LotR1-FotR-Seq04

[alatar]

Not all goodly things come dressed in white...

We see Gandalf hustling along to Orthanc, to Saruman, to see what aid and comfort the head of the order can give. More great scenery. Not for a moment do I believe that Orthanc exists, yet here we see it stitched right into our reality. The aerial camera following Gandalf's ride yields an interesting viewpoint on Saruman's abode. Maybe this tower is not how you may have depicted it; to me it’s not far off.

And while I’m on the architecture of Orthanc, we see that as Gandalf passes the gate and enters the ring that the place looks much like the Shire – with trees. Book Gandalf enters a place that already has orcs and wolves and pillars and pits. PJ’s version actually makes more sense (did I just say that? ). Think about it: when Gandalf is rattling off his tale of confinement to Frodo in Rivendell, he says something like if he would have caught something in Radagast’s voice that he may have ridden into Isengard more warily and so not have been caught like the fly he was. But really, when Gandalf was going though the gate, couldn’t he have gotten a whiff of orc or wolf? What of Glamdring? Was it ‘turned off?’ I think that pride made Gandalf make claim to voice-analysis gifts while ignoring the obvious questions about seeing that much was amiss in Nan Curunir.

Anyway, here when Gandalf enters Isengard there’s no outward reason to suspect anything; unless, that is that you’re a bit paranoid and think that anyone with such immaculate landscaping just must be hiding something. On the other hand, in this version the grounds crew have a lot of work to do in a very short time.

But back to the DVD.

We hear Christopher Lee before we see him standing on the steps, and he clues us to what's going on. See Gandalf patting his horse? More positive character traits being shown as this wizard appreciates the animal's help. He could have grabbed the horse’s shoulder, but I guess that no thrill was needed here.

Did Saruman look dirtier than you expected?

Well, the Maiar meeting starts off well enough between these 'old friends,' but things don't stay that way for long. Gandalf bows his head in deference, something that you might have noticed that did not happen when he met old friends previously. Was Gandalf being polite? Or is Saruman snooty and so expected that kind of thing? Gandalf is chided regarding his use of the hobbit's leaf, so maybe this isn't an ad for the smoking lobby (plus we all know that Saruman, a duplicitous traitor scoundrel, is also a hypocritical closet smoker).

The close-up of Saruman's face might be more insight into this character. Gandalf's face is wrinkled with lines of care and laughter: Saruman has either discovered the art of Botox or is not like Gandalf. He’s more aloof and cold and appears to be able to view both bliss and hell without twitching - a soulless face with avaricious eyes. His staff too appears different than the wizened old prop carried by the Grey Pilgrim. Saruman's staff is metal, inorganic and has edges...sharp edges...hmmm. It appears more like a weapon.

Saruman's discussion of Sauron is really picking Gandalf's spirits up, and you can see him thinking, "for this I rode from the Shire? I could have gotten better from Ted Sandyman…" When Saruman cocks his head, saying "I have seen it," you just know that something's wrong. At least the real Gandalf comes back when we see the Palantir. Instead of just listening to Saruman's advice, beratings, admonitions, etc, Gandalf starts pushing back.

And the Palantir room actually makes sense as somewhere I read that you walked around it to use it; it wasn’t some ball that you used like a cell phone.

Ah-Oh! Another !shock! flash of the Eye. I think that everyone by now has figured out what's going on. Is it chance that Saruman now sits on a black throne-like chair?

But Saruman is a bit too happy about the Nine going after the Ring Bearer. I liked him better when he was selling out both the West and the East. PJ is making Saruman the movie baddie for FotR, increasing his power then somewhat, but on the other hand the White Wizard is pretty much Sauron’s flunky. You don’t get the feeling that even if Sauron is controlling Saruman that Saruman believes that he’s a free agent. Also, won’t this conflict later with the scene where the Uruks of the White Hand head for Isengard and not Barad-dur? I know that there may have been some confusion in the lower ranks, but PJ's Saruman could have saved a lot of postage by just having his Uruks head east.

Back in Orthanc’s stone walls the tension builds. Doors slam closed at a glance. I like that some of the 'prepared speech" from the books is started, but it's stopped too soon. And where did the bags under Saruman's eyes just go?

An insult starts the battle royale between these two ancient staff wielders. By the by, I never imagined that this is how the fight went down. As we may have no text to say otherwise, I concede that PJ’s vision is as valid as any other, I guess. PJ states that he didn't want the ‘electricity from the hands’ kind of fighting, and so has Gandalf and Saruman slug it out with staves that never physically touch the other. Different, but not my cup of tea/coffee. If only one of them could shoot a fireball or something.

An aside: Making use of the slo-mo and pause buttons, I was able to examine Saruman's hands and was disappointed to see that neither bore a ring. Not even a ring tan line. Sigh.

Anyway, after a fight that lasts too long, Saruman claims Gandalf's staff and so gains the upper hand, as the old saw about two staves in the hand…or was it heads…anyway. Pivoting Gandalf on his ear was just too weird, and I'm not sure what that was supposed to mean, but there’s another saying about standing one on one’s ear. I give up. Gandalf is launched skywards into the blackness. I don't think that he's killed, as the scene finish doesn’t feel that way.

Well, it now seems obvious that Gandalf isn't going to receive any help regarding the Ring from Saruman, and he may not even be able to go back and help Frodo and Sam. And these two are being hunted by the Nine, which if we didn't fear for their sakes enough before, Saruman just said that Sam and Frodo will be killed.

Just where are those two hobbits anyway? We'll get back to them next week.



*** Special off-topic note: The alatar tribe increased by one this past Sunday. Mom and new daughter are home and well. ***

[Dimturiel]

I was wondering whether anyone noticed that, when Saruman describes the Eye of Sauron to Gandalf, Gandalf leans on his staff as if he is suddenly feeling very weak and seems to be in pain. Why? Is it because, when he had seen the Eye after Bilbo had left, he too felt it "pierce his flesh"? I have always felt intrigued by this thing. And I also wonder why, when Gandal sees the Eye in the palantir, he does not tell Saruman immediately what he had just seen. Could it be because he is starting to suspect that something is not quite right with Saruman? This is all, for now, maybe I will come back with more later. ( And off topic, congratiulations Alatar!)

[Lalwendë]

I remember looking forwards to seeing Saruman, and the fact that it would be Christopher Lee playing him made this all the more intriguing, as I'm a bit of a fan. Incidentally I missed meeting him once in London, and I've been narked about it ever since. Garrr.

The depiction of Saruman and Orthanc could have been done in many different ways for me, as he is one character who has never been 'fixed' in my mind, and nor has Orthanc. If I had to choose one image I had of the place, it might have been as it appears in the film, strangely, as I've always liked the Alan Lee illustration, and he is the person responsible for this set. In his painting we can only see a small portion of the tower, yet it hints at something much, much more immense than what we are shown; the design is almost identical. I also like how the chain-link 'fence' has remained, as this is one aspect of Tolkien's description that has always stuck in my mind; it is simply weird to me. Why does Saruman have a chain link fence? Is it to keep people off the grass? Is he a park keeper?

As for Saruman, he could have been easily portrayed by a young guy for me, as I had no idea of how he might look, the only aspect I ever focussed on was his many-coloured cloak. I was disappointed not to see this! And yes, he did look a bit grubby. But I can't grumble as Christopher Lee is just fantastic. He has retained that creepy, masterful presence he had when playing Lord Summerisle, and his voice is possibly the best voice they could have chosen for Saruman. He can maintain a long monologue seemingly without drawing breath and it has a hypnotic quality.

One point that did strike me as interesting is how they show Gandalf to have incredible deference towards Saruman here. He begins by looking quite foolish, even sheepish as he listens to the leader of his order, and when Saruman starts to display his real intentions, Gandalf take some time to recover his senses. Here are two real professional actors at work.

In the books we do not actually meet Saruman until the Ents have destroyed Isengard. All we know of him is what others tell us about him. This is one of those instances where we did have to 'see' scenes which we do not personally 'see' in the books. What does everyone else think of this?

[mormegil]

Originally Posted by Lalwendë

In the books we do not actually meet Saruman until the Ents have destroyed Isengard. All we know of him is what others tell us about him. This is one of those instances where we did have to 'see' scenes which we do not personally 'see' in the books. What does everyone else think of this?

This definately works on film, if it were simply dialogue between Frodo and Gandalf or Elrond and Gandalf it would be rather boring and uneventful. In this instance we are able to see and feel Saruman much more on a tangilbe level and it at least shows us where Gandalf went after he abandoned the hobbits.

Lal, I agree that Christopher Lee's voice is exceptional here and always intrigued me. He sounds very clever and cunning. Yet the way he is actually depicted doesn't show the subtilty of his plan. The book version is great where we see Saruman try and convince Gandalf and use the logic that "our goal is to accomplish order and we can do so by claiming the ring". It seems to me that Saruman is a pawn of Sauron with no agenda of his own. I think this detracts from the actual character of Saruman and doesn't show the duplicitious nature of his treachery. One extra minute would have accomplished this. It would have made more sense when Saruman said something like "I gave you a choice but you chose the way of pain" it doesn't really seem like Gandalf was given a choice as much.

Other than that I really like this scene, where it is placed, Christopher Lee, Orthanc is more or less how I imagined it, and the scenery is great.

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by mormegil

Yet the way he is actually depicted doesn't show the subtilty of his plan. The book version is great where we see Saruman try and convince Gandalf and use the logic that "our goal is to accomplish order and we can do so by claiming the ring". It seems to me that Saruman is a pawn of Sauron with no agenda of his own. I think this detracts from the actual character of Saruman and doesn't show the duplicitious nature of his treachery.

I agree that they did simplify Saruman's true aims, and it did come across as though he simply wanted to follow Sauron. I think that they may have done this to simplify Saruman for the audience, who may not have coped with a 'bad guy' proposing a 'third way' suddenly materialising so close to the start of the story; the film focussed on the good/evil divide, and was complex a story enough without troubling poor cinema goers' minds with Saruman's true aims. At least I hope that this wa sthe aim, as otherwise I would take it that they themselves misinterpreted the nature of Saruman.

Still, even without this, I do think that this was one of the best character depictions in the films, simply due to the sheer quality of Christopher Lee's acting! And there is a hint that Saruman is more clever than we are led to believe. As portrayed, you can see him thinking on his toes all the time.

Originally Posted by mormegil

This definately works on film, if it were simply dialogue between Frodo and Gandalf or Elrond and Gandalf it would be rather boring and uneventful. In this instance we are able to see and feel Saruman much more on a tangilbe level and it at least shows us where Gandalf went after he abandoned the hobbits.

Yes, it would have been incredibly dull to only have heard of Saruman through the talk of other people in the film. Not only that, but when we read the book, when we first actually meet Saruman, we can flip back to the pages where he was mentioned before and view that information in a new light. You can't do that with a film, so this was the only way I believe.

The other thing about Christopher Lee's voice being so suitable for Saruman is that he is able to convey 'command' or 'authority'. It's worth comparing him in LotR to how he acts in The Wicker Man; in this film again he uses his voice to convey a character who it is very difficult to defy.

[Boromir88]

Again, I have to give kudos to the acting, and I will continue because the acting is one of the stronger points of the movies. I think most of the actors did a great job in making convincing characters in the movies. Chris Lee is no different, bringing in such a beloved Tolkien fan as well as an experienced actor was a big plus for the movies.

morm brings up a good point about the simplification of Saruman's goals. He certainly does seem like Sauron's puppet, a miniature Sauron. He becomes Sauron in TTT as Sauron is in ROTK. In the movies I got this picture that he was like "the lower boss," you know in those video games...to get to the head hancho you have to beat through the lower bosses. Saruman is certainly simplified, I believe he says "We must join with Sauron."

Also, I'm not convinced that the audience could not have seen a different motive. Where now instead of just plain Middle-earth vs. Sauron/Saruman we have Middle-earth vs. Sauron vs. Saruman (which is the way I pictured it in the books). Saruman may have communicated and shared details with Sauron, but I got the impression that Sauron was using Saruman for his own purposes, and Saruman was planning to backstab Sauron.

Now could we have had this in the movies without creating a lot of complexion? I think so. I think it's been done in other movies as well, where we have multiple factions, multiple goals for each side. Each side is in it for a different reason.

Braveheart comes to mind right now where we have the Big Bad English dominating the Scots, but we have the Scottish nobles who can't break away from England because they're fighting amongst themselves. They can't decide who is to rule them, and they can't be united, each "faction" has their own agenda.

So, I think portraying Saruman as this man who comes to Gandalf and says..."Hey, together we can beat Sauron and we can use this Ring to restore Order and overthrow Sauron." And of course, Gandalf being the good guy that he is, saying that's all wrong. But, now we see that Middle-earth also has to deal with Saruman, not just as a mimic of Sauron, but someone who's after the Ring himself for his own power. (And we'll see this used later in Boromir/Denethor/Faramir scenese especially TTT EE. Don't see why it not here).

With all that being said, I think the movies did do a good job of establishing the feeling of "something's not right with this other wizard." Even before we meet him we have Gandalf tell Frodo "I must see the head of my order, he is both wise and powerful. Trust me Frodo. He'll no what to do." Lines like that may seem, ok everything's going to be fine, but it's just a use of irony. Just by using "Trust me, Frodo. He'll no what to do." I don't know about you, but I got a sense of, "Umm, he's not going to know what to do," or atleast what the "right" thing to do is.

Then when we get to the actual scene we start having our suspicions reaffirmed. Once we get to the Palantir, and Gandalf touches it, with the flash of "The Eye of Sauron." We then get the history of the Palantiri and that's basically the climax right there, we now are pretty confident Saruman's not a good guy.

[doug*platypus]

My preference would have been to have this scene as a flashback at the Council of Elrond. But I admit, I could quite easily be wrong on this point. The scene of Gandalf's merry ole trip to Isengard fits in well where it is here placed. Although, having said that, Gandalf's escape from Isengard fitted in well as a flashback at Frodo's bedside, so maybe having the whole thing as flashback may have worked out well. At least then we would have had some "where's Gandalf" moments, as we get in the book.

Christopher Lee was superbly cast as Saruman. His demeanour, his voice, his posture brought the character to life as no other actor could have.

Orthanc was different to the picture I had always had in my mind of a smooth, obsidian like monolith which was less designed and more organic. But having said that, it was exactly the same as in my Alan Lee-illustrated LOTR, and that was a great comfort! I thought the park-like atmosphere was a nice touch. Obviously that's just the southern end of Isengard, and the orcs and wolves are hidden away somewhere "round back"! I liked Saruman chiding Gandalf over use of the "Halflings' leaf".

I think that more should have been made of Saruman's own aspirations, his willingness to betray his new master Sauron, should the One come into his possession:

"Why not? The Ruling Ring? If we could command that, then the Power would pass to us. That is in truth why I brought you here."

Movie audiences are often smarter than filmmakers give them credit for, and it seems entirely plausible to me that Saruman should have a lust for his own power, rather than a life subservient to Sauron. Think of the Sith Lords from the Star Wars saga. One of the key aspects of them is that one is constantly seeking to overthrow the other. Darth Vader and The Emperor are not simply the evil team. Vader wants to rule the galaxy with Padmé and later Luke, while The Emperor wishes to cast down Vader and take Luke as his young apprentice. And it's entirely plausible... because they are evil!

On to the palantír. Another beautiful and lovingly-crafted prop! I liked the cover that could be thrown over it. Didn't like seeing the Eye of Sauron there. It just gives too much away. Plus everytime we see the Eye, as my theory goes, we get a little more immune to its effectiveness... "oh, it's that flaming eye again. I'm so over that!".

So then we have Saruman gloating over the ride of the Nine, and how they will kill the Ringbearer. Gandalf makes for the exit, but no! Down comes the impregnable door. So he tries another one... that comes down as well. And yet another one... Gandalf, are you starting to see a pattern here? Cotton on, man! Slowed mind, indeed. It should have been obvious from the first door slamming that Saruman intended to keep Gandalf locked up. Just a waste of preciouss screen seconds to show more than one, I believe.

The wizard fight is a bit out of the ordinary, and something of a gamble on PJs part, but in my mind it comes off pretty well. In the book, Gandalf says:

"They took me and they set me alone on the pinnacle of Orthanc..."

But can you imagine how that would play out in a movie? Some nasty men and/or orcs turn up to aid Saruman, and Gandalf just meekly goes along with it? I think that moviegoers would have demanded a bit of a fight from the old guy. It seems more logical that Saruman had to defeat Gandalf in battle before imprisoning him. The one thing I didn't like was that Saruman got his filthy hands on Gandalf's staff. Hey, man, that's his staff and a symbol of the authority and mandate he has from the Valar! You can't just swipe it! Where is he going to get another one? There are continuity editors watching, remember... oh, well, maybe not after all. I guess staffs are relatively easy to come across, then. Even in the book, Gandalf the White turns up with a new one (from Lórien?).