Wednesday, December 20, 2006
The Lord Of The Rings 5th Anniversary, Part 2 - The Two Towers
By Charlie Brigden, Andrew Clarke and George Merchan
We're back with the second part of our look at The Lord of the Rings trilogy (check out part one here), a set of films many fans associate with this time of the year. Today we talk The Two Towers, the film in the trilogy that seems to divide most people, partly because of its pacing, its fractured storylines, and its more serious tone. How does it hold up since its initial 2002 release? Let's find out...
Charlie: Hobbit-forming or a load of old tosh and walking trees?
George: Gollum completely makes Frodo and Sam's story in this one, because otherwise, I'm sorry to say, it's a little boring and not as emotional at you think it would be (Return of the King nails this element, however). Mortensen steps up his game like whoa. And Miranda Otto is love. Ditto Bernard Hill. I think I'm also one of the few people that really likes the Arwen/Aragorn stuff here. It's genuinely romantic, which might be why some nerds are turned off by it.
What I do like about Towers is that it does take itself a bit more seriously. Not that I'm against the goofiness that's inherent in Fellowship and especially King, but I think it suits the more political machinations of Towers, as well as the fact that this film is actually about the world of men, and as such, reflective of them. There's also an added level of poetry because of it which I feel is never a bad thing.
Of course, it might also have been made more serious because of Treebeard, the poor fuck.
Charlie: Not to sound like some jumped up buzzwording exec, but Towers truly takes it to the next level. The key word in this film is conflict, and that sums up both the trio of Frodo, Sam and Gollum, but also the Fellowship and Rohan. It certainly has a different emotional landscape than Fellowship, but no less affecting, and I agree, the romantic side is played absolutely perfectly, which I'm sure we'll go into later.
This film also has one of the greatest openings in cinema history.
George: By the way, I had to look up the word "tosh". You goshdern Brit.
Andrew: The opening of this film points up two of the stars of the movie: New Zealand and WETA. We wrote a lot about Jackson's great directing abilities last time, but any stupid sod could point a camera at those mountains and have half his world-building work done for him.
Then, once we zoom in and enter Moria, that bizarre mutant sfx creature WETA takes over and blows us, once again, away. I'm referring to the last two shots of the sequence - Gandalf and the Balrog emerging from the tunnel-thing into the massive underground cavern. You get an authentic sense of scale in the wide static shot which sees a tiny ball of flame fall oh so slowly from the roof, and you get that POV shot with the wobbly camera as they plunge.
Too many times the promise of a film falls short of its execution. A character speaks of a huge castle and you get a small cardboard model. Your imagination paints grand, but very vague pictures. WETA manages to fill in all the details and yet keep that impossible 'grandness'. Equally, did you ever get vertigo while zooming around the streets of Star Wars' Coruscant?
"...those shots are still transporting, and still breathtaking"
There is an argument that states that Lord of the Rings' need to show everything destroys the imagination. The allusiveness and suggestiveness of fantasy are gone; replaced with a very prosaic literalness. There's certainly a good point in there somewhere about not fetishising the idea of 'showing everything'. However, I do think that WETA's achievement of realising the unreal without any seeming compromise is worth celebrating. It is special, and it isn't, at least at this point in the trilogy, spectacle for spectacle's sake. Certainly those shots are still transporting, and still breathtaking.
I can't see the fight itself without seeing Ian on a barrel trying not to make a fool of himself, but nothing's perfect.
Anyway, the point of all this is that the opening sequence demonstrates one of the reasons I keep coming back to the movies. Quite apart from any acting, directing or story-telling, the achievements in building a convincingly impossible world do a great deal to create an atmosphere, a 'feel', that is a joy to dive into and get immersed in for what is, being honest, a really bloody long time.
Charlie: I'm a big fan of sequels that go back to the previous movie and look at it from a new angle, and that's one of the reasons Towers not only has such a great opening, but how it expands on events in Fellowship period, which I'll go into in more detail later.
The shot Andrew mentioned about the expansive cavern is a great point to pick up on, such an amazing example of the scale LOTR goes to great lengths to show you, without making it feel like spectacle for the sake of spectacle. Also, I can't talk about the opening without mentioning Howard Shore. The opening track, "Glamdring" ("Foundations of Stone" on the original album) is utterly spectacular and works so well to add an extra layer to the scene.
George: Shore's music steps it up a lot here in Towers. And I guess that's because, like the film itself, we begin to hit the heart of the conflict in the trilogy, and it's reflected in the music's more somber tones. Andrew had mentioned having a problem with the Rohan theme and I'm absolutely DYING to hear what he has to say. But we'll get to that a little later.
Indeed it is a great opening. For all the reasons mentioned and especially because it's a simple, exhilarating, just plain effective way to tie Fellowship and Towers together. Having Gandalf and his badassery as that focal point is also a great sort of bookend to his eventual appearance at Helm's Deep, and it's great narratively because taking us back to Gandalf's fall helps remind us of Frodo's struggle to come to terms with his solitude as the ring bearer and how fresh it all still is in his mind. Which of course leads to Gollum and the empathy/bond Frodo establishes with him. Gollum is still one of the very best things in this trilogy, btw. Technically and artistically. And the character very much follows the point Andrew makes about the special effects to a certain degree.
Poor Sam. I sometimes feel he's like the boy trying to get the attention of the girl he likes, only to continually fail. But he just keeps trying and trying and trying, dammit. He'd be so good for her! Foolish girl keeps going for the one that's just not right, though.
Gollum must have a big dick.
Andrew: I've spoken with some of those strange benighted fools who don't care for LOTR and the only criticism that ends up holding any water is, simply 'who cares?'. Once you buy in to the project of creating this vast world, all the details fit, everything works, and immersion is total. The only problem is if you don't care for the problems and dramas of this 'other' world, and are more interested in the dramas of this one. It's fair enough, though any discussion can only come to a friendly impasse after this, with one side thinking the other either very dull or hopelessly off with the fairies.
But it's Towers that gets closest to justifying this criticism. We aren't, actually, getting to the heart of the conflict in this film. There was no-one from Rohan in the Fellowship, and a three act story would get straight to the White City. The film consists of endless introductions, secondary conflicts erupting and resolving while the central narrative lines stay, relatively, in limbo.
What, then, does this film give us that makes it worth watching?
Charlie: There was never going to be any proper resolution to the narrative because Towers is only the second act. And Towers does perfectly what a second act should do. It provides further character development and raises the stakes significantly, ending with the characters - and Middle-Earth - in an even more dire situation, leaving us waiting with baited breath for the final act.
In terms of endless introductions, that's an exaggeration, but the characters and places that are introduced are necessary to help one of the film's goals; to open up the canvas and show Middle-Earth's plight not just from the Hobbit's viewpoint, but from other states or countries if you will, and how they will all figure in the battles to come. Theoden, Eomer, Eowyn, Treebeard, these characters are all instrumental to the fight against Sauron, with Treebeard essentially ridding Sauron of a large portion of his forces by reducing his puppet Saruman to a relatively harmless state, while the Rohirrim directly influencing the battle of the Pelennor Fields, and Eowyn herself removing one of the direct threats, the Witch-King.
"...emphasizing the darker edge of Frodo's personality"
Even Faramir, who acts mainly as a reminder of the Ring's power over men, will have a general impact on how Gondor is defended through the events that happen between he and Denethor. His story is also dead sad, as well.
The film is also important in establishing the almost-symbiotic relationship Frodo and Gollum have, and shows the beginnings of how Gollum comes between Frodo and Sam, while emphasizing the darker edge of Frodo's personality.
Equally important is Aragorn's arc, showing for the first real time that he's not just a ranger who can fight pretty well, he's also a natural leader and someone men will follow into battle, and die for. The moment where Theoden all but gives up hope with that brilliant line, "What can men do against such reckless hate?", is the second of Aragorn's defining moments, and again where he puts the battle above himself and goes flying in where angels fear to tread against massive odds and a whole lot of orcs, and this is where Aragorn really stands up to show where his destiny really lies, with the only real stumbling block his belief in himself and his refusal to stand aside men like Isildur who gave themselves so easily to the Ring and its seduction.
George: On the "heart of the conflict" thing - You're right, saying "heart of" is wrong. What I mean is that, in Towers, you begin to see the real development of the trilogy's central conflicts because of two things (which Charlie mentions but I'm going to repeat anyway) - the introduction of Gollum and the disconnect that begins to have on Sam and Frodo's relationship (as well as Frodo's gradual descent into becoming a "crack fiend"), and Aragorn's being forced into a position of leadership amongst the Rohirrim. And it is important to note that he's FORCED into it. Passively of course, but regardless. His true qualities of being a man of leadership naturally come out, but it takes Gandalf's leaving and Theoden's pessimism to move him to that point.
"...where Aragorn really stands up to show
where his destiny really lies"
Andrew: Those are pretty good replies to that question. They're what I'd say, pretty much too: It's a deepening, a widening and a more-ening, and it's great. The movement of this story is from one Hobbit finding a little ring to an entire world at war, and the stages of escalation are brilliantly done.
It is a slog though. At least a bit. A lot of individual scenes in this movie are really good but, due to the cross cutting between narrative threads we have now the fellowship is split, they don't have that simple, linear, propulsive narrative to tie them together. What we have is a slow accumulation of stuff that eventually coheres into a climax. And more, i'd put that eventual coherence down to Tolkien rather than the film-makers. If Jackson didn't have such a reliable source material, written by someone who had worked out all the details in horrifying detail, this would have been a mess. They even admit to this is the various commentaries - they couldn't work out the through-line, they didn't know how the film would flow - they made a bunch of scenes and leant heavily on Tolkien for the hope that they would work. And they do.
So what about the stuff that isn't strictly Tolkien? I'm talking about the Warg attack here, and Aragorn's 'death'. Should they have made stuff up?
George: I like both those events even though the Warg battle admittedly looks like ass (mostly - there're a couple of inspired shots in there), I like Aragorn's fall because it's another good "fantasy film" way to tie Arwen and him together, and it ramps up the dramatics a bit when he returns to Helm's Deep (and makes himself look all the more worthy of awe among the people and soldiers of Rohan). Plus, it features that absolutely lovely scene between Mortensen and the horse coming to his aid. Yes, I also loved Hidalgo.
I'll tell you what's a slog for me, though - The Frodo, Sam, Gollum stuff. And like I said earlier, it's saved by Gollum and Serkis' performance. I do still chuckle at the PO-TA-TO scene, though that's been diminished quite a bit thanks to the internet and its knack for killing jokes. But really, I can't place exactly why their stuff feels tedious to me. It's much less so in the EE thanks to the inclusion of the Boromir/Faramir/Denethor scenes, but even then, that's because the filmmakers have shifted away from the Hobbits yet again. I think the most interesting stuff here in Towers is the human political situation. It's infinitely more intriguing, and I think the way the characters are written and developed is much more engrossing. The shit with the Ents, while you kinda hate to hate it, obviously drags... but their climax? WOW. The Ents attacking Isengard is just so phenomenally done, and again, ties in SO well with Andrew's original thought about building that absolutely convincing and epic world that truly does seem magical in a way only cinema can showcase. The Hobbits come a close third for me, sadly. Though, I do love Sam's cliche speech at the end. Its context and utter sincerity makes it work.
Charlie: I wouldn't say it's a slog, but it is exhausting to get through, although I think in a good way. I agree that the Hobbit scenes and the Ents really do fuck with the pacing, but it's the line between wanting to give our main characters (Frodo/Sam/Gollum) a lot of screen time, and really showing a few friends walking through a bunch of places. In Fellowship, we set out with the Hobbits for the first time and the road was fraught with danger and a lot of actiony/fighty bits, but here, it's more of a concentration on the characters rather than getting them from one place to another, and that is occasionally a strain.
What doesn't make it a strain is places like the Dead Marshes. The concept is amazing, and the entire scene is utterly creepy, even if the deadites are a bit much. What interests me more is the changes in the characters. Obviously, Gollum is the big one, with that incredible scene where he "frees" himself of the Gollum side, and it's there that we really begin to sympathise with the character, right up to when he's caught by Faramir at the Forbidden Pool, when we feel hugely sad for him, especially when the rangers are kicking seven shades of shit out of him.
But what's more fascinating is the way Gollum intersects Frodo and Sam's relationship. Because of Frodo being the ringbearer as Gollum once was, and I guess I don't know if Sam was ever told what really happened to Gollum, at least in a way he understood, Frodo's immediate sympathy with the character as opposed to Sam, whose only real knowledge and experience of Gollum came from him attacking them and thus is not a huge fan, starts to come between them. I love the scene where Sam calls Gollum "Stinker," and Frodo has a huge go at him, because it reminds me of what it's like to see two friends arguing, or to go a tad Oedipal/Freudian/whatever, your parents. It's the skin-crawling uncomfortableness of that scene that makes it incredibly hard to watch, but on a dramatic basis, something you can't take your eyes off.
Is the Warg attack not in the books? I always thought it was. Oh well. I think it's a good scene, and it helps keep the pace up so we don't overdose on seeing the Rohan folk walking about, and it has one incredible set of shots where Aragorn gets on his horse and rides backwards to give a meaningful stare at Eowyn, who we cut to, and it's absolutely stunning, and very passionate for something so small. Aragorn's fall, like George says, it works very well as a way to tie Aragorn and Arwen together, and the ensuing scenes (along with the Sheila Chandra vocals) are very beautiful and my kind of romance. Also, I can never get enough of a man and his horse.
But this leads to a point I think the entire trilogy suffers from, and I'm not sure entirely whether the failing is down to Tolkien or PJ, but essentially, it's Arwen. Obviously, in the books she only appeared once in Fellowship at the council, and didn't reappear until the end of King when they get married, but even the way she's featured in Fellowship especially, there's nothing really there to make you really feel for their relationship. I don't think the man/elfkind dynamic was fleshed out enough, and it's almost as if they said "OK, these two are supposed to be together even though everyone thinks they shouldn't be, so deal with it, K?" As Andrew said in the Fellowship discussion, the Lay of Luthien enforces their love much more than anything else, and it was cut out.
It suffers more, because Eowyn seems so much more developed. We understand how she feels at being "caged" as a woman born in a country built on being warriors of valor, and we completely understand her attraction of Aragorn as someone who understands her and her needs, and who himself is a natural leader who is also taking on responsibilities despite some not thinking he is up to the task, and someone who puts himself in harm's way again and again for the sake of her people. Whereas all we get with Arwen is "Oh yeah, he lived with the elves and they hooked up."
What it means is by the end of Towers, I feel more of a desire to see Aragorn with Eowyn than with Arwen, which doesn't work if they're supposed to be this destined couple. Which is why they tried to put Arwen at Helm's Deep, and why they try to put her a bit more to the forefront in King, which I'll talk about in that discussion.
However, I do love the way it's setup that Arwen has to go to the Undying lands, and the expansion on the Rivendell scene where he essentially leaves her, once again adding new meaning to scenes from Fellowship. And the scene where Elrond tells her what will happen, and the montage we get of Aragorn's body turning to stone, is a stunning and deeply haunting visual, and one that adds an extra layer to their relationship, knowing that even if they do get it on and she stays, that will be the last days of her being.
Charlie: We've obviously missed some stuff. What about Theoden and Edoras? Gandalf's return? The Uruk-hai?
Shadowfax?
"The attack on Isengard is very emotional,
very satisfying, utterly jawdropping and fucking rocking."
Andrew: You know who's film his is? It's Treebeard's. Bollocks to Gollum and his attention grabbing antics. Bollocks to Theoden and his deeply miserable looking town. Bollocks even to Aragorn's growing role as a leader.
Treebeard's parts are certainly slow and possibly even a slog. He's kind of a joke, and he's saddled, in Merry and Pippin, with the two main comic reliefs in the movie. He's a very goofy 'fantasy' creation, especially in a film that starts to get serious about the more human drama. But his is the only story introduced and resolved in this film and it is he who is the true opposite of this film's baddie, Saruman. The Two Towers is the culmination of the nature vs. industry theme in Tolkien's work, especially now the 'scouring of the shire' (where the pretty, natural Shire is turned into a smoke belching mill town) is missing from the films, And Treebeard is the big hero for nature.
Watching it this way (and it was kind of the same revelation I had when I realised Fight Club is actually all about Marla) and suddenly the cross cutting to the Ent Moot doesn't get in the way of the cool-rockin' Helm's Deep battle. And it really annoyed me when I fist saw the film.
So yes, It's the EE that saves this film once again. The more time we waste with Treebeard, the more his final action hits. He's supposed to be boring and a bit stuffy. The poetry reading speaks of his genuine love for the forest. The slow bits, you see, are good when we're dealing with the Ents. All of that extra time adds to the effect of that final charge towards Saruman's tower. You, meaning me, I guess, really feel the Ents righteous anger turning that slowness into an unstoppable momentum. The attack on Isengard is very emotional, very satisfying, utterly jawdropping and fucking rocking.
So there you go - Treebeard is my hero, which I felt the need to say because he is often derided as boring, a waste of time or just a bit silly.
Charlie: I will say out of all the EEs, Towers is the one I think works best because it contains some actual proper story stuff. And the scene with Boromir at Osgilliath should never have been cut out.
George: Yeah, I would say that Towers is helped out the most by the EEs.
Andrew: We do need something to argue about.
Charlie: Faramir? His character is probably the most changed from the books. Should Saruman have been finished off in Towers?
Is Eowyn hotter than Arwen?
George: Haha. I think talking about the music would be good, mainly because I still want to hear why Andrew doesn't like the Rohan theme.
Andrew: OK, the reason why I don't like the Rohan theme is because the melody line is too short and ends on a down note, a minor chord shift. This means that it can not loop back to the start without first needing to do some chordal changes first for the music to re-orient itself. It, essentially, stops dead.
It does create a melancholy note and a sense of dread which I have no problem with. By itself it's a cool way to end a phrase - it isn't neat or pat. The problem is that it ruins the momentum of any scene with the film in. You only 15-20 seconds of theme and then an enforced mood change and a regrouping. This is bad because Jackson's big 'theme' moments usually last a lot longer than that. The strange ending only draws attention to itself, which is bad because it then stops providing emotion for the scene.
This is made especially bad because of soundtrack is written around themes - every main set of people (Rohan, Saruman, the Fellowship and so on) has their own and it shows up every time they have a 'moment'. This is fine over a 90 minute, three act film where you can introduce the theme, modulate it, then have it return triumphantly at the end for the resolution. Having it play a dozen times over the course of three films becomes repetitive and 'bitty', with scenes becoming just collections of theme 'stings'.
That there's a funny end at the end of the Rohan theme, only makes that repetition, no matter how many different ways it is played, all the more obvious and annoying.
And that's why I don't like the Rohan theme.
Charlie: Wow. I disagree utterly. I have no music background to back it up, I just feel it fits the emotions and visuals of the film (s) perfectly, especially during Theoden's rise after being freed by Gandalf, and the Rohirrim's ride at the Pelennor fields, which makes me certainly disagree with "The problem is that it ruins the momentum of any scene with the film in", and certainly the way it's used in "Forth Eorlingas."
It sounds like you have more of an issue with leitmotif in general than the theme itself.
Andrew: Yes, and it's not the overblown aspects of it that's the problem, it's the repetition and the schematic nature of the music. Here's a horse, so here's the Rohan theme. It all gets predictable and mathematical. Stupid bloody Wagner.
In small doses the music is big and heroic and emotional and only cartoony in the way Jackson's direction is (which we covered last time), but taken over such a long period, just like Jackson's direction, it all gets a bit overwhelming for me. It's too much, and I stop being 'in' the film, instead just letting it wash over me. This is, though, a problem mostly found in the third film.
George: I heart ponce-y-ness. You'd like it if it were the Truckin' Lauras though, huh?!
I get your gripe, but, to steal something from our own Katanga, isn't that critique somewhat akin to not liking the costumes because they're improperly sewn? (If there is such a critique on the internet, please don't tell me because I'll just kill myself.)
But no, I really don't agree with it either. It's a beautiful piece of music that, yeah, really just fits not only the emotions and visuals, but is wonderful as even a parallel mode of storytelling (like all the pieces of music in the film, but especially true of the Hobbiton, Rohan, and Gondor themes). There's a sense of background and culture in the sounds themselves, and I think it's most evident in the three aforementioned themes (my favorite being Gondor's because they use pan flutes, of which I own like five different types). I don't know, I guess it's just another layer that I appreciate since it's not often done so well. I do understand what you mean about the composition, but it seems like a minor quibble. And I suppose I can see how some people would get tired of the repetition. I just hope these people are okay with me hating them forever and ever.
Andrew: Don't worry, I'm used to everyone hating me forever and ever.
Charlie: Things I've left out...
- The performances are amazing. Wood, Serkis, Astin, McKellen. But two of the standouts are Mortensen and Bernard Hill. Viggo in particular, he's just incredible here.
- The end montage with Sam's speech and the rousing reprisal of "The Road Goes Ever On..." is amazing. Well, it was until the EE spoiled it.
- David Wenham's Faramir is brilliant, and is a huge improvement on his character in the book, especially with the cutscene at Osgilliath.
George: Again, The Two Towers, while very awkward in its pacing, ups the dramatic ante and becomes a more interesting film by focusing on the overall more intriguing human characters such as Theoden, Eowyn, Eomer, and of course, Aragorn (who, if you're gay for, you'll be having all kinds of orgasms here). The performances are great, the sense of "epicness" is grander, yet the intimately emotional elements at the core of these films are never left by the wayside. The EE, in my opinion, is better here too, but I'd still probably rank Towers behind Fellowship and King in the grand scheme. Which is not to say I don't love it, because I totally do.
"It truly is one of the great stories."
Andrew: I know I've given some criticisms of this film, and I do believe they hold water, but the conviction everyone involved puts into it gets the film over any bumps of second act malaise. the concluding moments of Gandalf returning to Helm's Deep, and especially the Ents attacking Saruman, are emotionally satisfying and genuinely transcendent moments. They achieve what fantasy should - to raise all this self-serious gobbledygook on to the level of myth - timeless, necessary stories that use their distance from real life to clear away the confusion of the everyday to express what feel like very core values of our humanity. Yes the liberal in me wants to express doubts over the reductionist Manicheanism of having clear baddies it is all right to slaughter indiscriminately, but part of the point of myth is to simplify and distill. It's great stuff, and it still gets to me after god knows how many viewings.
Charlie: The Two Towers, for me, is the greatest film of the trilogy. It effortlessly combines the "smaller" nature of Fellowship with a new sense of the world opening up, and of course, the conflicts herein provide plenty of juicy drama, not least of which is Aragorn and Legolas having a barney.
It's intense stuff, and even the slower bits don't make it any less so because they are so key to the story. Even the Ents. It's a film of determination, of inspiration, of true heroism in the face of the most outrageous odds, that tells us, "there's some good in this world, and it's worth fighting for."
It truly is one of the great stories.
Join us on Christmas Eve when we conclude our discussion with The Return of the King. Thanks for reading!
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