Tag: tolkien

movies

Sacrilege in Middle Earth

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Even though Sir Ian is reprising his role as Gandalf, as I have previously noted, I’m still very worried about how “The Hobbit” will be adapted for the silver screen. Case in point: New Line cinemas issued the following statement regarding the not one but two “Hobbit” movies:

…the first film will be an adaptation of The Hobbit and the second will be an original story focusing on the 60 years between the book and the beginning of the Rings trilogy.

Yes, you read that correctly intrepid reader. While I usually never curse on this site, trying to keep the discourse to a higher level, seriously, what the fucking fuck?! An original Hobbit story written by some Hollywood hack? Sacrilege! This whole hob-debacle keeps getting worse.
Via Jessie

movies

I'm Afraid of "The Hobbit" Movie

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Yay – they are making not one but two “Hobbit” movies! Um… actually… I take that “yay” back because upon further review, besides the fact that Guillermo del Toro based on beard, glasses and job description seems to be a cleaned up version of Peter Jackson, there are many reasons to worry about the quality, the story, the style – basically everything – about these new “Hobbit” movies.
hobbit_director_producer.jpg
One reason to be wary is because of how del Toro feels about the genre. In 2006 he said,

“I was never into heroic fantasy. At all. I don’t like little guys and dragons, hairy feet, hobbits — I’ve never been into that at all. I don’t like sword and sorcery, I hate all that stuff.”

The second reason this director should not be trusted with the Tolkien franchise is that (to quote the Salon piece), “his aesthetic is darker, more Gothic and more grotesque than the Tolkien-via-Jackson universe; it derives more from the medieval mire of middle-European fairy tale than from the high-toned, pre-modern northern European epics Tolkien was channeling.”
Something is rotten in the lands of New Zealand and Tinseltown. Read the full Andrew O’Hehir penned Salon article (just click on the top right where you see the small words in a red box that say “Enter Salon”) for all the reasons you should temper your enthusiasm. I have two words for you: George Lucas. ‘Nuff said.

literature

New Tolkien! New Tolkien!

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The first new book in almost 30 years by J.R.R. Tolkien (since 1977’s Silmarillion) has been published and as George put it, “It’s like he’s Tupac!” I mean, Tolkien passed away in 1973 and while the Silmarillion was published posthumously, it was only 4 years after his death. Now comes The Children of Hurin, almost 35 years after died! Tupac indeed. Why it took his son this long to edit and publish it, I’ll never know. I hope against all hope that it’s not because it kind of sucks and Christopher just needs money.
Here is brief blurb courtesy of Barnes & Noble:

The book was completed by his son, Christopher Tolkien, and illustrated by renowned artist Alan Lee. The Children of Húrin takes readers to an area of Middle-earth that was to be drowned before Hobbits ever appeared, at a time when the great enemies were still the fallen Vala, Morgoth, and Sauren.
This is the epic tale of Húrin (the man who defied Morgoth’s force of evil), his family’s destiny, and his son Turin Turambar’s travails through the lost world of Beleriand. Fans will be reunited with Elves and Men, Dragons and Dwarves, and Eagles and Orcs in this stirring tale.

Um, I CANNOT WAIT TO READ THIS BOOK!!!
Here is a pic of the book:

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literature

New Tolkien Book

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CNN is reporting that “Christopher Tolkien has spent the past 30 years working on “The Children of Hurin,” an epic tale his father began in 1918 and later abandoned. Excerpts of “The Children of Hurin,” which includes the elves and dwarves of Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings” and other works, have been published before.”
More stories with Gimli? I hope so….dwarves rock!
Via Slashdot
Unfinished Tolkien work to be published in ’07 from the AP:
NEW YORK (AP) — An unfinished tale by J.R.R. Tolkien has been edited by his son into a completed work and will be released next spring, the U.S. and British publishers announced Monday.
Christopher Tolkien has spent the past 30 years working on “The Children of Hurin,” an epic tale his father began in 1918 and later abandoned. Excerpts of “The Children of Hurin,” which includes the elves and dwarves of Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings” and other works, have been published before.
“It has seemed to me for a long time that there was a good case for presenting my father’s long version of the legend of the ‘Children of Hurin’ as an independent work, between its own covers,” Christopher Tolkien said in a statement.
The new book will be published by Houghton Mifflin in the United States and HarperCollins in England.
J.R.R. Tolkien’s “Lord of the Rings Trilogy” has sold more than 50 million copies and was also adapted into a blockbuster, Academy Award-winning trio of films. A stage version is scheduled to open next year.

literature

Books versus Movies

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My fiance sits on the couch finishing Return of the King as I sit typing at the computer. Having just come from Stephen King’s web site, having just watched a number of DT inspired short films and having made plans to watch The Two Towers on DVD tonight, I feel the need to reaffirm why I love books tremendously more than movies. Mr. King himself said it better than I can, at least right now, so I will lift what he wrote from the FAQ section of his site in response (it was in response to the question “Are you going to make a Dark Tower Movie?”):

“I’ve always resisted that idea because movies have a way of freezing characters and places in the audience’s mind whereas in books everybody has their own different idea of, for instance, how Roland or Susannah looks but if you do it as a movie, immediately that kind of gets frozen in place and you say ‘Oh, Billy Bob Thornton is what Roland Deschain looks like.’ Or you say ‘Brad Pitt, that’s what Eddie Dean looks like.’ You know what I’m saying, or you can say ‘Calla Bryn Sturgis from Wolves of the Calla looks like maybe the Universal back lot’, and I’ve always resisted that.”

‘Nuff said for now…

ramblings

The First Step

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You are reading the first entry of my very own web log. Hopefully, 100 years from now a researcher, in his attempts to learn more about the late 20th and early 21st centuries, will discover these words on a server somewhere. I hope he or she finds what I wrote to be interesting, witty and relevant. If not, oh well, because it was interesting, witty and relevant to me.

In honor of my first step, a poem by Mr. J.R.R. Tolkien:

The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say.