"The Lord of The Rings: The Two Towers" An Improvement on all Fronts

 

    Chills man. Some parts of this film give me chills. Like before, this will be a bit of movie and book review, compare and contrasting the two, because Peter Jackson's adaptation of this series has become so iconic, that I could not imagine one without the other. And I have to say, I do think The Two Towers is pretty handily better. Perhaps it's just because I love the large sweeping epic fights, either way, I think the second book of the saga is a tremendous improvement. For a movie over 20 years old now, I think it still holds up incredibly well, and I would recommend anyone, especially those who are a fan of fantasy to give this movie and this book the respect it deserves. It is truly a classic for a reason, and it is very much well worth the three hour runtime the movie has. So let's talk about it.

    I was looking through my first review of the film/book and honestly I might have to go back on it. I think Peter Jackson might have done too much mucking about trying to make the characters more "interesting" rather than pretty black and white. Which let's be honest in the book most of them are like that, but I think it sort of fits with the more classical fairy taleish nature of the series as a whole. Respectfully I don't know how much nuance or gray characters you need. I take back everything I said about Aragorn, I kind of see the vision in the books. Yeah it's kind of weird he gets Anduril so quickly, but it's pretty convenient knowing he can pull it out so everyone understands his birthright. Also I know technically the scene where he takes hold of the Palantir isn't in the movie, but when he acts all kingly in the book and says, I will use it when the time comes or whatever, that was so great. 

    Don't get me wrong, I do like Viggo's portrayal of Aragorn, it's just that in the books they even note he's constantly switching between king and strider mode, but in the film it feels like he's mostly just in strider mode most of the time. Also, I remember when I watched the film ages ago there was something between Eowyn and Aragorn, but after reading it again I forgot it was almost entirely a book addition. And yeah I'm going to be honest it adds nothing. We really don't need Eowyn fawning over some man, I think her character doesn't need to be shackled by the burden of weak love interest stuff for the sake of it. 

    Though, I will say in terms of changes I did like, I do kind of appreciate this Frodo more. Not in the sense that he should be showing the ring to a Nazgul and somehow surviving, that really was stupid, I don't know what they were thinking with that, but in the sense that, you can feel him being more troubled. In the book, by the time they get closer to Shelob you can see small bits of aggression and domination peering out of his soul, especially he talks to Smeagol, but in the movie, I think the subtext of Frodo wanting redemption for Gollum is a nice touch. After all, he's thinking about life after the ring, if that's what the ring slowly transforms you into, even after not touching it for decades, then what hope would he have anyways? It's a good point to have, and I kind of wish it was explored more, but Jackson mostly just scattered the Sam and Frodo plot throughout this movie to remind viewers that they do indeed still exist. I kind of wish Frodo wasn't so mean to Sam in this film though, in the movie he still very much holds him dear, and it does feel like Sam's more competent, though in the movies defense the book does end in Shelob's lair, which is completely cut out of this film, and I presume is resolved at the beginning of the next film.

    Can we talk about Faramir though? He was so nice in the film. I kind of understand trying to make the ring feel more tempting, but you literally upended his entire character, and his arc in this film is so useless. Why did he drag the two hobbits back to Gondor, why is he also just as tempted by power as his brother. In the books he's so scared to even talk about or look at the thing, and I think I appreciate that contrast between the brothers, because in the film he just kind of feels like a Boromir clone to be honest.  A change I do understand is making Theoden like 50% more depressed in the film than the novel. I do think he's a bit tad too defeatist, but I completely understand where he's coming from considering how quickly the events of this novel go by, and he is just quite fearless in the book. 

    Now, this seemed like a lot of complaining, but I'm mostly just comparing and contrasting between small what I'd call nitpicky changes that I preferred when reading the book to the movie. In all honestly, I do really believe this film is fantastic, it looks pretty, the acting was great, and the action was amazing too. I had literal chills when Haldin and the elves came to help defend Helm's Deep, and I do think it was a good choice to have them too. You basically only ever see humans do anything useful in this film anyways, so it's good to see that other people care about this supposed end of the world or whatnot. 

    Oddly enough, for a world that's supposed to be relatively hopeful and optimistic I was surprised at how pessimistic the world often feels. After all, LOTR isn't done during the peak of magic, it's done in an era where all that is magical is declining. Hearing Theoden basically talk about how the greatest era's have come and gone, and he's just hoping they'll be remembered is pretty sobering, it makes the odds feel almost insurmountable. I think by far the saddest part is hearing Treebeard talk about the last march of the Ents. I do love the Ents and Treebeard and even reading the book I felt so bad when they talked about how all of the Entwives left them, and there were too few young Ents left. 

Final Score: 90/100

    The battle for Helm's Deep is so good. I do think they hammed up the humour with Gimli a bit much, after all in the film he's shown to be a fighter so good he can more than hold his own, but let him have a little bit more honour in my opinion. Also I guess when you actually see it on screen and basically have them repeat the number of people on both sides multiple times it really does make it feel more impressive. I mean 300 (+ elves and Eomer reinforcements) against 10,000 really does make it feel more hopeless during the fight. I do really love this film. Perhaps I need to come back to it more often. Would I say I enjoy it more than Harry Potter? Well I suppose I never went back to Harry Potter if that makes any difference. I've been enjoying reading so much I'm almost tempted to try reading the Silmarillion, which I never ended up finishing.