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Re: I don't get your analogy

Posted by Bulkington (A) on June 28, 2005 at 07:18:42

In Reply to: Re: I don't get your analogy posted by Analog Scott on June 27, 2005 at 16:02:58:

Victor's critism of LotR has been nothing more than calling it kaka. So I can't say that it is or is not due to the genre or the movie. I'm still waiting for Victor to name an epic fantasy that he likes.

Like what other epic fantasy might that be? If there were no other epic fantasy he liked, what would that prove?

There are no epic fantasy films I like. I think they're bad films. I think people apologize for their badness on generic grounds when there's no generic necessity to film them the way they're filmed. Critics who gave the LoTR films praise or even a pass by and large abandoned the kind of critical standards to which they hold other films. Why? The soft bigotry of low expectation. Most people assume genre fantasy is bad and therefore don't expect much out of it. "For epic fantasy, this is great!" Back-handed praise.

What was it about how it was filmed that makes you think that?

Do a search for previous posts of mine on this topic. If that doesn't suffice (it's been a while, and my memory's conflating what I've written here and in private exchanges), lemme know and maybe I'll get back to you. I don't have any great stake in writing a monograph on the cinematic offenses of the LoTR, but a monograph on that subject could very easily be written.

"I grew up with Tolkien, and while I still wax nostalgic over his work, I don't regard it as high literary art, though I do regard Middle Earth to be a great fiction."

That makes you one of many millions. But the vast majority of those many millions, myself included< don't share your opinion of the films.

And a million people can't be wrong. Can you offer a better defense of the film than recourse to its popularity? What have you offered in the way of analysis that's any more substantial than Victor's "kaka"?

" I don't, therefore, hold the original sacrosanct--in general, I understand that the translation of a literary work to film requires processes of restructuring, compression, and re-imagination, and all with an artistic integrity on the part of the translating filmmaker. In the adaptation of a novel to film, the film should be a free adaptation. Neither film nor novel should have a parasitic relationship to the other. In the end, the film should be judged on the extent to which it's a good film, not on the extent to which it was faithful to its source."

If it is faithful to the source and the source is a good one it stands to reason that the film will likely also be good. History has supported this basic logic.

That makes no sense whatsoever. It does not follow that faithfulness to a "good" source will result in a "good" adaptation. A bad director is perfectly capable of botching a good script just as a good director can salvage a bad one. And Jackson's faithfulness to Tolkien is only superficial at best.

"That said, the list of Jackson's departures in content and style, not to mention his interpolations, had the effect of making me realize that Tolkien was a much more accomplished story teller than I'd given him credit for. I think Tolkien has ample cause to be rolling in his grave because of those films, though maybe he's resting well knowing how many readers were sent to his novels after viewing them."

Among the millions of fans of his books you are in the vast minority when it comes to the film. That doesn't make you wrong but it certainly makes you less right in a way. Think for a moment what it would have meant had Jackson made a movie you liked but the vast majority of Tolkien fans didn't.

Again, have you an argument outside of lazy populism? It doesn't make me less right in any way whatsoever. Had Jackson made a film I liked and that a majority of Tolkien fans did not it would only prove, as their liking what in fact he did make proves, their poor reading of Tolkien, the poverty of their imaginations, and their complete lack of reflection upon the expressive possibilities of film. I think most Tolkien fans who creamed themselves over Jackson's films did so primarily because they felt themselves somehow affirmed by them: "See, these books I've been charishing? They're the real thing, man! Cultural stamp of approval!" Whatever.

Does that bug you? Deal with it. My opinions are not up for vote by the masses. I would not think very highly of anyone whose were.

"Seriously, though. I've seen no effort on the part of LoTR defenders here to defend the film as a film."

What's to defend. Calling it kaka is a comentary that is completely devoid of substance. If somebody were to make specific points on substance I'd be happy to take them on if I disagreed with them.

Fair enough, I suppose. I also think it a pretty basic critical exercise to offer an explanation as to why you like something, why it works for you. We expect as much from positive as from negative reviews, but of course tend to let it slide when the pronouncement is in accordance with our own. Those who agree with Victor that the films are kaka would probably regard elaboration tedious and superfluous; those who don't agree want an explanation. It's the same with those who agree they're good, though often such people like to have conversations about what it is they thought was good. I've not seen that here, however.

" "Oh, Victor doesn't like orcs on wargs!--or was it goblins? [That's the lingo, Victor, for 'animal-looking "people" riding wild boars-like "horses"'] He just doesn't get it!" Well, I have nothing against that sort of thing per se and I thought that whole sequence of the film to be outragiously stupid."

OK so you have called it a name. Now tell us why it was stupid. Then we will have something to talk about.

A laughably fake CGI action squence (that, like all such sequences in the film, was so over-the-top in a Jerry Bruckheimerish way as to divest the action of any genuine sense of danger) patently contrived to separate Aragorn from the group in order to elaborate on the silly, interpolated Aragorn/Arwen (is that her name?) story line, culminating with one of those aweful, gozzy, breathy, Liv Tyler sequences. What the hell's to like about that--especially as a Tolkien fan?

"I could go on and on and on. I think I have here before."

I hope your previous comentaries had more substance than "it was stupid."

Why don't you take a look?

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