The Fellowship of the Ring. The book vs movie - Essay Example

The Fellowship of the Ring: A Comparison Between Tolkien's and Jackson's Middle Earths In any adaptation of a book to a movie, there are always inevitable comparisons between the two, usually in favor of the book. The first film in Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings trilogy, The Fellowship of the Ring, drew some criticism from fans of J R R Tolkien, who proposed that too many changes had been made from the book to the movie for the latter to remain faithful to the spirit of the book. This paper examines some of the differences between Tolkien's epic and Jackson's adaptation to analyze whether or not the movie seems to be faithful to Tolkien's original. The scenes chosen for this study, which focuses on changes between the book and the movie, are the following: the fight at Weathertop, Arwen's rescue of Frodo when he is stabbed, Aragorn and Arwen's meeting at Rivendell, and Pippin's knocking the skeleton into the well in the Mines of Moria. At the outset of this study, it is important to observe that the visual medium of the cinema is by its very nature rather different from the print medium, and there was no doubt even before the movie was released that there were bound to be differences between the two. As Appenzeller points out in his review of the differences, Movies are a visual medium, and attempting to portray certain parts of a written piece -- thoughts of characters, for example -- can be difficult. [] The filmmakers of the LotR Trilogy have pointed out the fact many times that their work is an adaptation, and the process of adaptation means that certain parts of the original story have to be shortened or eliminated for the sake of making a 2-3 hour film [] So, in general, there is a difference between books and movies due to the fact that they are different types of media. (Appenzeller 2001) While the above point is undoubtedly a valid one, this study is concerned not so much with minor changes that were done for the sake of time constraints - for example, the fact that the hobbits had a long journey by river before they reached Bree - but rather with more thematic and seemingly unnecessary changes that seem to veer away from the spirit of the book. The depiction of the fight at Weathertop between Aragorn and the hobbits and the Nazgul is one of the sequences where the portrayal of the characters of the hobbits - especially Merry and Pippin - seems to represent them in a different light than did Tolkien. In the book, Aragorn himself starts the fire at the mountaintop. In the movie, however, Merry, Pippin and Sam foolishly start the fire because they are hungry and want to fry some tomatoes and bacon: Pippin: Can I have some meat Merry: Okay. Want some tomatoes, Sam Great tomatoes! Frodo: (Waking up from sleep) What are you doing Merry: Tomatoes, sausages, nice crispy bacon. Sam: We saved some for you, Mr. Frodo. Frodo: Put it out, you fools! Put it out! (Begins stamping out the fire) Pippin: Oh that's nice! Ash on my tomatoes! This is not the first attempt to portray Merry, Pippin and Sam as the comic relief in the movie. In earlier scenes such as the one where Pippin wants a 'second breakfast' but Aragorn will have none of it, the mood is at least light-hearted. In the Weathertop scene, the audience is made to believe that Merry and Pippin are gluttonous, reckless hobbits who neither know nor care about the importance of the mission they are on. Their stupidity is directly responsible for Frodo's being stabbed by the Mordor blade carried by one of the Nazgul. This scene also highlights the nature of Frodo's experience with the ring. As in the Prancing Pony when he puts on the ring accidentally, Frodo is shown by Jackson to experience visions of Sauron's eye, which is nowhere in the book. The changes that Frodo goes through are psychological rather than literal in Tolkien's book. In the book, Frodo just turns invisible, as Bilbo used to, when he puts the ring on. While this may be attributed to the director's need to visually depict the trauma that Frodo goes through because of the power of the ring, it does raise some pertinent questions about the nature of the ring itself. Most importantly, if Frodo sees the eye, then Bilbo and Gollum must have, too. Had they done so, Gollum would most definitely not have referred to the ring fondly as his "precious." His memories of the horrifying visions of Mordor and Sauron would have surely caused him to be frightened of the ring, rather than to be heartbroken at its loss and to want it back. Similarly, if Bilbo had seen the eye, he too would have been far too wary of the power of the ring to use it lightly, as he did during his disappearance at his birthday party. While Bilbo's and Gollum's apparent inability to see the eye of Sauron in the film may be explained by the suggestion that Frodo is somehow the 'true' ringbearer while they were not, this explanation seems to be rather simplistic. Jackson's depiction of Frodo's fearful visions, therefore, has significant consequences in terms of the plot of the story, and the change in the manner in which Frodo perceives the world after he puts on the ring seems to have been initiated by the movie-makers without adequate thought as to how it affects the storyline and raises questions about the ringbearer's relationship with the ring - and Sauron - that Tolkien's epic does not raise. Another aspect of the fight at Weathertop is that Jackson portrays Frodo as weak and vulnerable. In the book Frodo goes down fighting, and attacks one of the Nine Riders before he is stabbed and incapacitated. In the movie, he tries to scramble away, puts on the ring in desperation, and cowers helplessly as the Nazgul stabs him. Far from being an isolated incident, this scene reflects the manner in which Jackson's Frodo loses the greatest character trait which Tolkien's Frodo has: courage. The second scene that requires some reflection on Jackson's depiction of Tolkien's characters is Arwen's rescue of Frodo after he is stabbed with the poisoned blade. While it is true that the aid with which Frodo is sent to Rivendell is given by the elf Glorfindel rather than Arwen in the book, that discrepancy does not alter the spirit of the book as much as the manner in which Jackson portrays Frodo as weak and helpless. As in the fight at Weathertop, Frodo is shown to be weak and helpless. He does not ride Asfaloth but rather lolls on the horse in front of Arwen like a sack of potatoes, his eyes rolling and his mouth spouting green slime like in a cheap science-fiction film. In the book, Frodo's courage in this scene is a defining moment, as he bravely faces the Nazgul even though his strength is fading: Suddenly the foremost Rider spurred his horse forward. It checked at the water and reared up. With a great effort Frodo sat upright and brandished his sword. "Go back!" he cried. "Bo back to the Land of Mordor, and follow me no more!" His voice sounded thin and shrill in his own ears. The Riders halted, but Frodo had not the power of Bombabil. His enemies laughed at him with a harsh and chilling laughter. "Come back! Come back!" they called. "To Mordor we will take you!" "Go back!" he whispered. "The Ring! The Ring!" they cried with deadly voices, and immediately their leader urged his horse forward into the water, followed closely by two others. "By Elbereth and Lthien the Fair," said Frodo with a last effort, lifting up his sword, "you shall have neither the Ring nor me!" (214) The above scene in the book is an indication of Frodo's resolve to not give up the ring, even if it means that he endangers his own life. There is also a marked difference in the manner in which Arwen confronts the Riders in the movie - she is almost taunting them, probably because she knows that she can work the magic that will cause the river to flood: Nazgul:Give up the halfling, she-elf! Arwen:(brandishing her sword) If you want him, come and claim him! Frodo, on the other hand, as he struggles to hold his own against the Nazgul, has no way of knowing that Elrond and Gandalf are arranging the flood in the book. His bravery, therefore, is more significant in the book than Arwen's is in the movie, because he does not have the powers that she does. This corruption of Frodo's character by Jackson reduces his role in the movie to that of a pawn in a larger game that he neither knows, nor is really capable of understanding. From being the hero of the epic, he becomes a weak and dependent character whose only dialogs are along the lines of 'I can't do this, Sam.' In the book, Frodo is a character who makes his own choices and takes on the quest complete awareness of what he is doing; in the movie, he seems barely aware of what is going on, and seems to drift along with the tide of events, having the quest thrust upon him rather than making the conscious choice to take the ring to Mordor. Thus the fortitude and resilience of Tolkien's Frodo is lost, depriving the movie of a strong protagonist, and diluting the very nature of the quest narrative itself. The third scene examined in this paper is the meeting of Aragorn and Arwen at Rivendell. Although the scene is not in the book, it deserves to be recognized as a change rather than an addition because it is based on lines that Tolkien himself included in the Appendix of his volume. In Appendix A, Tolkien describes how Aragorn is singing the song of Luthien and Beren - which anticipates the human-elf love that he himself is to share with Arwen - when he first lays eyes on Arwen: And suddenly even as he sang he saw a maiden walking on a greensward among the white stems of the birches; and he halted amazed, thinking that he had strayed into a dream, or else that he had received the gift of the Elf-minstrels, who can make things of which they sing appear before the eyes of those that listen. (1058) The movie includes this meeting in the form of a reminiscence that Aragorn and Arwen share when Aragorn guides the hobbits to Rivendell. Unlike the adulteration of Frodo's character that takes place in the earlier scenes discussed in this paper, this scene beautifully captures the relationship of the man and the elf, and their anguish at having to be apart because Aragorn will not hear of his beloved having to give up her immortality for his sake. As Tolkien himself indicates in the book, there is much more to the tales of Middle Earth than he himself as a narrator can capture in his volumes. Jackson gives us a sense of the scale of Middle Earth and its untold stories in this scene, and also effectively creates a brief but illuminating background to the story of Aragorn and Arwen: Arwen:Renech i l i erui govannem (Do you remember when we first met) Aragorn:Nauthannem i ned l reniannen. (I thought I had strayed into a dream.) Arwen:Gwenwin in enninath... -'arnech in naeth i si celich. (Long years have passed... You did not have the cares you carry now.) Apart from the echoing of the words that Tolkien himself used (e.g., "strayed into a dream"), Jackson also makes the scene immensely effective by using Elvish as the language for the spoken dialog, supplemented by English subtitles. The care and effort taken to authentically translate the dialog - Tolkien's original is in English - shows great dedication and hard work in the transcription of the book into a screenplay, and the scene effectively captures the spirit of Tolkien's original. Unfortunately, few other scenes that have been changed show the same commitment to the spirit of the book. Pippin's knocking over the skeleton in the Mines of Moria is another instance in which the hobbits are shown as being clumsy and irreverent to the profound nature of the quest that they are on. In the book, Pippin merely drops a stone into the well to gauge how deep it is. In an earlier scene, too, when the Fellowship is attempting to enter the Mines, Pippin and Merry are shown to have disturbed the Watcher in the Water by carelessly flicking stones into the lake, which results in Frodo almost being dragged into the water by the creature's tentacles. In the book, it is Boromir who wakes the Watcher, foreshadowing his later attempt to talk Frodo into taking the ring to Gondor. While Tolkien himself seemed to suggest that Pippin was at fault, his mistake is greatly exaggerated in the movie, with Gandalf rounding on him furiously and saying, "Fool of a Took! Throw yourself in next time and rid us of your stupidity!" He says much the same in the book, but he is also "relieved" (313) rather than merely angry that the sound has been caused by Pippin and nothing else. In the movie, Pippin causes the skeleton as well as a considerably long length of chain to fall crashing into the well, which presumably results not only in the Orcs finding the company, but also in alerting the Balrog to their presence, thus resulting in Gandalf's perilous - and seemingly fatal - battle with the demon. This scene is yet another instance of the manner in which all the hobbits lose their credibility in Jackson's version of the story. They are shown to be little more than children who do not know the stakes. The film-makers seem to have mistakenly assumed that because hobbits are small in stature, they are intellectually immature as well. The movie seems to have portrayed a rather different version of the hobbits to the viewers; even critics who have not read the book believe that the hobbits are young and immature: It tells the story of the desperate mission of the youthful hobbit Frodo, who inherits a magical but potentially corrupting doomsday ring and struggles to elude capture and death by marauders and monsters who crave the object for despotic purposes. (Arnold 6) This simplistic summary of the plot by Gary Arnold is typical of most reviews, which tend to classify Tolkien among Harry Potter-like tales of stereotypical battles between good and evil. One reviewer even concludes with the following lament: "The sad thing is that we will have to wait twelve months until we find out what happens next" (Tiscali.Org review). The fault is arguably director Jackson's, who has been described as being "wary of the fidelity issue" (Arnold 6): "When I read reviews, I often think they're reviewing the degree of fidelity more than the film itself. The Harry Potter thing is the most recent example," he says. "What I've attempted to do is be responsible as a filmmaker, primarily. You can walk in off the street, having never read Lord of the Rings,' knowing nothing about Middle Earth, and still be able to follow our movie." (Arnold 6) Jackson seems to be encouraging viewers to categorize the epic in terms of the genre of fantasy alone, instead of being the magnificent, many-layered achievement of J R R Tolkien. Consequently, there is a plethora of simplistic definitions such as the following: "The plot [] can be pared down to a relatively simple synopsis [] : in Middle Earth a ring is bequeathed to a young hobbit Frodo Baggins" (Tiscali.Org review). Frodo is, of course, fifty years old in the book and far more mature than he is portrayed to be in the movie. As Ralph Wood points out in a scholarly article on the transformation of Tolkien's epic from book to movie, The film's chief fault lies in the decision to depict the four chief hobbits--Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin--as raw youths rather than the middle-aged creatures whom Tolkien invented. [] Technical ingenuity has enabled the moviemakers to shrink the size of these hairy-footed halflings, and thus to give them the appearance of adolescence. (Wood 35) That the hobbits are not adolescents is nowhere suggested by Jackson's interpretation. The film's primary meritorious achievement seems to be that it did catch the attention of the popular imagination, since it depicted violence and its consequences almost immediately after the terrorist attacks on America in 2001: "After September 11, the movie also serves as a salutary reminder that war is not an antiseptic affair of bombs dropped from on high, but that the battle against evil is dirty and dangerous and unending" (Wood 35). While it achieved an arguably greater objective in compelling its audience to take hope in the idea of goodness, perhaps this was not a primary theme for Tolkien himself. Despite the movie's flaws, it seems to have done a commendable job of portraying Middle Earth itself, with its variety of beings and settings. There are many reviewers who believe that "the motion picture adaptation is as faithful as one could imagine possible" (Berardinelli). Yet the same reviewer also points out that the movie is no more than "a well-crafted adventure yarn set against the backdrop of a mythical clash between good and evil" (Berardinelli). Nev Pierce, in a review of the film for the BBC, seems to agree, suggesting that the "film's problem comes in cramming so much story into even three hours." In other words, the adaptation does not quite manage to capture the spirit as well as the pace of the original. The movie adaptation of Tolkien's epic may not satisfy those who have studied and known Tolkien's works intimately, but the fact remains that his fans were almost an academic minority before Jackson's epics were released. The Fellowship of the Ring as a movie remains "flawless introduction to the world of Middle-earth" (Pierce), at least in terms of the newfound interest it has generated in the classic works of Tolkien. Works Cited Appenzeller, Gary. "The Fellowship of the Ring: Differences Between The Movie And The Book." Retrieved 29 April 2006 from . Arnold, Gary. "A Director's 'Ring' Quest." The Washington Times, December 14, 2001. P. 6. Berardinelli, James. "Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring: A Film Review." Retrieved 2 May 2006 from http://colossus.net/movie-reviews/movies/l/lotr1.html The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. Dir. Peter Jackson. Perf. Elijah Wood, Ian McKellen, Viggo Mortensen, Sean Astin, Liv Tyler, Hugo Weaving, et al. New Line Cinema, 2001. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (A Review). Tiscali.Org. Retrieved 1 May 2006 from http://www.tiscali.co.uk/entertainment/film/reviews/the_lord_of_the_rings.html Pierce, Nev. "The Fellowship of the Ring: A Review." BBC. 2001. Retrieved 30 April 2006 from http://www.bbc.co.uk/films/2001/12/11/lord_of_the_rings_fellowship_of_the_ring_2001_review.shtml Tolkien, J R R. The Lord of the Rings. New York, Houghton Mifflin, 1994. First published 1954, 1965 and 1966. Wood, Ralph C. "Tolkien the Movie." The Christian Century, Vol. 119, January 2, 2002 Read More