On Thu, 19 Dec 2002, Horn, John wrote: > I saw _The Two Towers_ yesterday. Very, very good. I thought the first > half was excellent. Extremely faithful to the book. There wasn't anything > I would have changed about it. The second half wandered a bit from the book > but was still very well done. > > * > * > * > * > * > * > Spoiler Space > * > * > * > * > * > * > * > Hmmmm.... that should be enough... > * > * > * > Random thoughts: >
I also loved it, pretty much for all the same reasons. My own random obervations: The Gandalf vs. Balrog fight was one of the coolest things I have ever seen. When they plunged into the lake below the mountain it was like watching a scene from the war in Heaven from Paraside Lost. (And the music!) The appearance of Gandalf the White in Fangorn was extremely nifty because of his voice. It sounded like they mixed or merged McKellan's voice and Lee's, maybe with a little electronic enhancement that gave the impression of Olorin the Valar (Maiar?) gradually returning to his human incarnation. Gandalf the Exorcist was pretty cool, too. (Gandalf the tour-guide, slightly less so.) I enjoyed Gimli's comic-relief role, but it does diminish the character slightly to make him the butt of so many sight-gags. On the other hand he kicks some serious Orc heiney, so what the heck. I think the detour of Frodo and Sam into Osgiliath was a good choice for the movie. Since Shelob has been deferred to RotK, we need to get them into some kind of high-end action to ratchet up the tension. And the Frodo-Nazgul scene was pretty damn good, too, IMO. However, this does compromise Faramir's character slightly. Maybe he'll be fleshed out better in the extended DVD. The Ents were a lot of fun. Silly but fun. I hope they get barked out better in the extended DVD too. Rohan, Eowyn, Helm's Deep -- all pretty damn cool, though the appearance of the Elves surprised me. D'ya suppose Jackson has been reading DB's essays? Aragorn upbraiding Legolas was a great moment. The fighting was so chaotic I'm going to have the watch the movie several times to get a good feel for what actually happened (poor me). Gollum, cool. Marshes of the Dead, extra cool. The ending...was a bit of a disappointment. The Samwise the Brave/Your my Bestest Famousest Hobbit Friend schtick comes off as a bit too hokey on screen. It's fairly faithful to the books, but since the first film ended the same way I was hoping for something different. Gollum is menacing, to be sure, but in print The Two Towers is one of the big-daddy cliffhangers of all time, and I wish a sense of that had carried over to the film. Maybe if they'd stopped on the stairs of Cirith Ungol instead of in the sunlit woods. Eowyn is much more impressive in motion than in the still images I had seen in advance of the movie. I love Gollum's song. Marvin Long Austin, Texas Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Poindexter & Ashcroft, LLP (Formerly the USA) _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
