Oh what could have been...

 its ok Malick !  its late, your tired, you know not what you say, You'll come to your senses in the morning ! And ILL still be here to remind you ! " it wasnt a dream !

azriel wrote:  its ok Malick !  its late, your tired, you know not what you say, You'll come to your senses in the morning ! And ILL still be here to remind you ! " it wasnt a dream !  

I was only Half Joking, a very small part of me would like to see what Jackson could do with $700 million on a 18 rated Zombie flick...it would be more memorable that the hobbit films at least...

More than likely
Tho I also was teasing you...... a tad.....If you can see the tiniest of silver linings in this colossal rain cloud of doom, then, I applaud you most sincerely

malickfan wrote:

azriel wrote:So why didnt he have faith in Tolkien ? Cos I certainly dont believe he had faith in himself ! oh no ! He bobbed back & forth between his fantasy & Tolkiens story set up, he took a bit here, a bit there & tried to piece it together, but all it did was make a very bad soggy cake where the icing is running.

In fairness to PJ he was under alot of pressure by the fans and studios and was working from what 4/5 months of pre-production when he was officially announced as Director, he was bound to disappoint someone, and had a hard enough time jumping into such a big production at such a late stage.

Yes, you read that, sympathy for PJ!

I think Jackson got caught up in the Hollywood machine. He sold his soul to the studio and in turn agreed to make what THEY considered a blockbuster instead of doing what he did with LOTR. Sadly New Line was dead and they cared about the story Jackson was telling in LOTR. WB is nothing like that they want high yield return on their investment and nothing more. Crank it out generic D&D for all they care. As long as it turns a healthy profit.They want it fast and cheap, without any care for the story or the fans of the previous work. I mean all the fancy red epic cameras for the 3-D, and the 48fps, the CGI sets instead of scale miniatures, digital computer generated stuff for tried and true old movie making tricks that had worked for decades like forced perspective. I mean he completely abandoned the style of LOTR for the newest latest greatest thing (supposedly) I understand him thinking that motion capture will be the future but I don't think it should replace an actor with practical effects. That guy in the rubber suit for me will always look more real than something cut and pasted over top of the scene filmed with nothing really there other than a guy in a green gimp suit. The Uriks from LOTR were superb compared to the crappy CGI goblins in Goblintown. Some were real, some were part real and part CGI but most were just penciled in. completely different film making than LOTR which is why the feel of the films is so different from the LOTR. At least the Uriks on screen you could see them "IN" the scene because they were. Goblins well the dwarfs had to pretend and fight nothing and then they were put in digitally later on...You can see it looks like video game animation and not real. Azog in the first film is a prime example of that and Bolg in DOS is another. they just look painted over the scene and not part of it.

Then we get to the shoddy scripts, lack of concept from start to finish. Yeah all the scenes were there in some way or another but the characters weren't fully developed this time around. They second guessed themselves about good material to put in subpar material because they didn't want to sacrifice their made up stuff for the book stuff. The dwarfs being taken before Thranduil in the behind the scenes footage proves this. They filmed book stuff and then cut it because it didn't move the story along being followed by their made up elves fighting spiders and capturing the dwarfs scene. Jackson himself says so in the commentary.

I do not feel sorry for Jackson. I know he was never bound to please everyonewith the Hobbit. Instead of using common sense though and thinking that the LOTR /Tolkien fans made his LOTR films as successful as they were. He went with the latest greatest technology trying to reinvent film making.Instead of following the formula for the success of his own LOTR films. It was a choice he made.Right or wrong it was his choice. It was his choice to not fully develope characters waiting on actor input to finish their story and arc. When a real director isn't the actors buddy. He is there to get a performance the way the character is written, if the actor isn't right for it they need to go. Hence Stuart Townsend in LOTR.Jackson made poor choices and he gets to live with them. Sympathy falls in between Shit and Syphilis in the dictionary and all 3 are bad things, when they did it to themselves like Jackson has

yep those Uruks were really scary in LOTR. they still look good after 10 years. Indeed I prefer all the Orcs and Goblins of LOTR, the Moria ones were superb.

Mrs Figg wrote:yep those Uruks were really scary in LOTR. they still look good after 10 years. Indeed I prefer all the Orcs and Goblins of LOTR, the Moria ones were superb.

couldn't agree more Figgs. Loved the Moria goblins

I do not like the way the cameras took the scenes. I watched the long blog that shoed Peter explaining the frames per second but now it does not look natural and real. It looks like a stage setting at your local live theatre and I keep seeing that in my mind so that you feel they are going to move the furnishing and back drop after each scene. So that bothers me.To me, that makes it all not real so you cannot get into it like the Trilogy. There are a lot of fantastic things that happen and special effects but again it does not look or feel real.

Im shaking my head over The Hobbit because of the really rushed feel it has, & also, the lack of depth,it feels hastily glossed over yet theres 3 films of it ? Going back to LOTRs, peejers & crew did lovely things often to items we could never properly see & appreciate, like the detail on Eowyns dress. no ones really gonna notice all the lovely embroidery. many costumes were done as this & yet time was found to do this, not just time but, the want to.



If peejers had wrapped his arms round The Hobbit & given it a hug as he did LOTRs I might have enjoyed it better ?

thats a lovely costume, and they did film their wedding in full, but its never surfaced. this would be ideal footage to include in another super extended EE version. by all accounts Eowyns wedding was spectacular, that bit always looks so rushed in the theatrical version and we dont get to find out that Eowyn and Faramir married, although book Readers know they did a general audience doesnt get that closure.

The goblins in Moria were rather overdone in terms of grotesquerie, even if their horror did work well. (But the ceiling climbing! It makes no sense!)

And as for this "sympathy" for Peter Jackson. Well, he had a massive budget, as much help in all aspects of film-making as he could ever need, and a teeny little book to adapt. Four to five months is plenty of time with those kinds of resources. The decision to expand to a trilogy happened after production started! (I believe.)

Keep in mind that PJ was involved with pre-production during the GDT period, too. It's not like he was called in from retirement when del Toro left or something.

And it's interesting to note that with LOTR, the more PJ and Co. revised and fiddled with ideas, the closer they tended to get to the book (relatively speaking). The opposite seems to have happened with The Hobbit.

The decision to expand to a trilogy happened after production started! (I believe.)- Forest

No, much, much worse. The decision happened after they had actually finished shooting the original 2 films. And then they decided to go for 3 in the editing room and they had to get everyone back to shoot some more stuff that they had just made up to pad it out and fill the gaps.

Sinister71 wrote:

Mrs Figg wrote:yep those Uruks were really scary in LOTR. they still look good after 10 years. Indeed I prefer all the Orcs and Goblins of LOTR, the Moria ones were superb.

couldn't agree more Figgs. Loved the Moria goblins

Liked the Moria Orcs, but the Uruks in my book were NOT scary in half the scenes. The problem was the actors clearly felt uncomfortable in the metal sandals and couldn't see their footing. The scene where they are chasing Merry and Pippin down Amon Hen has them sort of waddling down the steps, etc. Looks ridiculous. You want to run up behind them and knock them over. The upper torso shots are great; or when they aren't moving. But the moment you see their footwork it's all shot to hell.

halfwise wrote:

Sinister71 wrote:

Mrs Figg wrote:yep those Uruks were really scary in LOTR. they still look good after 10 years. Indeed I prefer all the Orcs and Goblins of LOTR, the Moria ones were superb.

couldn't agree more Figgs. Loved the Moria goblins

Liked the Moria Orcs, but the Uruks in my book were NOT scary in half the scenes.  The problem was the actors clearly felt uncomfortable in the metal sandals and couldn't see their footing.  The scene where they are chasing Merry and Pippin down Amon Hen has them sort of waddling down the steps, etc.  Looks ridiculous.  You want to run up behind them and knock them over.  The upper torso shots are great; or when they aren't moving.  But the moment you see their footwork it's all shot to hell.

Some scenes with the Uruks looked off but for the most part the were believable, and IMHO much better than the CGI fest we got in the hobbit

The goblins in Moria were rather overdone in terms of grotesquerie, even if their horror did work well. (But the ceiling climbing! It makes no sense!)

I didn't get the spider man ceiling crawling either but I think the look of them worked rather well esp.when compared to the CGI goblins of goblintown

In reference to straying from the books, one of Boyen's favorite excuses to use was that a certain part of the book was "death for film" or "film suicide," which to me is just a lame way to cover up making a mistake or not wanting to take a risk. The books themselves were risky to publish! So naturally the film would be also, she should have known that going in. In terms of taking a step backwards, I think we're seeing the George Lucas-ification of PJ here. He's always been a visual person, he doesn't care much for script or story (clearly) and now that he has more money and better technology there's nothing stopping him. I just hope he doesn't go back to the LOTR trilogy and update the effects like Lucas did

Ayup All...

Ditch all of film 3, get most of the actual dialogue from the book back into the film, and ditch all the modern stupid shit about friendship and destiny, get rid of six flags down to laketown, the 'coaster ride down from Goblin Town, remake the Trollshaw scene and get the history of the war between the dwarves and Goblins right. Including ditching Azog in his particular capacity. Ditch the Nazgul and Sauron Bollox at Dol Guldur, beyond a brief mention, and give Beorns bits the proper treatment.

Hell, Ditch it all and make the Hobbit PROPERLY, like we wanted ! In 2 films !

The more you look into it, & question the films, the more scrapage you find, till theres nothing left thats redeemable !Its a "gone off" sandwich this one, Keep the credits, Top & bottom, & get RID of the filling

I can't agree that there's nothing good about these films, and I know numerous other people have praised certain elements of them as well.

Im just cynical The very beginning at Bag end was nice, I was settling in at that bit. I even let it go that it was Gandalf who geed Bilbo up in the morning to get to The Green Dragon or he would be late. Where did I lose my faith It started to ebb off a tad with the Trolls, the tide went out with Goblin Town, Spiders was good, tho killing a lesser creature wasnt. Really liked the Gollum exchange, best bit of the film I thought. So, there, not too negative ?

The films do actually have some good parts and those parts are the ones like the book. You can identify them because you smile in the theater when they happen Like Gandalf's entrance in AUJ, Beorn's house in DOS, Riddles in the Dark, and... well I think that's really it...

How does someone from Staffordshire know about Six Flags?

Ayup FS...

Probably when he visited the US about 25 years ago... ?

Eldorion wrote:I can't agree that there's nothing good about these films, and I know numerous other people have praised certain elements of them as well.

I quite agree Eldo... there are a few things about these films I do like. Baggend being one, I enjoyed the betting scene, I enjoyed the parts that were close to the book. Sadly there weren't enough scenes like that, to save the films for me. But they weren't a total waste for me. Like the changes I mentioned in my other posts in this thread. THOSE are the main bits I would have changed. If something along those lines were done the films would have IMO felt much more like the book.