Lord of the Rings Humour: Parodies, Satires and More [3]

The NC videos are generally hilarious. I disagree with it on a few points in the LotR vid, though. For one thing, it harps too much on #11: The others didn't have that much time to pull Gandalf up. And even if they did, considering he had a elephant-sized Balrog dangling from a whip wrapped around his legs, I don't think they'd have been able to do much without possibly pulling Gandalf apart or something.

Also, it left out the movies' stupidest moment: Faramir taking the hobbits to Osgiliath.

There is no Balrog hanging off him, or whip round his legs in PJ's version.
We clearly see the Balrog falling into the chasm whilst Gandalf is still hanging there, and there is no shot of the whip round his legs once he is hanging there and we see the whip disappear with the Balrog.



That flicker of orange in the black is the last you see of the whip in the film as it disappears into the blackness. Nothing is pulling on Gandalf at all in PJ's. He could have climbed back up himself   

Whoops—my mistake. I guess I just keep forgetting that and giving the movie more credit than it deserves (and not allowing for the possibility that the screenwriters could be that stupid).

So, yeah, it's a pretty very stupid moment.

Also begs the question of how Gandalf managed to fall in five minute later and still be falling alongside the Balrog in his exciting action sequence at the start of TT   Maybe the Balrog hung about and waited for him halfway down before resuming its fall.

True, that. I also think having that scene at that time in the movie was a mistake in itself.

Well yeah- its a huge spoiler when the audience shouldnt be thinking about Gandalf at all as he is gone.
I think PJ just panicked as he didnt have a big action scene to open the film with and his big book of film cliches said he needed one.

I think he's also afraid of showing things in flashback; perhaps he doesn't think they'll be exciting that way. That would explain why, instead of the mystery of Gandalf's absence, we get a ridiculous wizard's duel. And then the Balrog scene. In both cases, the tension is thoroughly defeated.

Still haven't watched the NC video but the Balrog/Gandalf thing has always bugged me too.  I think we had a thread about it on the old forum once.

I think I've always noticed this oddity it but somehow just let it slide, for some reason. Surprising, because I'm not particularly inclined to give these movies any leeway.

I think it falls into a broad category of minor continuity and/or common sense issues that only exist because PJ drew something out for (melo)dramatic effect. I don't care for it, but it's not a dealbreaker in and of itself for me.

It's funny because I used to think that was an effective shot or that I didn't mind it because I wrongly thought the Balrog was hanging from Gandalf. Now that I've finally figured out that that's not the case, it's just another in a long list of movie oddities. It doesn't really make the movie seem any worse to me.

Is it because Peejeers gets to far ahead of himself ? I bet he thought ages ago about this cracking, fiery,powerful opening scene. Dramatic, spotlight on the 2 main characters on this grim fight between good & bad, stirring music, strong choir, edge of your seat stuff. And it would be if, the lead up was correct. It looked good on set, sounded good but, what lead us there ? Nothing. Balrog said 'bye bye', fell into the darkness, Gandy should have either been able to pull himself up or at the least SOMEONE should have dashed forward & grabbed him ? isnt that what you do when a friend is in schtook ? Even if Orcs/Goblins are firing at you, isnt it better to have a wizard on your side ? one thats living ?                                                   We were all so taken in with the spectacle that we didnt see the means. Easy to pick holes now, with hindsight. Bad cinema on Peejeers side tho. He didnt think that one through did he ? no, just spectacle again. thinking that will do for his audience. And now hes set himself up for the next step, 'what do we do next?' *light bulb moment* ah yes, epic fight with Balrog that was totally unnecessary as Balrog was out of here anyway. Cavern, underground lake.not unusual, mainy countries have caves/lakes etc underground, dark, warm, mysterious places, then...cold,snowy mountain top ?? That bit confuddled me when I saw it at the Cinema. & how quick everyone was in leaving Gandalf, even Legolas, the demi god, with his physics defying tricks. I think its a case of Peejeers trapping himself into a corner, he should have known better but, if you just stick with the same, (uneducated) team, take no input or advice from any other source & you dont open your eyes & ears, these things happen. I thought the speech Gandalf gave sounded odd ? something about stars over head, life ages etc ?

Well I wasnt blinded by spectacle- crabbit and buckie yes, but not fooled by the spectacle- I always thought it was a horrible change to have Gandalf just hanging there for so long.
And I was gobsmacked he opened TT with a complete spoiler (but then they were stupid enough to have Gandalf on the TT poster so I guess PJ was never interested in retaining any sense of suspense or mystery regards Gandalf) that it was a spoiler that also made no sense given the last we saw of Gandalf and the Balrog they had fallen in at separate times and some distance apart, was just to be expected of PJ.

Going from the cavern to the mountaintop was just clumsy editing, they had I believe intended to do the chase up Durin's stair as in the book, but never finished shooting/cgi'ing it it, so instead they just have Gandalf voice over the line about lowest dungeon to highest peak. Not the worst thing in the film by far, but it is clumsy in the final cut, especially to a viewer who doesnt know the book and can fill in the missing details.

h/t TORn's Facebook page

fuck. i was just about to post that

it's so awesome though  good excuse to take hipster picture of ur coffee though..

gotta go fast

yeah, that's your motto isn't it

30 seconds or less

wow. really?

that's just sad, jacob....

How do you find a flippin' JennLaw gif in 30 seconds??

how do you not find a JLaw gif in 30 seconds?

No idea.