LotR1-FotR-Seq01

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Like many things, we start in darkness...

Peter Jackson's prologue to the Trilogy really had a lot of work to do: get buy-in for this fantasy world from both Tolkienites and those that just happened to stumble into the theater or were dragged therein by a date. He had 7.5 minutes with which to work, to set up the world of Middle Earth, to establish the characters/players and to get us all fearing the One Ring. What is this place Middle Earth, how does it work? Who lives there? Should proper names be used, and if so, and how many to include? How much information was too much for the general audience? Or too little - or worse, incorrect - for the fan base? And who should be narrating - who's POV?

New Line wanted a prologue of about two minutes. Glad that PJ fought for the longer version.

The movie begins with Galadriel speaking Treebeard's words, getting us started in the world of Middle Earth and letting us know what's so special about this least of rings. There's something about Cate Blanchett's voice - not young, not old; authoritative, yet not too harsh. Mysterious. The whispering Elvish in the background adds to the eeriness of the narration.

Next, the main races or peoples of Middle Earth are introduced - Elves, Dwarves and Men. The elves are perfect beings; the dwarves shown more neutrally. Men are not presented in the best light, and this even before we get to meet Isildur. Did you catch the one-eyed bearer of one of the Nine?

We hear the "one Ring to rule them all" line, again delivered well by Ms. Blanchett, while seeing the elvish script on the Ring. The map shows us Mordor and the blackness that spreads over the countryside. Nice way to show where everything is located while also showing the growing menace in a simple yet threatening way.

Then it's on to the battle of the Last Alliance. The color palette is muted, possibly to show that this event occurred in the past. Plus Mordor is a black and grey place. The only real color in the scene is in the groups of elves and men, who are presented as green - a 'nature/life' color?

The synchronized sword swinging thing that the elves do looks really cool, and I assume that it was added to show the precision and coordination of the Elves, in contrast to the chaos of the orcs, who seem to attack in a free-for-all swarm. If you really think about it, though, the orcs have to hit the line in sync with the elves' sword wave for the wave to serve any purpose. If an elf swings his/her sword too soon, it's ineffective (but looks really nice! just like a marching band...); too late, and the orc has already bopped him/her on the head. On the one hand you have this graceful coordinated orc-dicing wave, on the other hand you start to think that the elves are automatons. A quick shot shows someone wielding a spear- to me it's Aiglos.

And while quibbling, do the arrows sail close by Elrond's head (1) to show that the archers were performing really close ranged-attack support, (2) to demonstrate the precision in which elves do everything, and so Elrond is unconcerned as the arrows will fly true (yet close) or (3) to see Elrond yet again, as he's important to this story somehow and we need to reinforce that? What's funny here is that we have the elves, all with the same shields and helmets and sword-moves, and later we will see this 'mass production' conformity in the Uruks, and so is the sameness a good thing or a bad thing? Sure, I'd rather have an elvish sword over those chunk of metal scimitars, even if it were mass-produced, but just thought that this was a noted difference between the races.

Whoa! Sauron shows up. Not exactly as imagined, but cool nonetheless. He has his Ring, and he's also carrying a big stick and obviously he means to use it...But what didn't really work is the fact that everyone seems a bit surprised that he shows up. Hello!?! He's most likely twice as tall as everyone else, and there are not many trees in Mordor behind which to hide. So where did he come from? After watching the scene a few times, you start getting (more?) goofy in the head, and you start thinking that Sauron is going to tap Elendil on the shoulder and say, "Excuse me sir, but I'm late come to this battle, and was just wondering if you could direct me?"

The Ring, seen again on his right index finger, looks menacing, but after Sauron starts swinging his mace I'm guessing that the only power the Ring supplies here is to only help him bat people away better. He didn't hold up his Ringed hand and crush people down, or push them back remotely, or even make them feel like an invisible hand was choking them. The Ring must have just made him stronger. Can you imagine Sauron saying, "Batter up!" or "Fore!" as he swung away at the elves and men?

And why didn't someone pepper him with some of those nifty arrows that we just saw? Even better, the Elves could have shot at him from a distance as he walked from behind a mound of slag. But maybe they thought it was to be a champion vs. champion fight. "Don't shoot the big guy who just popped out of nowhere. It's to be a Gil-Galad and Elendil tag-team against Sauron and the Mouth of the South, so just stay out of it."

Just a clue for the for the Last Alliance regarding attacking Sauron - encircle him, and attack him from the back. Just my two coppers.

And so now we come to it. Elendil "the King" takes a Mace-induced flight, and his son runs to his aid and to his sword. Sauron breaks Narsil by stepping on it. Ahh... not how I would have pictured it. Always thought that the Sword would have been broken while attacking Sauron, not cracking beneath his foot. If Sauron can break the sword with his heel, and he becomes a searchlight eyeball, exactly why would he ever fear Narsil/Anduril later?

Oops, jumped too far ahead there...back to the action.

So now Sauron reaches for Isildur. Why? Did Isildur have something that Sauron wanted? Was the Dark Lord going to hold him up and crush him with the Force? Was Sauron going for Elendil's wallet? What? But ha! Isildur cuts off Sauron's fingers.

Yes, fingers.

Oops! Looks to me that Sauron isn't going to be able to count beyond six using his hands. Wasn't he subsequently nine-fingered, even in the movie? Losing the Ring makes Sauron implode with light, then explode. Everyone on screen is knocked flat - initially I thought that they might have been killed, but as Elrond and Isildur are still around afterwards, it was just some sort of force wave, a 'parting gift' from Annatar to the elves - to tussle their hair.

Isildur is a pompous jerk. He has such a smug look as he rides through the foggy forest with the Ring atop his 'made-for-ring' chestplate you almost start hoping (quickly, as the scene's moving on) that he falls for some misadventure. And he does - ambushed! The attack is a little hokey, as you'd think that the good guys would have seen it coming. Isildur experiences a flight/fight reaction and goes with the first option. The grass that he parts (to show his invisible movement) is just too contrived as it seems to be the only such weed of that height anywhere. And just what was Isildur thinking anyway? Most people, especially when in water, sink. Most of these same people, laden with chain-mail armor, sink like rocks in water. Actually more like heavy large aerodynamic rocks with lead centers. So not so sure what he planned to do when Isildur started into the water. Luckily he gets a few wooden 'arrows of buoyancy' in his back as these offset the weight of his body and armor so that he can float away.

Or did he shed his armor? Hard to tell, seeing him from the back floating on the water like that, but it looks more like he's robed. Anyway, couldn't we have had a chase scene where Isildur is pursued, throwing away his armor piecemeal, then is shot after diving into the river? I guess every frame counts in film, and that would be too much time and detail for a character that isn't really important to the rest of the tale. Or not.

We learn that ~2500 years pass, which is odd that we get a detail that might not have made that much of a difference to the telling. The deed becomes history which becomes legend which becomes myth line expressed the same relative time span.

So Gollum finds the Ring and goes into hiding. Not sure who he is at this point (from the movie POV), except that he's obviously not one of the good guys and that he really really likes fish. The circular waves in the water, like the darkness spreading across the ME map, was another good visual. The sunset, and the Ring falling down. Nice images. Plus we are hearing that this Ring isn't just a spectator but a player. And now we're approaching the present time, and something odd happens when we see an ordinary-looking person find the Ring - definitely not a King, not a creature, but someone more like you and me. He's a Hobbit, we're told, and these little people are going to be important to the story.

But just who are these Hobbits? That will be for next week.