"Well, I'm back".... (TTT Spoilers!)
I went to the midnight showing of "The Two Towers". As I did with "Fellowship", I had some problems. The biggest one was the characterization of Faramir, which seemed to make him "Boromir II'. (I'm hoping the extended edition helps this the way it helped the first with Galadriel. ) Also, while I found the appearance of the Ents perfect, I missed the Huorns at Helm's Deep. Actually, it seemed to me that they had made the Ents more "Huornish" than they are in the book: wilder and more hostile to other peoples.
However, there was a good deal to like here as well. The battle scenes were absolutely amazing. They had the Legolas/Gimli Orc-slaying competition. ("Nineteen...(whack), twenty...(whack) ...twenty-one....") There was a lot of Sam here, and you could see Frodo being corrupted before your eyes. I was happy that some of the later Sam/Frodo dialogue was from my favorite scene in the book.("Let's hear the one about Frodo and the Ring !" )
However, the best thing, IMHO ? In his own words, "Gollum, Gollum". If Andy Serkis doesn't get an Oscar nomination I will be miffed.
Being in the theater was an adventure in itself. Thanks to a friend of mine, I had a reserved seat, so I could wander about. In the line, which was out the door by 11:10 pm , there were "Elves", a good many "Wraiths", and even a Viggo/Aragorn lookalike, as well as miscellaneous people in cloaks. My actual seat was great, though I was not particularly entranced by the patrons on either side.While we all waited for the start (which was delayed) on my left there was a group of comic book store employees talking shop, and on my right a group of action film/anime folks doing the same, and since I'm into neither, it got a bit tiresome listening to how this or that comic series was going to the dogs and how the subtitling was lousy on films I'd never heard of. So I went back to my tattered copy of "The Silmarillion". Also, I am annoyed that there are commercials as well as trailers before the start of the feature nowadays. (Can't we go anywhere to escape constant bombardment with Pepsi commercials ?)
The audience reaction surprised me at one point. At the point of the Gollum-talking-to-himself scene, I heard laughter. Now what the heck was that about ? This same sort of laughter happened at the first showing of the first film, when Bilbo seems "Gollumish" in Frodo's eyes at Rivendell. Odd.
Well, I need to see it again, of course, at a reasonable hour. I think it will be about three viewings before my opinion is completely solid.
(BTW, if you don't get the reference in the post title, go read the book again.)
I went to the midnight showing of "The Two Towers". As I did with "Fellowship", I had some problems. The biggest one was the characterization of Faramir, which seemed to make him "Boromir II'. (I'm hoping the extended edition helps this the way it helped the first with Galadriel. ) Also, while I found the appearance of the Ents perfect, I missed the Huorns at Helm's Deep. Actually, it seemed to me that they had made the Ents more "Huornish" than they are in the book: wilder and more hostile to other peoples.
However, there was a good deal to like here as well. The battle scenes were absolutely amazing. They had the Legolas/Gimli Orc-slaying competition. ("Nineteen...(whack), twenty...(whack) ...twenty-one....") There was a lot of Sam here, and you could see Frodo being corrupted before your eyes. I was happy that some of the later Sam/Frodo dialogue was from my favorite scene in the book.("Let's hear the one about Frodo and the Ring !" )
However, the best thing, IMHO ? In his own words, "Gollum, Gollum". If Andy Serkis doesn't get an Oscar nomination I will be miffed.
Being in the theater was an adventure in itself. Thanks to a friend of mine, I had a reserved seat, so I could wander about. In the line, which was out the door by 11:10 pm , there were "Elves", a good many "Wraiths", and even a Viggo/Aragorn lookalike, as well as miscellaneous people in cloaks. My actual seat was great, though I was not particularly entranced by the patrons on either side.While we all waited for the start (which was delayed) on my left there was a group of comic book store employees talking shop, and on my right a group of action film/anime folks doing the same, and since I'm into neither, it got a bit tiresome listening to how this or that comic series was going to the dogs and how the subtitling was lousy on films I'd never heard of. So I went back to my tattered copy of "The Silmarillion". Also, I am annoyed that there are commercials as well as trailers before the start of the feature nowadays. (Can't we go anywhere to escape constant bombardment with Pepsi commercials ?)
The audience reaction surprised me at one point. At the point of the Gollum-talking-to-himself scene, I heard laughter. Now what the heck was that about ? This same sort of laughter happened at the first showing of the first film, when Bilbo seems "Gollumish" in Frodo's eyes at Rivendell. Odd.
Well, I need to see it again, of course, at a reasonable hour. I think it will be about three viewings before my opinion is completely solid.
(BTW, if you don't get the reference in the post title, go read the book again.)
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