…but ultimately, ??The Two Towers?? disappointed me.
I do not think I am being obsessive about the movies exactly replicating the books–frankly, I have a great deal of affection for Ralph Bakshi’s animated version which plays _much_ more fast and loose with things than Peter Jackson has.
What I do look for is staying true to the characters.
So, changes in the flight from Hobbiton, the lack of Tom Bombadil and the Barrow Wights in both versions, the changes in the way the whole Rohan thing unfolds–even, after a second viewing of the first film, the modifications to Arwen’s part–do not particularly bother me, because they do not seem to distort the characters, even if they do some violence to the story itself.
Faramir, though, gets screwed, and for no reason I can discern. In fact, in the book a large part of the point of the interlude in Ithilen with Farmir is setup for what happens in Gondor later, and the person that Peter Jackson has portrayed does not, in my opinion, fit into the place that the character in the book fits–so one is forced to wonder what further distortions, on top of the time wasted in this whole stupid Osgiliath segment (including Sam’s clanging speech), are going to have to be made to try and fix these seemingnly unnecessary changes to the story brought on by some bizarre need to create extra tension.
I think I need to remember in future to _not_ see movie adaptions of books for which I have some affection, because the filmmakers cannot win with me–if they stay too close to the book, I walk out wondering why I spent my money, but if they stray too far, I walk out wondering why I spent my money.
Perhaps this explains why I go to so few movies.
Next up in the list of potential disappointments…??X-Men 2??. Although, in fact, I have high hopes for this–??X-Men?? was a much more subtly done movie than I ever would have expected, and they showed great respect for the characters while telling a story that had not been told before. Perhaps Brian Singer and company will pull another rabbit out of the hat…
