Glad2 get to get rid of the scouring

I believe taking out the scouring is exactly the right thing to do. It's impossible to engage with post the huge climax of ring and journey and it has a distinctly odd anticlimactic feeling as though its all taking place in a Middle Earth at a different, very much later, period in its history. The tone is so at variance with the rest of the novel one could very easily believe it to be from an alternative version of TLOTR that Tolkien was toying with.<P>One of the great things about the Grey Havens is that we are returned to the Middle Earth that we have spent most of a thousand pages in. It is, I think, the true emotional climax of the novel and, in a few understated paragraphs, perhaps Tolkien's finest moment. Sentimental but absolutely authentic, and a perfectly judged close. <P>Nonetheless I think Jackson will reference the Scouring in some way and I think I can take a guess at how he will handle post-ring Hobbiton which we will visit for a time. But aren't the cinematic opportunities for the Grey Havens wonderful? The psychological release of this is powerful enough for readers and I think even more so for viewers. Our one and only view of the ocean in an otherwise land locked film, the limitless horizon, the pearly light, cloaks billowing in the off-sea breeze, the ship, a hint of which we have already had. And, of course, that most nostalgic of sounds: the crying of gulls. It will be, I believe, one of the very finest moments of the film. RP