Why Jackson's 'Lord of the Rings' sucks. Hard. A partial installment

On this subject I am filled with a depthless, inhuman hatred of the type I normally reserve for Republican tax policy and Sanchos. But let's face it: the 'Lord of the Rings' films are so grossly overrated it's ridiculous. Their better parts are crude caricature of good fantasy and good character writing, and their worse parts transpose the modern world and poor visual effects onto one of the more prototypical stories of modern fantasy literature.

Perhaps the simplest (if possibly somewhat pretentious) explanation is that as someone who grew up reading truly vast amounts of (often fairly nuanced and intelligent) high fantasy (also actual medieval) literature, of which Tolkien is only one example, not the progenitor, what seemed sort of new and exciting to others in those movies felt pretty half-assed and crudely stereotyped to me. When not deviating entirely from both the medieval idealizing and mythic fantasy of the source material in order to add staples of entertainment film like comic relief, vulgarity and the cheap horror which is actually Jackson's wheelhouse, the films seem to me to drop the more nuanced or distinctive parts of the genre and characters, and replace them with market-tested stuff someone thought would make the film accessible to a broad audience (the films are distinct in the way they drop a lot of Tolkien's characters for more modern film types; Tolkien's Aragorn, who, while admittedly not my favorite in the books, (he's honestly kind of boring, though less so than Jackson's)-- is very much the uncorrupted, idealized medieval lord of an old bloodline, a sleeper king in ranger's cloth, very wise and self-aware, is replaced in the films by some very modern, angsty dude with the same name but no family resemblance, a guy who makes fun of his war comrade behind that man's back, (while flirting), has a generic anti-establishment sarcastic attitude, and, in a rather tired character arc, has to be convinced by Elrond to take his place as a leader of men--basically a modern type dropped into Middle Earth in a tunic and boots and a sword in a back-sling).

I don't actually care, on principle, that they changed Tolkien's shit--just when they replace his better material with the stuff of low comedy, schlocky horror and shallow characterization, all of which cut against the almost impossibly epic storyline and the nature of the genre. I also care, to a lesser extent, when the filmmakers don't follow the obvious cues about the differences between the medievalized world and our own, which are part of the point of following the story, and part of what makes interesting the worlds of Tolkien and his ilk (i.e. medieval armies, especially orc ones, do not wear uniforms or assemble in highly organized battle formations--that stuff is exclusive to modern warfare and (and, to a limited extent, a few ancient states such as Rome). I generally find it hypocritical that, despite all the hype they generated about their attentiveness to hand-made detail and the creation of a different world, they didn't bother to do even very limited research into, say, medieval war or ways of life, of the sort that would have prevented exactly this transposition of modernity onto the medievalization of the 'imagined reality' which is half of the very heart of the modern fantasy genre. I may be putting words into someone's mouth, but I wouldn't be surprised if Mr. Van Dyke was in part irritated by this sort of thing also.

Besides that, all sorts of things about the film-making are surprisingly shoddy: the editing (the shield Legolas throws in front of himself, then jumps on as it slides up from behind him), the props (the orcish bow at the CLIMAX of 'Fellowship' which quite obviously has absolutely no tension on the string being pulled by the monstrous Urukhai as he prepares to kill our hero(es)), the costumes (many of which were carbon copies of another, as though middle earth took place during the age of mechanical reproduction and interchangable parts) and the effects (Christopher Lee watching in horror as his empire in Isengard is destroyed by a three-foot high waterfall sweeping away some four-inch high models; 'Superman' is the only other major film with a comparably bad water sequence, and it actually takes a lot of shit for it, despite being made on much more limited resources. And, you know, in 1978. But for some reason it's okay in 'TTT'). I have no idea why Jackson got a free pass on all that garbage-quality film-making. The acting and characterization also generally lacked much nuance (though the fault here is clearly more in the screenwriting than in the actors, who honestly didn't have much to work with and have done good work in other places, Elijah Wood possibly excepted). ...So far as I'm aware, there are relatively few comparable flaws in pieces like 'Avatar' or the original 'Star Wars' films--especially 'Star Wars', even though those were much more limited, budget and effects-wise. ...Admittedly, Cameron was basically allowed to swim in a sea of money for his latest creation, which cost about as much as all three Jackson films combined, and that fact has certain salutary effects (though I'd note that 'The Terminator,' shot on a 6.4 million dollar budget, holds up a lot better in terms of film-making craft, once money is taken into account, than anything Jackson's ever done, so...fuck all.

Also, none of Cameron's films have five different endings in a single edit, none of which even fulfill their avowed aim (i.e. the excuse for their redundance) of giving the audience some sense of resolution regarding the films' characters.

I'm just going to stop talking, now. But Jackson can make me revise my opinion by producing a version of 'The Hobbit' (which, let's be honest, is a better work than 'The Lord of the Rings' anyway) that's better than its live-action predecessor. It shouldn't be hard. The cheap, animated Bass-Rankin version of the book got most of the important points despite being pasted together from children's drawings animated at about four frames per second.