41
We're not that big on theaters anyway; all the people you know. I much prefer seeing movies at home, on the couch. My home theater system is good enough (35" TV and Yamaha NS series speakers all round) that it's pretty enjoyable. Plus, it's much better on the wallet. :wink:

42
Storm13 wrote:We're not that big on theaters anyway; all the people you know.
yes, i know exactly.
Storm13 wrote:(35" TV and Yamaha NS series speakers all round)... much better on the wallet. :wink:
uh....um......maybe i'm not reading this right, but.... ;) ;)

LOTR: The Two Towers info

43
TheOneRing.net wrote:Want To Know Just WHAT French Premiere Has To Say?Xoanon @ 12:38 pm EST

Thioden was kind enough to translate bits of the French Premiere article we posted just a few hours ago. Take a look at some massive spoilerage!
I have taken a look at the TTT article in the French magazine premiere, and have translated for you some interesting tidbits:

[...] some changes from the book have to be predicted, for example Elrond and Galadriel's participation to the battle of Helm's Deep, and the demise of the wizard Saruman.

Now that pretty much confirms that Saruman dies in The Two Towers, as earlier stories reported. And I assume that both Elrond and Galadriel send contingents of Elves to Helm's Deep to help the Rohirrim.

ALSO:

...Fran Walsh promises us a real tragic follow up to Arwen and Aragorn's love-story.

...John Rhys-Davies has given a Welsh accent to the Ent Treebeard, whom he voices.

...The construction of Minas Tirith has taken itself 32 weeks of hard work.

...The flashback scene of Smeagol before he was enslaved by the power of the Ring is in the can, and directed by Fran Walsh.


Xoanon here, I'm not too sure about Fran directing the Smeagol/Deagol scenes, I do know she was writing them the last I spoke with her a while back, could it be she directed that segment with a 2nd unit? Who knows...

44
here's the full translation courtesy of Orlando Bloom Multimedia. check out the original scans here
Translation of TTT article from French edition of Premiere
October 7, 2002
Elbakin.com
Translated by Sadie


After eight weeks of supplementary filming last spring, diverse readjustments, a brief post-September 11th attempt to modify a title perhaps too symbolic, "The Two Towers" is getting ready for a world-wide release on the 18th of December.

Is it a sequel? No, sir, it's a continuation. Faithful to the mind of Tolkien, Jackson chose to pick up where "The Fellowship of the Ring" left off. "So that one day, we can watch the trilogy in its entirety", the director eagerly specifies.

After the dissapearance of Gandalf and the death of Boromir, the compagnons disperse into three groups on Middle-Earth, kept in check by hordes of Orcs and Uruk-hais, frightening cross between Orcs and Elves. Frodo and Sam are on their way to Mordor and Mount Doom, where they count on getting rid of the evil ring. Merry and Pippin, kidnapped by the Orcs, take shelter in a strange forest...searching for them, Gimli, Aragorn, and Legolas are going to help King Theoden of Rohan in his struggle against the obscure forces of Saruman and Sauron.

Since December 2000, websites dedicated to the films and books have been circulating all kinds of rumours, even before Peter Jackson finished his first montage this winter. Among the most anticipated events: the titanic battle of Helm's Deep, the return of Gandalf, and two of the most mythic characters, Treebeard, the Ent, and Gollum, the former Hobbit, already introduced in the first film- consumed by the power of the ring.

Review of details...

The loutish and inevitable scenes to introduce the first film will not be seen this time around. Peter Jackson promises, "This time we go right into the action. "The Two Towers" is the one that develops best certain aspects outlined by Tolkien. We adventure, for example, in the meanderings of Gollum's psychology, faced with Frodo and Sam." The comfortable benefits (Sadie's note: can't make much of this word) the first film allowed Peter Jackson the ultimate luxury of sizing his opus to his own mesure, adding, after scenes filmed in May-June of 2002, more than 25 minutes of film. Knowing that this gentleman, under the stroke of inspiration, is capable of laying down a dialogue over the course of breakfast that will be in the can two hours later, anything is possible. Without betraying the confidence of fans, a few minor inacuracies will be in the film, like the participation of Galadriel and Elrond in the battle of Helm's Deep, or the end of Saruman...(Sadie's note:can't make much sense of the rest of the sentence).

What to expect of the new characters
First of all, back in white: Gandalf the Grey, just escaped from the Balrog, let his white hair grow out, and is wiser. This time, he doesn't intend to botch his mission to rid Middle-Earth of the ring. "Vigourous, manicured, relieved of his past, he has become a veritable samorai, a better-trained combattant", according to Sir Ian McKellan.

Now the little news:
Theoden, the king of Rohan (Bernard Hill, the captain of the "Titanic"), bewitched be his councelor Grima, or Wormtounge, in the service of Saroman, is going to find a renewed youth in the battle against the forces of evil. To incarnate the deceitful Wormtounge, Brad Dourif (Billy Bibbit from "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest") sacrificed his eyebrows, but not his ability to elicit repulsion...

We'll get also a double dose of testosterone with the arrival of lots of men on horses: Eomer, third marshal of the Mark (Karl Urban, from Xena) and the dedicated nephew of Theoden, Faramir, brother of the late Boromir (David Wenham, seen in "Moulin Rouge"). Those who regretted the absence of a feminine touch in the first film should be satisfied: Phillippa Boyens promises a tragic development in the love story of Arwen and Aragorn. Then there's Eowyn (Astralian Miranda Otto, seen in "Apperances"), the strange pale lady of Rohan, niece of Theoden, who will (do something, but I'm not sure what) in a world of brutes.

And at last, Peter Jackson offers in this second film two of the most anticipated characters in the epic: Treebeard and Gollum are the make of the most flattering rumours. Honor to ancestors with the Ent, tree-man who speaks with a millenial wisdom: the venerable flora animatronic 5 meters tall, every bit as well garded in the special effects studios of WETA Digital as the jewels of the crown of England, found his voice in the rocky Welsh intonations of John-Rhys Davies, who we can still see under a kilo of prosthetiques as Gimli the Dwarf.

Special Effects
According to Fran Walsh who supervised the creation of creepy Gollum, the sinister and pathetic creature corrupted by the ring is a revolution in itself. In fact it's the first numeric character entirely generated from the performance of an actor. Models, motion capture, numeric images, and lots of Andy Serkis (seen in "24 Hour Party People" from Michael Winterbottom) who, between a (?) voice and feline movements, brilliantly approached his character like a drug addict. We can also subtly detect his schizophrenia in the flash-backs where he (camps ?) the Hobbit Smeagol before he becomes devoured by his passion for the ring...

WETA, already having received Oscar nods, hasn't been idle, but all that is nothing compared with the battle scenes in "The Two Towers": the siege on Helm's Deep is already considered to be one of the most extraordinary scenes in film history. Boosted by MASSIVE software, let's imagine each of the 10,000 screaming Orcs and Uruk-hais, set loose in a model the size of a rugby field and equiped with battle prowess and movements that befit them... "A stroke of pen and a couple of drops of ink for Tolkien, five years of work for us", commented Richard Taylor, supervisor of WETA... For his part, Peter Jackson filmed the forces allied with Men and Elves faced with the monstrosities of Saroman, at night and in the rain for four months in a quarry near Wellington (New Zealand). (Sadie's note: Don't understand this sentence)

Set Decoration
The director didn't let the decoration department rest: between the abundance of new locations that took shape for the film (the tower of Barad-Dur, the marshes...), he gave special attention to Edoras, capital of Rohan. "Why create on the screen what we can create in real life? Tolkien didn't live in a virtual, numeric world, me either."

After months of helicopter patrols to find it, on an almost desert island in the New Zealand archipelago, the breathtaking view described by Tolkien, the team had to erect from scratch, in four months, a midieval city inspired by Scandinavian civilisations, and then rebuild it two years later for reshoots in Stone Street studios in Wellington. The only technical higher bid: the construction of Minas Tirith during thirty-two weeks. Nothing was left to chance so that "The Two Towers" be finished in delay. And still, this is only the beginning: Peter Jackson declared that this second opus would be better than the first...but not as good as the third.

45
the rings camp produces yet another amazing poster:
LORDOS2BRP[1].jpg
You do not have the required permissions to view the files attached to this post.
Last edited by TC on 10/08/09, 15:37:46, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: attached image

[DVD] info on extended cut of LOTR: FOTR

46
the digital bits wrote:Well folks... I have seen the new extended cut of The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. Matt and I attended a special screening of the contents of the new 4-disc DVD at New Line on Saturday. The event ran from 9 AM to after 9 PM, and even after 12 hours of viewing, they still didn't have time to show everything that's included in the set (the 4 audio commentaries and thousands of production artwork gallery stills went unseen). To be fair, Matt and I only stayed to see the new cut of the film shown in a big-screen, theater environment with DTS surround sound. 12 hours is, after all, a LONG damn time to sit on one seat! But I can tell you that the new cut of the film is absolutely wonderful.

Many of you already know a little about the 30 minutes of material that's been added back in, but here's a list of SOME of the new scenes: an extended opening with Bilbo writing his memoirs, a new introduction to Samwise Gamgee, a scene at the Green Dragon Inn, the Hobbits witnessing the departure of the Elves from Middle Earth on the way to Bree, Aragorn singing the ballad of Beren and Luthien, Aragorn at his mother's grave, new moments during the departure from Rivendale in which we see Arwen's emotional reaction to Aragorn's leaving as well as Elrond seeing the Fellowship off, a scene in the mines of Moria in which we learn how the Dwarves unleashed the fire-demon, Galadriel's complete gift-giving scene at Lothlorien and more footage of the battle at Amon Hen.

That's impressive enough, right? But there are also many smaller scenes, scene extensions and additional brief moments that have been added in throughout the length of the film. The cumulative effect is to make this film seem vastly more epic in scope - something I would never have guessed possible. There's a greater sense of distance to the Fellowship's journey, with many more points of interest along the way. We get to learn much more about Hobbits in the new opening, and there's more interaction between Frodo and Bilbo, which illuminates their fond relationship. You see that Gollum has continued to follow the Fellowship after leaving Moria. Lothlorien is depicted in much greater detail. The battle scenes are all much more intense now, and several characters are given added moments that make them feel more rounded, particularly Boromir (his last stand is now much more heroic and emotional). There's more humor in this cut. And the new footage adds significant texture and depth to the film - particularly welcome as much of this directly references material in the original book. The result, ultimately, is a much more satisfying viewing experience. I have no doubt that those who disliked the film because it was too long will bemoan the new version. But for fans, if you liked Fellowship in its theatrical form, you will absolutely love this. The 15 or 20 people in the preview audience with us were in complete agreement - the new cut of this film is nothing short of extraordinary. We'll be back with our in-depth review of the entire 4-disc DVD set later this week. But I just wanted to chime in this morning with the good word on the film itself.
i can't fucking wait!!!

Jackson's dinking w/characters....

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...will jar Tolkien readers. this is a good article to offset the hype surrounding the new flick. of course, i haven't seen it myself yet, but am looking foward to some thoughts from all of you on it.
St. Louis Post-Dispatch wrote:Jackson's dinking with characters will jar Tolkien readers
BY SARAH BRYAN MILLER Of the Post-Dispatch
12/15/2002 12:00 AM


When director Peter Jackson sticks to J.R.R. Tolkien's story and characters in "The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers," he does pretty well. When he tries to be innovative, he falls on his face.

The good news first: Gollum is just about perfect. The unfortunate proto-hobbit, kept alive too long and too unhealthily by the power of the Ring, is as simultaneously loathsome and pitiful as Tolkien stipulates. And Jackson resists any urge to dink around too much with his character or motivations. But there are problems - big problems, from the book lover's perspective - elsewhere.

The major casting and interpretation issues from the first film (principally a too-young Frodo, and Merry and Pippin as "Dumb and Dumber," along with an insufficiently heroic Aragorn) remain, of course. But this movie's difficulties are even greater, because Jackson seems to have no concept of the nobility of certain of his characters, and apparently can't resist messing with their essence.

Aragorn, the descendant of the great kings, and Arwen, the Elven king Elrond's daughter, are of a different stuff than most of the other characters, and their vows to each other are for eternity. Aragorn is sorry for Eowyn; he's not the least bit interested in her. Arwen's decision to remain in Middle Earth was made decades before, and once it was made, her father Elrond accepted it.

But here we see Aragorn eyeing Eowyn, Arwen apparently bugging out with the rest of the elves, and Elrond urging her to do so. It's wrong, it's jarring, and it undermines the whole essence of the story.

Although the tree-like Ents are beautifully realized, Jackson played with their part of the story, too: Instead of showing them deciding to join the battle after long deliberation, he has them refusing to help the forces of good - until Merry tricks their leader, Treebeard, into going south instead of north. There, he sees the destruction to the forest wrought by Saruman, and the Ents bring the wicked wizard's plans (and fortress) down around him. But the Ents aren't stupid, and Treebeard is hardly one to be manipulated with such ease.

Theoden, the aged King of Rohan, is possessed by Saruman when we first see him in the movie. That would seem to render his adviser Wormtongue superfluous, but it does allow Jackson to pull off a nifty special effect. And once the king recovers from the exorcism, he's much too young for the part.

Faramir, Boromir's nobler brother, has been warped beyond recognition. Like his brother, he is tempted by the Ring; unlike his brother, he does not yield to the temptation - at least Tolkien's Faramir does not. Jackson's Faramir is just as bad as Boromir, deciding to take the Ring and the Ring-Bearer to his father - until he's scared by a Nazgul and lets Frodo go after all.

As for Frodo, he's practically catatonic by the end of the film; the Ring's power over him is invoked too early. We'll have to wait for the third and final film in the series to see if he really does have anywhere to go from here.
[Edited by Kanuck, to fix the GODDAMN ANNOYING SPELLING ERROR :P]

Re: Jackon's dinking w/characters....

48
TC wrote:...will jar Tolkien readers. this is a good article to offset the hype surrounding the new flick. of course, i haven't seen it myself yet, but am looking foward to some thoughts from all of you on it.
St. Louis Post-Dispatch wrote:Jackson's dinking with characters will jar Tolkien readers
BY SARAH BRYAN MILLER Of the Post-Dispatch
12/15/2002 12:00 AM


When director Peter Jackson sticks to J.R.R. Tolkien's story and characters in "The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers," he does pretty well. When he tries to be innovative, he falls on his face.

The good news first: Gollum is just about perfect. The unfortunate proto-hobbit, kept alive too long and too unhealthily by the power of the Ring, is as simultaneously loathsome and pitiful as Tolkien stipulates. And Jackson resists any urge to dink around too much with his character or motivations. But there are problems - big problems, from the book lover's perspective - elsewhere.

The major casting and interpretation issues from the first film (principally a too-young Frodo, and Merry and Pippin as "Dumb and Dumber," along with an insufficiently heroic Aragorn) remain, of course. But this movie's difficulties are even greater, because Jackson seems to have no concept of the nobility of certain of his characters, and apparently can't resist messing with their essence.

Aragorn, the descendant of the great kings, and Arwen, the Elven king Elrond's daughter, are of a different stuff than most of the other characters, and their vows to each other are for eternity. Aragorn is sorry for Eowyn; he's not the least bit interested in her. Arwen's decision to remain in Middle Earth was made decades before, and once it was made, her father Elrond accepted it.

But here we see Aragorn eyeing Eowyn, Arwen apparently bugging out with the rest of the elves, and Elrond urging her to do so. It's wrong, it's jarring, and it undermines the whole essence of the story.

Although the tree-like Ents are beautifully realized, Jackson played with their part of the story, too: Instead of showing them deciding to join the battle after long deliberation, he has them refusing to help the forces of good - until Merry tricks their leader, Treebeard, into going south instead of north. There, he sees the destruction to the forest wrought by Saruman, and the Ents bring the wicked wizard's plans (and fortress) down around him. But the Ents aren't stupid, and Treebeard is hardly one to be manipulated with such ease.

Theoden, the aged King of Rohan, is possessed by Saruman when we first see him in the movie. That would seem to render his adviser Wormtongue superfluous, but it does allow Jackson to pull off a nifty special effect. And once the king recovers from the exorcism, he's much too young for the part.

Faramir, Boromir's nobler brother, has been warped beyond recognition. Like his brother, he is tempted by the Ring; unlike his brother, he does not yield to the temptation - at least Tolkien's Faramir does not. Jackson's Faramir is just as bad as Boromir, deciding to take the Ring and the Ring-Bearer to his father - until he's scared by a Nazgul and lets Frodo go after all.

As for Frodo, he's practically catatonic by the end of the film; the Ring's power over him is invoked too early. We'll have to wait for the third and final film in the series to see if he really does have anywhere to go from here.
well golly fucking gee, books are one thing, films are another, and never the twain shall meet.
This is a snakeskin jacket. And for me it's a symbol of my individuality and my belief in personal freedom.

Re: Jackon's dinking w/characters....

49
O-dot wrote:well golly fucking gee, books are one thing, films are another, and never the twain shall meet.
yeah....while all of this is interesting, i just don't think that some of these talking heads have any clue what goes into making a movie, and the responsibilities a person has who has been given hundreds of millions of dollars by a studio and told to make a return on it. as with the "100 things wrong with LOTR" post in these forums, it's interesting, but the books and the movies really have to be taken as two seperate things, and this is not news.

on a seperate note, go have some more coffee; you're a tad wound today. :ay:

strange...

50
I thought there would be more screaming and shouting about THE TWO TOWERS here... I can't see one post!

Well anyway, I saw it yesterday. Actually, I kinda enjoyed it. It's still chintzy and childish and reactionary as hell, but I liked it a lot more than the first one. There's a lot packed into the 3 hours, intercutting story-lines, lots of quite imaginative creatures and some seriously big battles. And the scene with the 'cockney-orcs' was the first flash of real Peter Jackson humour since the trilogy began - infact, the humour overall is more successful, it takes itself less seriously. And gollum is nicely done.

Still doesn't make my Top 10 of 2002 tho... :bwaha:

51
ah, so there is one post.

lol!

all this stuff is so hilarious. I saw another comment somewhere that the 'Ent's legs are too long'. Pwahahaha!!!

As for: "Jackson seems to have no concept of the nobility of certain of his characters"

The goddamn 'nobility' of the characters is the absolute worst thing about the film as it is. Any more nobility and Jackson would be a prime candidate for the guillotine. This is one of the things that makes the Star Wars prequels so much easier to stomach as action-packed mainstream adventures; they're conservative, but not quite so repulsively reactionary as Tolkein's world, where white kings and aristocrats fight against dreadlocked hordes of "unthinking" evil. Near the end when Gandalf charges down the mountain with his army, was anyone else reminded of BIRTH OF A NATION?

and: "their vows to each other are for eternity"

pleaazzzz don't make me vomit! The ridiculous "eternal love" between the elf and the human is the other worst thing about the movie. Actually, just Liv Tyler in general... I hope Jackson adds a scene in the third movie where Arwen is tortured, gutted and hanged. As it stands, Jackson adds an unexpected layer to the film by introducing a competing love-interest for Aragorn. Most of his other changes also serve to make things a little less naive.

Re: strange...

52
I thought there would be more screaming and shouting about THE TWO TOWERS here... I can't see one post!
Won't see it until next week. Visiting the folks these past couple of days. Yesterday we saw Harry Potter :roll:

Well anyway, I saw it yesterday. Actually, I kinda enjoyed it.


Well I'll be darned.
Still doesn't make my Top 10 of 2002 tho... :bwaha:
Shit, I haven't even got a top 5. There's Bowling for Columbine, Auto Focus, Attack of the Clones... and that's about it.
This is a snakeskin jacket. And for me it's a symbol of my individuality and my belief in personal freedom.

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klimov wrote:I hope Jackson adds a scene in the third movie where Arwen is tortured, gutted and hanged.
Heh, with an Aerosmith ballad playing on the soundtrack, natch.

:killer:
This is a snakeskin jacket. And for me it's a symbol of my individuality and my belief in personal freedom.

54
i've already got too many to fit into a Top 10. And there's still some I haven't seen...

Need to see CITY OF GOD, KEN PARK and a few others.

55
Hopefully I can chime in on Gangs of New York after Monday, but that'll be the last flick I see for a while. Probably will get to see LOTR in January.

So O-Dot, you liked Clones?

56
Alexhead wrote:Hopefully I can chime in on Gangs of New York after Monday, but that'll be the last flick I see for a while. Probably will get to see LOTR in January.

So O-Dot, you liked Clones?
I don't know where you get that.
This is a snakeskin jacket. And for me it's a symbol of my individuality and my belief in personal freedom.

Re: strange...

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klimov wrote:reactionary as hell
I'd be interested in hearing you expand upon this, please.
This is a snakeskin jacket. And for me it's a symbol of my individuality and my belief in personal freedom.

58
klimov wrote:Need to see CITY OF GOD, KEN PARK and a few others.
The Polanski film. And most accounts suggest you missed the boat on Spider.

:loony:
This is a snakeskin jacket. And for me it's a symbol of my individuality and my belief in personal freedom.

Re: strange...

59
klimov wrote:lots of quite imaginative creatures
It's a mistake to have the same actor who's playing Gimli also voice the talking tree. Much too distinctive a voice and it's distracting to the viewer.
klimov wrote:and some seriously big battles
Why must Jackson cut his action scenes as though they were for a Michael Bay movie?
This is a snakeskin jacket. And for me it's a symbol of my individuality and my belief in personal freedom.

Re: strange...

60
klimov wrote:Still doesn't make my Top 10 of 2002 tho... :bwaha:
Do NOT keep us in suspense! Will MOTION make a return appearance?
This is a snakeskin jacket. And for me it's a symbol of my individuality and my belief in personal freedom.