Paintbrushes Forgotten

Rating: Null/10 (11 August 2003)

The Fellowship of the Ring reached magical depths that one cannot fathom how they were forgotten in this, The Two Towers. How could have the makers of such a beautiful portrait of Middle Earth as was the first movie have put their aesthetically sophisticated, spiritually dipped paintbrushes away for ones to portray this more prosaic vision of Middle Earth?
The first one included infinite more scenery - the vividly green and blue Shire bathed in sunshine, the dark and scary mines of Moria, the dark greens and greys of Lothlorien, the balming peace and ethereal architecture of Rivendell, the black and red terror of Barad-dur, the grey eeriness and further terror of Isengard unleashed, the silent threat of the Great River Anduin, the false safety of the cheerful Bree, and the trodding across said lands and the lands in between, like the snowy white Misty Mountains (my favorite scenes), and the lands surrounding Weathertop.

The second one was little more than grey and brown terrains - beautiful, but sorely in need of others to contrast them.
The Fellowship of the Rings was more suspenseful. Who were those Black Riders? Were they not infinitely more terrifying than any of the orcs that came out in the second film? The Ring was prominent in the first film. What could it do to that who owned it? The second film gave little time or thought to the Ring.
The first one was much more exciting. Being chased by Black Riders through the woods at night, listening to their chill wails? Fighting them? Being chased by orcs and a troll in the mines and by Uruk-hai above ground? How can an "epic battle" such as Helm's Deep stand up to such uniqueness?

The exclusion of the hobbits from the majority of the film seemed also most unjust to me. Although Viggo Mortensen's Aragorn is a rich character with fathomless depths who deserves prominence in the story, this was not a reason to rob Elijah Wood's brave little protagonist Frodo of starring the major emotions and perils in this story, which after all, is mostly his, as well as the other hobbits. Frodo is a very deep character as well who represents the virtues of innocence and perseverance, virtues he could turn his back on more easily than Legolas or Aragorn perhaps, who have more ease when facing danger, but chooses not to.
Aragorn is a major character observed in the books, observed through the eyes of Merry, Pippin, Frodo and Sam, who themselves are the ones living and feeling the peril described by Tolkien. That Aragorn might seem more apt to action sequences seems a bit absurd to me; it is scads more exciting to see these tiny, little beings flee and fight the way they did in the first film (when arriving to the Brandywine Crossing).
And even if they did spend arduous expanses of time trudging, there was something to be said for it. Endurance, perseverance, moving forward instead of collapsing with utter fatigue...
The first movie allowed the audience to weep - weep with emotion when Arwen charged across woods and plains in order to save Frodo and save hope for the entire world, weep when she wept for Frodo weeping for innocence lost, weep when the noble protector Gandalf fell into the darkness of Moria, weep at the sheer beauty of the crossing of the Misty Mountains, weep sympathizing with Boromir's fright... In the second one only Theoden's grief for his son mattered much.
The first movie included meaningful expressions - Legolas' terrified face when encountering the Balrog, Galadriel's lust after the ring, Frodo's, Bilbo's and Gandalf's impish blue eyes sharpen when detecting Sauron's sultry whispers while discussing the Ring, Boromir's quailing before Galadriel, Gimli's shock and grief at finding his relatives killed by orcs... The second one had Merry near to tears when reproaching the Ents, and Eowyn's beautiful, anxious face, but not much else.

The second movie was much like Braveheart since it focused entirely too much around the story of Helm's Deep and the people of Rohan. These scenes were fantastic, but they should have been pruned down to much shorter time, and much more time (and emotion) should have been given to the hobbits' stories (even Gollum got more time than Frodo and Pippin it seemed). I would have loved to see much more of Fangorn, Isengard and Mordor than of Rohan, which deserved a substantial but not all encompassing slice. For stories about brave humans abound and will continue to be made, but there is only one that I know of that includes hobbits and elves. I hope directors and producers will eventually learn that international audiences at large will appreciate the finer webs of which the first film was made than the obvious ones of the second.
A rather odd thing to be such a fan for a person who generally reads only non-fiction...