"The stories that stay with you"

Rating: 9/10 (7 April 2012)

Of the three pictures in Peter Jackson's epic treatment of The Lord of the Rings trilogy, this one probably takes the most liberties in adapting JRR Tolkein's book. Middle sections in a trilogy are often problematic, especially in the movies. Tolkein would have expected his readers to work through the books chapter-by-chapter, the split into the three volumes being mainly to keep the actual tomes to a practical size. A movie however is more of a stand-alone thing, and it needs a satisfying beginning and ending even when it's the middle of a larger story.
Jackson, along with his co-writers Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens and Stephen Sinclair have done a neat job. The Two Towers has an added problem in that the characters get split into three groups, and three separate narrative lines. The novel devotes half a book each to the different sets of characters. The script for The Two Towers must find more fluid ways of integrating the different story lines, and there is some canny balancing of pure action and 'human' themes. They insert a little episode of the romance between Aragorn and Arwen, which is a bit dull in itself but provides a brief moment of tranquillity to build up tension before the next burst of action. There's also an implication that Eowyn slightly fancies Aragorn, which as far as I recall was not in the book, but it actually works far better than the official romance because it is tied into the sense of danger at the battle. Finally, the writers leave off some of the book's material for the third movie, to put more focus on the Helm's Deep climax and wind towards satisfactory conclusions for each of the story's strands.
Peter Jackson is very much a craftsman of his generation, with all the pros and cons of modern filmmaking. As with The Fellowship of the Ring, the movie is over-edited, with shots never lasting more than a couple of seconds. But this is Jackson's style and he knows how to do great things with it. He's especially good at switching between the inside and the outside of a situation. When Aragorn, Gimli and Legolas encounter the Rohirrim, the riders surge into view over the hillside, and Jackson really gives us a feel of the power of this army with breathtaking shots from above and then ones inside the throng with horses towering over the camera. Later he creates a mighty "wow" moment when the black rider appears, a gauntleted hand at first, before pulling back to reveal the massive winged steed. And the detail in Jackson's close-ups is if anything more meaningful than his massive CGI crowd shots. When we see Frodo's hand moving for the ring round his neck, his fingers are rough and dirty, just as they would on someone who has spent weeks travelling in the wilderness.
The breaking of the fellowship into smaller groups in The Two Towers allows individual characters to come out a bit more, and it's the better movie for it. As before though there are a few problems with the acting. Elijah Wood makes a dismal and unsympathetic Frodo, moaning his way across Middle Earth with a perpetually forlorn look. Andy Serkis's Gollum is certainly a spirited little fellow, but I feel he's just a little too pathetic, and not convincingly cunning enough – or perhaps that problem lies more in the way he's been animated. Once again it is Ian McKellen who brings most dignity to the proceedings, but this time he is aided by solid turns from the likes of Bernard Hill and Miranda Otto. Alongside the development of characters, most of the players from the previous movie perform a little better this time around, and John Rhys Davis is particularly good as a loveably comical Gimli.
Perhaps what really makes The Two Towers is Jackson's deliberate tendency to be somewhat silly. Who else would come up with a Tolkein adaptation featuring an Olympic torch-bearer orc or Legolas surfing down the steps on a shield, unless it was a deliberate parody (which it never for one moment feels like)? Above all, he seems to be having fun with what he's doing. I don't think the oliphaunts were supposed to be quite that big in the books, but Jackson clearly wanted the Imperial Walkers from The Empire Strikes Back in his movie. It's his ability to adapt the material with dignity but without taking it too seriously, that means generally the audience is having as much fun as he is.