  does seem to be away from the more fantasy cartoon violence. So I, yeah, it's problematic. I can see
• 24:53
  why he wanted it, but I don't enjoy that. I don't enjoy that scene. There you go.
• 24:59
  Yes, yeah, I agree. It is difficult to watch and I do. So, and this is something I'm sure we'll talk
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  about at length a little bit later, but showing violence in the shire, in a shire-related landscape,
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  something showing the violence that can't take place there because of the ring or as a result
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  of the ring that evil can work its way into the most pastoral of settings because of this object
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  of power. So I can see, again, like you said, I can see why they put it in there, but it is,
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  but you're absolutely right that it is kind of a departure from like human elf dwarf hobbit on
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  ork violence or cape troll or right. Usually you're not dealing with humans. The only time you really
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  get human on human as a little bit in two towers where you see characters with warm tongue and
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  some of what he's doing there, but and Denathor is kind of a human on human villainous character
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  in the films. This is what you're seeing visually, but you're right it is. It is a departure. It is
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  unexpected and difficult. Yeah, I probably wouldn't, for my thinking, on my little one, I won't
• 26:23
  have him watching that. It's true though, isn't it? I will mind it growing up now, but at the time when
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  they were sort of older children, you know, you're sort of watching it with the eyes of what I
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  wanted to see. That was an element which I think is not so much the fact how long it goes on for
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  and how graphic it is that he's toppling this person. So the second sort of departure is
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  from the extended cartridge, which is where Saraman is reinstated, the death of Saraman,
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  and there's a speech raised at the top of all thank and then falls down and gets spiked on
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  that sort of wheel thing. What do you think of that scene? Yeah, if you're not showing the scouring
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  of the shire and you have to come up if you're already decided that you're not doing that for the
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  story that you want to tell, then I'm trying to think of what other ways you can dispose of
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  get an end for the character of Saraman. I mean it's so in some sense you still have
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  you know, worm tongue as the disposer in one way, but then what you lose in
• 27:50
  offing Saraman there is more of the pity of Gandalf, which in his speech, in Saraman's speech
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  at the top of the tower, he, you know, derides Gandalf because you know, I don't need your pity,
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  right? Or mercy. You really see that in the book version when they just leave and let, you know,
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  they let Saraman off and give him a chance to still do something, right? Having mercy upon him
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  and then leaving it up to him on how he decides to change or not. So you do miss that and so
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  that that's a moment something that I appreciated from the book that you don't get as much by just
• 28:33
  watching Saraman. It is it is a spectacle, right? And him being impaled specifically on his
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  his own machinery like yes, I understand, you know, the kind of irony of that
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  and it is visually really arresting. And I think I understand that it's kind of a visual callback
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  to another one of Christopher Lee's roles as Dracula in a film where he was impaled in that film.
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  So kind of a visual nod to another piece of cinema. Yeah, so it was the theatrical cut didn't have
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  this and so it was a bit random that people just picked up the plant here and that which is a
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  seeing stone in order to set that up. So it's better with it in but and also it was if felt wrong not
• 29:26
  to have a goodbye scene for Christopher Lee, didn't it? But this is definitely one of those
• 29:32
  spaces where I think there's room for improvement given a bit more canvas, a bit more scope.
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  That actually what the Saraman survival to end up causing trouble in the Shire does is it gives
• 29:49
  a real sense of how evil just doesn't go away when you throw a ring in a fire, you know,
• 29:57
  the damage remains but also it gives Frodo his moment of fullest maturity when even after there's
• 30:05
  an attack on him, he in the right at the door of Bagend, he says you were great once and that's
• 30:13
  his moment of greatness is when he says that and I'm sure we're not spawning the plot for anybody
• 30:22
  Grima then attacks him and then the Hobbit shoot Grima so it kind of wraps it up and I would
• 30:30
  really enjoy seeing that moment because whilst Frodo's been rising up into being a sort of
• 30:37
  bigger soul, Saraman's been diminishing and I think that gives that moment because Saraman is a valar,
• 30:45
  he's more than just a wizard, he's almost, he was the sort of archangially messenger of the gods
• 30:51
  kind of person. Yeah and that's one of the themes I think that the film does well with the character
• 30:58
  of Gandalf right, just going back to the you know the background information with the Valar with
• 31:03
  you know we're with Maya right with with Gandalf being a Maya, right, that
• 31:08
  and correct and let me correct that. Right, yes, yeah, yeah. I meant to say Maya, the valar are like
• 31:16
  the gods, the Maya are like the next rung down so. Never less impressive. So we're not writing to
• 31:22
  correct the other world. We're seeing that moment. Right, yes, yes, but the archangel moment,
• 31:28
  yes, so with Gandalf right and in in in the summer early and you have right Olorin who's the
• 31:34
  who becomes who's who's Gandalf right embodied that he it mentions in summer early and that he
• 31:39
  has kind of been suggested that he has an apprenticeship under Niana who's the goddess of weeping
• 31:45
  and wisdom and so and pity and so that's where it seems that Gandalf picks up this idea of pity
• 31:51
  from as this kind of cardinal virtue and then I think Ian McKellen does a really good job of depicting
• 31:58
  this pitiful in the positive sense right somebody who's full of of of pity for others and where he
• 32:04
  has that that in his eyes and his demeanor I think he adds to he really highlights that in the
• 32:09
  character of Gandalf that's latent in the character of Gandalf that that's actually you know
• 32:14
  pervasive there you actually see that visualized and then Frodo right picks up that idea when he
• 32:20
  spares Golem's life later but then you see that I think fully realized with Sarmon who are then
• 32:28
  instead of having a you know Amaya kind of teaching him about pity this habit you then have a
• 32:35
  habit of who's displaying this you know fully realized sense of pity to this you know otherworldly
• 32:45
  superhuman being who was at you know at the height of its power earlier so I so I really like
• 32:53
  that like you're saying you know giving Frodo this moment showing his full moral development so
• 32:59
  you see him as a you know just like courageous development right if you're looking at that as a
• 33:03
  character aspect that's what the film's depict well but in terms of his moral development I think
• 33:08
  you do get a fuller realization of that in that scene that you're mentioning in the scarring the
• 33:14
  yeah this isn't a criticism of peach action choosing not to do that because I think you just
• 33:19
  had too much material but I'm just reading where I think the room is to do something different
• 33:25
  and interesting something more yeah yeah so let's that does actually take us to the problem of
• 33:32
  the endings of the film and this is why it doesn't make it as my favorite of them because I remember
• 33:39
  watching it in the cinema and we have a sort of white out when Frodo is sort of passing out on
• 33:48
  the the ashy slopes he wakes up and is in a bed and there's quite a long scene of slow motion people
• 33:55
  coming in and then there's a coronation and then there's a flying up the map and you think he's
• 34:03
  at the end is at the end and then there's riding into the shire then there's down the pub in the
• 34:09
  shire with the sense of Sam going off to speak to Rosie cotton then there's Frodo writing in a
• 34:18
  book this is all the end Frodo writing in a book and suffering his ill and then there's the ride
• 34:26
  to meet Bilbo who's going to the shores as well to catch the boat and then there is the long
• 34:34
  scene of farewells on the shores now each of those scenes has something good in it and something
• 34:42
  I wouldn't want to lose but the problem is is I think there's another blackout scene as well
• 34:48
  another moment where you think oh this is the credits are going to roll it doesn't leave
• 34:54
  you keep saying is it now is it now and I remember thinking in the cinema this is an I'm a
• 34:59
  passionate fan of you know the whole thing I remember thinking this is going on too long
• 35:05
  that it's just not just not working where do you think what would you agree and what would you
• 35:14
  have done yeah that's a good question but definitely I think visually they do that you're using
• 35:22
  the conventions of film with that especially like a fade to black that's usually denotes the end
• 35:31
  kind of a hard a hard stop on something so so using that yeah certainly I think
• 35:40
  interrupts the sense of flow that could that could be there at some of those scenes so
• 35:45
  it really is difficult because you want to have all of these different moments and so I think it's
• 35:50
  an attempt to to have have it always I'll have it both not just both ways but always right with
• 35:57
  with kind of having a there's almost yeah like a traffic jam kind of of of endings kind of
• 36:04
  piling up one after another in in one sense yeah in in another sense I mean because I like I
• 36:12
  want to live in that world I want to I want to be there and so I get a sense you know after each
• 36:18
  of the endings like can that can that can I please just get one more it's like an encore you know
• 36:21
  with somebody who's like a musician I like I like the fact that there is more of it it is but it
• 36:29
  isn't as smooth and I think as narratively as you could and I think yeah so it'd be interesting
• 36:34
  if you had to try to reconfigure some of those different endings is there a way where like you did
• 36:41
  with the mordor and a gondor battle struggle sequences is there a way that you could
• 36:50
  intercut some of those farewells that would be compelling I'm not sure because I think for for
• 36:56
  for endings usually right you want to like linger with the character and have kind of more extended
• 37:03
  dialogue sequences and that's harder to do with intercutting but I want yeah it would be it would be
• 37:08
  interesting to say like are is there a different way to do this yeah I'm wondering hearing you talk
• 37:15
  actually if the problem is that so much the number of endings it's the fact that we get the music
• 37:20
  and the signals that this is ending is a bit like your your applaud a piece of classical music
• 37:25
  before the end because you've taken the final chord as being it but actually know there's a
• 37:30
  coda which you didn't know didn't know to expect and I think actually the signaling the
• 37:35
  filmatic signaling is a bit wrong there and there's another way of doing it I can I can also
• 37:44
  in this other world I'm imagining of the mini series with much more time you could make a real
• 37:51
  virtue of it and have your sense of say the message is just because you kill the baddie or break his
• 38:00
  power it doesn't mean that things are over you know that this world and you could actually make that
• 38:07
  a really interesting part about that because it would give more space to breathe for some of the
• 38:12
  relationships which kind of get shunned into sort of a very rapid wedding bells style of um
• 38:19
  solution and actually there's a much more interesting reflections on that um so yeah absolutely
• 38:26
  one signals are wrong signals are wrong and that's a film yeah yeah yeah yep yep absolutely and one
• 38:32
  of the endings with with one of those that you don't really get is a moment with a pair that you've
• 38:38
  followed from the beginning which is like a listen gimli right the development of their relationship
• 38:42
  you don't really get a good send off of just those two as a pair that you do have mentioned right
• 38:49
  in the book that they're kind of going off to together for a while and then the possibility that the
• 38:57
  two of them then go into the west together but not not explicitly but that it is said something
• 39:03
  you'll some say that yeah this is something that happens on that in the book gimli and legolas have
• 39:11
  an agreement that um legolas will take gimli into fangirl to show him the appreciation of trees
• 39:19
  and gimli takes legolas into the caves at helms steep the problem they have is that gimli doesn't
• 39:26
  go in the caves at helms steep because of the way the narrative works air winds down there with
• 39:31
  the women and children and you don't even know they're a beautiful cave you don't get the chance
• 39:36
  to establish that for gimli this has been one of his peak moments in the journey is discovering
• 39:41
  these fantastic caves um yeah but also one thing i i appreciate how difficult this is i mean this is
• 39:51
  we're being very picky because we just reorganize it just you know in our armchairs but um one thing
• 39:57
  that i did think was done well in the extended edition which was cut from the theatrical is just
• 40:03
  a couple of moments with air wind and pharma establishing what they mean to each other there's a
• 40:11
  and i think actually that's one of the ways that's one of the good things that you could have done
• 40:16
  more with because he pitch jackson chooses some key moments so that in the houses of healing together
• 40:22
  they have a moment when when they're not sure which way it's going to go um and they find comfort
• 40:28
  to each other and then they're standing together at the coronation and if you're going to do a compressed
• 40:33
  version of their relationship that's quite a good way to go i think the problem with the
• 40:40
  arrogant and our wind story is they spend the entire story apart and they try really hard to
• 40:49
  bring a connection with some of the um the scenes that foretell our wind's future i mean i
• 40:55
  enjoyed watching those because it delved into material from the appendices and that was a bit of
• 41:01
  a geeky thrill to see that but i think there is a really difficult problem make us feel that
• 41:08
  that relationship mat you know it's just they just don't have the time together which is a shame it's
• 41:15
  just the way the story runs um and so perhaps yeah perhaps oh i can't suggest putting more in because
• 41:24
  that would have just made it even longer film i think that that was one of the less successfully
• 41:28
  handled love stories because it did vanish really below the yeah the weight of the other narrative
• 41:39
  right yep yeah i agree and especially with somebody as great as as ao and that you spend so much
• 41:45
  time with um earlier you know in the previous film and then on the battlefield i think it would
• 41:52
  so yeah i i think that she could have had a slightly better send off again but again that that
• 41:58
  would that would have extended the runtime yeah running way too far i mean she gets
• 42:04
  enough it's our wind who gets the she just comes with the wedding um right right you do have those
• 42:10
  scenes where she's leave i mean they i think they they decided to do well let's give her a little
• 42:17
  story arc so that she now is they added the thing about her dying um and the arrogant is also
• 42:24
  fighting for her um because otherwise she'll die as if he didn't need any any more motivation
• 42:32
  i can so they want to make the connection i just feel it's a really difficult story
• 42:37
  to put into a film because this isn't a love well it's not a love story it's a it's a love story
• 42:42
  in the sense that it's a story between friends a love story of friendships the Sam and Frodo
• 42:47
  and the fellowship and it just feels it's just difficult um yeah so it's not barren and luthian
• 42:54
  is it which is it's kind of uh what it's you know that would be that's the film i'd like to see made
• 43:01
  that one but do a proper Tolkien love story yeah right i think that the another cut i would have made
• 43:11
  is the goodbye speech of the grey havens just goes on too long and also i think the coronation
• 43:17
  just goes on too long you know there's some yes it does in terms of yeah we're
• 43:25
  speaking building the pace towards the end rather than putting on the breaks but anyway that's
• 43:30
  me being picky okay so um
• 43:34
  thinking about the things that if we were what other potential do you think there would be if you
• 43:42
  were given the job you get the phone call some big streaming platform wants you to do the
• 43:50
  return of the king again i've mentioned some things i'd put in where would you go yeah what
• 43:55
  did you like and not like about the changes that were made to return of the king what would you put
• 44:00
  back yeah right put yeah that's yeah i'm the so yeah the the scaring of the shy is something that
• 44:10
  keep going back and forth on on whether or not to to include that but i think you're right that
• 44:15
  it that that sort of ending seems more better fit for a long-form series uh you know limited
• 44:24
  series um just because there's there's there's there's so much that you see they're like you said
• 44:30
  what one of the themes you that they didn't follow is would be you know the the long defeat and
• 44:37
  that even when the ring is thrown into uh right the fire's amount doomed that evil still is and it's
• 44:46
  not they haven't changed the world and renewed it and now there's no more death and sorrow
• 44:52
  um uh or evil um so you get and i understand that you know in a film what you're doing that need
• 45:00
  those kind of stark you know you have your your your clear evil clear clear clear good and uh how
• 45:06
  those those two are wrestling in the hearts of some of these individuals how they went out and
• 45:11
  in some instances um but then in the end good wins and you can go home as an audience happy knowing
• 45:19
  that good has been saved uh at least in one world that you've experienced um but
• 45:26
  yeah i i but with that i think that the scarring of the shire does show that the story you know
• 45:34
  that the road does go ever on in in a way right that there are more the stories um there's more
• 45:40
  adventures to be had later and this is like you know sam says that there are these great stories
• 45:49
  you know we're a part of a story and we're continuing on and that these stories will continue to
• 45:54
  exist so if there's one thing that i think that could have been done where you could maybe bring
• 46:01
  in a little bit more of the fact that it's not necessarily happyly ever after you do kind of get
• 46:06
  a sense of that in the delivery of sam you know he's you know lying well on your i'm back uh there
• 46:14
  at the end it is kind of a bitter sweet him being back um but i think if you another possible avenue
• 46:23
  is to kind of lean more into that and show you know do him even telling those stories that same
• 46:30
  sort of speech that he has or moving that we're having him telling that to his children about
• 46:36
  having it which is different from the book right i think they they ended it in a book appropriate
• 46:43
  place there with sam saying i'm back um but if you wanted to continue some of those themes of
• 46:50
  each person being part of a narrative a larger narrative and then these kind of continually happening
• 46:56
  and good and evil continue to struggle that i i i i i i think there's there's a way that maybe you
• 47:03
  could include a bit more of that thematically and that we're all continuing even the audience
• 47:07
  included is part of this ongoing struggle um that looking back on it other people might say you know
• 47:15
  you had a heroic life when in the moment as you're struggling with this you might not feel that way
• 47:20
  yourself i don't i think that i wouldn't have chose i wouldn't have changed the end i definitely
• 47:25
  would have used that as my last line the thing i would change about sam though is the right at the
• 47:32
  beginning of the film where Frodo and Sam fall out i know they did this for narrative purpose to
• 47:39
  get Frodo on his own in she loves the layer but actually i think it works really well in the book
• 47:45
  where the two of them are so terrified um and doing it together i i think that really works that
• 47:51
  passage so i'd like to see a version where they don't fall out on the stairs this is where there's
• 47:58
  a bit of a character wrenching going on um we were talking about how farmy in the two towers has a
• 48:04
  sort of pushing into a more violent version of himself he's back at interestingly in this film he's
• 48:10
  back as the farmyer from the book after that little foray on the dark side um but in this film it's set
• 48:20
  up that Frodo is already so sort of impressed by the ring that he distrusts Sam and that doesn't
• 48:26
  happen in the book and i think that breaking of the trust then actually takes away the power of him
• 48:36
  right at the end breaking away from doing what Sam wants him to do i would have i would have held
• 48:42
  that moment till then the right on the the crack of doom literally that even Sam can't get through to
• 48:49
  him and so it's kind of done a bit early um so i would that's what i think that i would not
• 48:56
  would suggest that it's possible to redo and have a really good powerful scary you know we've
• 49:03
  seen the equivalent of the horror films of two people going through the haunted house if you're both
• 49:07
  equally scared it's equally terrifying you don't need to be on your own um yeah so that's what i
• 49:14
  i think i would change that because i think that narratively it works better to Frodo to have his
• 49:20
  moment of breaking right at the end right yeah and that's something yeah with with the
• 49:25
  you know we mentioned these kind of triads that are set up right with golem sam and Frodo and you know
• 49:30
  denathor faramir and and boramir and aragorn arwen and aowen as these kind of triad of triads of
• 49:38
  these dynamics between those different characters that Frodo sam and golem that to make them more
• 49:45
  to make it more of an equal triangle uh having Frodo kind of split between golem and sam and so
• 49:53
  introducing more tension between the characters dramatically i can see why they did that
• 49:59
  for that purpose but you but you in making that choice it's done at the expense of this deep like
• 50:06
  you said trusting um relationship that that has developed between Frodo and sam between all it
• 50:11
  done so you do lose something there it's it's done at the expense of that relationship and the
• 50:16
  beauty of that relationship and that's just seeing that i agree that maybe seeing that point
• 50:21
  that split done at the very end when you think that's the one thing that Frodo has to save him is
• 50:28
  sam uh and sam you know him and his relationship with sam it would be yeah i think more more of a
• 50:35
  gut punch an emotional gut punch than than it is uh as it is presently in the film but it's just
• 50:40
  to trade up but you get that gut punch earlier and so it's where we're do you want that falling out
• 50:46
  but i would like to see the version that you suggested absolutely yeah so there's always more to
• 50:53
  talk about we've talked for quite a long time about a film which lasts um or three hours or
• 50:58
  something isn't in the and there is still more to say but let's think about the achievement so
• 51:06
  we've been we've been nitpicking we love these films it's not it's not a criticism i think it's
• 51:12
  just quite exciting to think what you could do because there is a temptation to say these were
• 51:16
  such good films that we shouldn't be touched you should leave them as they are nobody else need come
• 51:22
  along afterwards but i do actually think when i've thought about it length that if you say well let's
• 51:28
  take a different pace let's take a different canvas i do think there is actually scope and plus
• 51:33
  some of the things which feel a bit CGI-like like the um the the black gate where the the land falls
• 51:42
  away beneath or but the good army that always feels like a video game to me that that the way it's
• 51:48
  short and everything it doesn't feel and i'm sure these days are we've come on 20 years time you know
• 51:54
  i think you could probably have another go at some of the CGI as well but anyway um what do you think
• 52:01
  about the return of the king and it's the fact that one all those Oscars was it a deserved Oscar
• 52:10
  win i think you've got eleven Oscars do you think that yes i think it was a third third yeah eleven
• 52:16
  thirteen it was it was and i think it was an odd some sort of odd or prime number uh that was
• 52:21
  more than ten uh i can't remember exactly it might it might have been thirteen but yeah i think
• 52:26
  and again yeah because this was there were all kind of shot concurrently um so i i i thought it
• 52:33
  was well deserved what i didn't you know you you didn't have um i believe it was uh Ian McKellen
• 52:40
  was you know nominated it for fellowship um uh for an academy award but not for a turn of the king
• 52:50
  when uh you know i argue he he should have been as well like i there there were a few kind of
• 52:58
  oversights i think but i overall yeah i think it's it was a a marvel a miracle a miracle even
• 53:06
  of uh of of of cinematic uh accomplishment there um so i i i think i think it was i was absolutely
• 53:15
  deserved and that wasn't just you know kind of a a a pity pity awards being given for something
• 53:21
  that had just taken so much time but just the ambition uh yeah especially expect even that i think
• 53:25
  i think it won everything except acting awards and there is a problem i think in the academy of
• 53:32
  giving uh in the Oscars are actually giving awards for acting in a fantasy film it they're very
• 53:38
  good yeah fantasy sci-fi yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah exactly awards to people who do things where
• 53:46
  they're changing their bodies physically but within a real world context but if you come a wizard
• 53:52
  you know you're you're counted out so i so i i think it i think it what it deserved the awards
• 54:00
  because i think and the awards i think were a recognition of the whole trilogy really i think
• 54:04
  that's exactly yeah it was kind of okay this is our last chance we got to do this and i do think they
• 54:11
  completely rose to the challenge so i mean my my last comment i want to make on this is basically well
• 54:20
  done these films deserved the Oscars because it was a recognition of the whole of the trilogy
• 54:27
  and they beat Jackson and his team brilliantly rose to the occasion they as a talking fan who was
• 54:39
  worried about what they would do for me they really achieved so much and they were as really
• 54:45
  respectful of the material whilst making changes which they felt were necessary i don't agree
• 54:50
  all their choices but i can see why they made their choices so it's just because of debate about
• 54:56
  you know not everybody makes the same film that's the whole point so i think they are definitely
• 55:03
  they're still my favorite films but i would i still think there's room for more
• 55:10
  a little bit more as Frodo says and that little bit more is somebody else having another go
• 55:15
  right i think that you know in a decade's time i'd be quite ready to watch watch it so good luck to
• 55:23
  whoever that is right yeah exactly i would love to i would i would love to sit you and similar
• 55:29
  yeah i had soft them it was like i mentioned in the first podcast this was my first introduction really
• 55:35
  into the world of of Tolkien and so it was i think for me and i'm sure for a lot of others kind
• 55:42
  of an ideal entry point into a world you know a brilliantly imagined painstakingly created
• 55:50
  lovingly curated world that professor Tolkien spent so much time put so much heart into
• 55:59
  it's i'm i'm so incredibly grateful but so many people took this so seriously created such a
• 56:05
  you know a lived in convincing world that i could step into and fall in love with and that led me to
• 56:14
  reading reading the books themselves and then everything else that the good professor
• 56:21
  put his put his hand to so it's been really riching experience for me so if for no other reason
• 56:27
  i applaud it and it holds a preeminent place in my heart because it introduced me into this
• 56:33
  broader world that professor Tolkien created yeah talking had the theory that we were sub creators
• 56:41
  and just as my my sort of coder is one of the things that Peter Jackson created was an environment
• 56:52
  a story around the making of the films so not only could you watch the films as a fan but you
• 57:00
  also had the pleasure of doing i think it's the best behind the scenes um coverage of any film
• 57:08
  I certainly raised the bike extremely high if anyone's followed on it's because of him
• 57:13
  so that not only was it like the film journey but you also had a sense of the journey of the actors
• 57:19
  and the stage hands and the you know the people who did the the set design and made all the
• 57:26
  and that in itself was a creation and an achievement which i think would and the sense of
• 57:32
  news even getting behind it as a sort of you know that whole fun part of it so i enjoyed watching
• 57:38
  the creation of the film world around it as well and i think that would be very hard to replicate
• 57:47
  in future so that might be in a sense what is most unique um contribution in the long run
• 57:54
  we'll see yeah it's a good like to go this next yes yeah that's right i mean i haven't heard
• 58:01
  anyone's um in in in the frame for doing it but i would imagine it will happen they've just
• 58:07
  announced that they're doing a anim of Rohan today at the day with filming this so clearly
• 58:16
  other sort of mini series type things are happening um so we'll see and of course we always
• 58:24
  do a section where we decide at the end of our podcast where in all the fantasy world is the best
• 58:30
  place for something we've been talking about kings so the obvious place to go Jacob is to decide
• 58:38
  where in all the fantasy world is the best place to be made king any ideas on that one
• 58:45
  um for me i think i'm going to have to go with um uh the world of fairy in Jonathan Strange and
• 58:52
  Mr. Norell by Susanna Park i think the raven king there uh it's incredibly mysterious character
• 59:03
  incredibly powerful you don't get to spend he only appears oh i don't want to give spoilers but
• 59:10
  you don't see a lot of this raven king if you do or do not see him again i won't say for certain
• 59:15
  but uh if he he appears and he carries a tremendous amount of weight without having to do too
• 59:24
  terribly much so if you're looking for maybe i don't know a retirement or a vacation destination
• 59:30
  to be a king where you get all of the the glory and the weight um and the kind of aura of of
• 59:36
  majesty and mystery um well not having to do a whole lot then uh yes fairy in uh the realm of
• 59:44
  fairy in Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norell i think is is probably the best you could hope for
• 59:49
  yeah some of the kingship gigs do seem a bit like hard work don't they i mean i think
• 59:54
  why we're going works really hard and he it's mentioned that he has to go around tidying up and
• 59:58
  you know so reuniting the kingdom it's definitely a post war reconstruction role that he has
• 1:00:05
  um so maybe not so good i think that there's some definite places not to be king like the game
• 1:00:12
  of thrones world right no no not taking that game possibly i would like to be a king in um or queen
• 1:00:23
  it's got to be nania really big partly that was the childhood thing of you get to be long live king
• 1:00:30
  pizza long live queen susanazama which is a great bit of an ego trip as a child you can imagine yourself
• 1:00:35
  being king but i'd actually probably prefer to be king in um the magician's nephew where you're the
• 1:00:42
  third king and it's the cabbie and his wife who get to be king and queen there and i always thought
• 1:00:48
  the idea of being king and queen in a pristine world where you're setting up the state sounds
• 1:00:55
  quite fun so that's where i'd like to go and be king and there's probably very little pay for work
• 1:01:00
  because you haven't inherited anything so it's just a straightforward king gig where you
• 1:01:05
  right the establish your court and everything up so that's great thanks so much jacob thank
• 1:01:10
  for joining joining me and i hope people have enjoyed our discussion we don't expect you to agree
• 1:01:16
  but we'll be very interested to hear your views so do write in a letters there you can find us
• 1:01:22
  at the oxford center for fantasy dot org thank you very much and goodbye
• 1:01:28
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• 1:01:35
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