From: owner-stillpt-digest@smoe.org (stillpt-digest) To: stillpt-digest@smoe.org Subject: stillpt-digest V4 #2 Reply-To: stillpt@smoe.org Sender: owner-stillpt-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-stillpt-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk stillpt-digest Saturday, January 12 2002 Volume 04 : Number 002 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Re: o/which wizard takes it? ["David S. Bratman" ] Re: o/which wizard takes it? [Kathleen Dalton-Woodbury ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2002 09:05:05 -0800 From: "David S. Bratman" Subject: Re: o/which wizard takes it? Thanks for the alert, Meredith: I've passed this on to a Le Guin list I subscribe to. The author has good choice in reading, but judging wizards by how cool they are and who'd best whom in a mano-a-mano battle makes me doubt the soundness of his tastes. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2002 12:56:07 -0700 From: Kathleen Dalton-Woodbury Subject: Re: o/which wizard takes it? I thought it was interesting that "the scariest scene in the movie" wasn't in the book that way at all, though I have not been able to figure out how they could have put it in the movie the way it was in the book. When Bilbo turns ugly after he's asked Frodo to let him see the Ring, it isn't because there's something wrong with Bilbo, as the movie implies, it's because there's something wrong with Frodo. In the book, Frodo's perception of Bilbo changes because of the Ring, and Bilbo realizes it--and that's what he's apologizing for. In the movie, Bilbo changes, and that's what he's apologizing for. I don't know how they could have done it otherwise, though, because the point in the book was that it was Frodo's perception that changed, and how to you film that so it's clear? The point of the scene is not really lost in the movie, because the Ring really does change people. (I suspect it was also a foreshadowing of when Frodo and Sam meet Gollum and see how he's been affected by the Ring.) It will be interesting to see if they show that Frodo has also been affected, in the scene at the Cracks of Doom, or even in the scene in Cirith Ungol, when Sam returns the Ring to Frodo. Phaedre/Kathleen workshop@burgoyne.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2002 15:33:49 EST From: GHighPine@aol.com Subject: Re: o/which wizard takes it? In a message dated 1/11/02 11:52:34 AM Pacific Standard Time, workshop@burgoyne.com writes: << In the book, Frodo's perception of Bilbo changes because of the Ring, and Bilbo realizes it--and that's what he's apologizing for. In the movie, Bilbo changes, and that's what he's apologizing for. I don't know how they could have done it otherwise, though, because the point in the book was that it was Frodo's perception that changed, and how to you film that so it's clear? >> That is interesting, because it makes more sense that since Frodo was the one is possession of the Ring at that time, he would be the one affected. I saw the movie last week. (Have to confess that I never really read The Book, because what has most interested me in Tolkien's work has been his linguistics.) I can see why discussion of it belongs here, because the movie (at least the last two hours of it) reminded me a lot of BUFFY -- if the whole Scooby Gang were male and the ratio of fight scenes to story were reversed. Frodo and Buffy both unwillingly bear the burden of saving the world. The moral dilemma that appeared to me to be at the core of the story -- when and how much to use evil to fight evil -- seemed to be touched on only lightly at brief points. I assume that in the book it has more prominence? I found the constant onslaught of battle scenes to be exhausting and redundant, even if visually impressive. Okay, okay, I got the point that monsters/bad guys are after them. More battles don't really advance the story much. But overall I enjoyed it. Loved the wall of water-turning-into-horses effect. Gayle ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2002 17:34:17 -0800 From: "David S. Bratman" Subject: Re: o/which wizard takes it? At 12:33 PM 1/11/2002 , Gayle wrote: > That is interesting, because it makes more sense that since Frodo was the >one is possession of the Ring at that time, he would be the one affected. The Ring can also affect you if you are not in possession of it. Gollum held it for so long that he is permanently enslaved to it. Boromir never touches it and sees it only once (in the book), yet he too falls victim to it. Gandalf says to Frodo, before he sets off, "I don't think you need worry about Bilbo. Of course, he possessed the ring for many years, and used it, so it might take a long while for the influence to wear off - before it was safe for him to see it again, for instance." I do read the scene in the book as Phaedre does: that it's Frodo's vision that is affected - but it is the Ring's remaining influence on Bilbo that makes him want to see the Ring again (in the movie, IIRC, it's an accident that Bilbo sees it), and when Frodo sees the "little wrinkled creature with a hungry face and bony groping hands," he is seeing something that, while it does not physically exist at that moment, really is in Bilbo - it's the potential of the Gollum-like creature that Bilbo would eventually have become had he not given up the Ring. It's not just Frodo's own growing possessiveness that is making him suspicious of Bilbo - though it's that too. Tolkien was very good at ambiguities like this. > I saw the movie last week. (Have to confess that I never really read The >Book, because what has most interested me in Tolkien's work has been his >linguistics.) If you have not done so, you should check out the Tolkien language sites, especially www.elvish.org, who have actually legitimately published many of Tolkien's otherwise unavailable linguistic documents. > I can see why discussion of it belongs here, because the movie (at least the >last two hours of it) reminded me a lot of BUFFY -- if the whole Scooby Gang >were male and the ratio of fight scenes to story were reversed. You mean that LOTR has more fight scenes than story? Alas, this is true of the movie only. In volume 1 of the book there are only maybe 2 or 3 big fight scenes, which take less long to read aloud than the scenes in the movie last (in the case of the cave troll, at least, this is literally true), and the battle at the end of the volume takes place entirely offstage. >Frodo and >Buffy both unwillingly bear the burden of saving the world. And a good comparison paper could be written on just that. They're quite alike in some ways. Frodo never literally tries to run away from his destiny, though at times he wishes he could; but his distress is like Buffy's, and the grim fortitude with which he faces it is a bit like hers. > The moral dilemma that appeared to me to be at the core of the story -- >when and how much to use evil to fight evil -- seemed to be touched on only >lightly at brief points. I assume that in the book it has more prominence? To put it mildly, yes. >I found the constant onslaught of battle scenes to be exhausting and >redundant, even if visually impressive. Okay, okay, I got the point that >monsters/bad guys are after them. More battles don't really advance the >story much. Amen! > But overall I enjoyed it. Loved the wall of water-turning-into-horses >effect. Which is straight from the book. "If I may say so," added Gandalf, "I added a few touches of my own: you may not have noticed, but some of the waves took the form of great white horses with shining white riders." ------------------------------ End of stillpt-digest V4 #2 ***************************