SPOILERS!!! for Return of the King

[Head Mutant]

But this did pop up in a review I read on promontoryartists.org/lookingcloser/movie%20reviews/Q-Z/returnoftheking.htm :

"Some reviewers have interpreted Tolkien’s epic as a mandate for “the West” to send Muslim extremists “to an early grave.” This is sorely misguided. The saga’s central thread is one of longsuffering and mercy. In the books, Aragorn even offers the orc armies a chance to surrender. Violence remains a grievous and questionable necessity for the protection of innocence."

B'sides, let's remember that neither Tolkein nor Jackson are from "the West" as we think of it.

[PoolMan]

Head said:

B'sides, let's remember that neither Tolkein nor Jackson are from "the West" as we think of it.

Maybe not, but they're from the West as Muslims think of it.

[Jade]

I came to this thread looking to see if I actually saw Darth Maul in a battle scene at Minas Tirith, but I was excited to find a discussion about Tolkien's writings being applied to the current political climate.

**Warning Political Rant of a Constitutionalist**
In the article previously posted, it described the west as being "Americans" and the south/ east as being "Muslims." I have read Tolkien since I was a little kid and C.S. Lewis (a good friend and colleague or Tolkein's.) , and both of them were very prophetic concerning the East vs. West. It's not about geography it's about Western Civilization and Eastern Civilization (the Arab world). It's about philosphies, one allows the freedom of thought and the other denies it. I think Justin said that the themes of the movies were loyalty and freedom. Nothing could be more true. But freedom comes from the preservation of Western thought, without it freedom dies. There is a constant battle to maintain the balance of freedom of thought because it is human nature to create rules to live by. But Western ideology is to have just enough laws to supress evil from taking over, thus allowing freedom of religion, speech, and equal opportunity. Western civilization promotes tollerance but it is a reck from within because if it tollerates to much it will be destroyed.

John Rhys-Davies put it perfectly in this interview www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1042278/posts

-Jade

P.S. Did I see Darth Maul?

[Xanthricus]

Well, it's kind of hard to call them "villans." Doesn't Sauron & Co. convince them that Gondor and it's allies have taken their land, killed their people, and oppressed them, and that this is a way to redeem themselves? So it was Gondor who created the tensions, and Sauron whipping them up into a frenzy. So they're not necessarily evil, but people blinded by their fury and misguided by Sauron & Co.


Oh, and the ghost Mountain men were awesome. They looked like a hoard of zerg on a rampage.

I'm very happy with all three movies, and I feel they represent, as close as they can, the books as a whole. Go Peter Jackson! Now get to work on making really good adaptations of books by Elizabeth Haydon, Martha Wells, Robin Hobb, and Terry Brooks.

[PoolMan]

Jade said:

P.S. Did I see Darth Maul?

Jade, I know exactly what part you're talking about. There's an orc running around with the black and red face paint/tattoos who flashes onscreen probably three times. Sadly, no double edged lightsaber in sight.

[Jade]

Well, I was just sitting there during that battle scene thinking, "There's got to be some bloopers in this movie." then I see Darth Maul at the right hand side of the screen. but no one else I was with saw it.

-Jade

P.S. to bad there wasn't a lightsaber:(

[Magill]

Before we get into too much debate about the modern political scene, I just wanted to add that I think Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond is a good primer, as it explains that many of the differences between global cultures are due to accidents of geography and resources (including good candidates for plant and animal domestication).

I guess I always thought of "the East" being more in Asia rather than the Middle East. And before we start feeling too superior about our culture of freedom of thought, we should remember that during the time that inspired Tolkien (i.e. shortly after the collapse of the Roman Empire through the Middle Ages), much of Europe was pretty backwards while scholars in the Middle East advanced mathematics and alchemy and translated many ancient Greek texts to Arabic, keeping them in existence. Some texts we only know from their Arabic translations.

Sorry for diverging so far off topic. I just finished The Years of Rice and Salt, which attempts to imagine a world in which the plague killed off >90% of Europeans. Muslims and the Chinese emerge as the two dominant global powers.

On a lighter note--even after 3 movies, I don't quite buy Elijah Wood as Frodo. All the other actors worked for me. Oh, and every time in the series when they showed a close-up of the ring in his hand, I was too distracted by his dreadfully bitten-off fingernails.

[Jade]

I have not read either of the books you mentioned, but I do understand their general message. They preach equality of culture, denying that any culture is superior to another (please forgive me for making such a gross generalization). I, myself, disagree with this. I feel that the culture I am a part of is better thany any other in the world right now-- I say that because freedom is the most important thing to me. Being able to worship the way I want, being able to show my head and face in public, and being able to debate like we are right now are really important things to me. If they weren't than maybe I would be more sympathetic to the idea of no culture being better than another.

I really appreciated

Magill said:

we should remember that during the time that inspired Tolkien (i.e. shortly after the collapse of the Roman Empire through the Middle Ages), much of Europe was pretty backwards while scholars in the Middle East advanced mathematics and alchemy and translated many ancient Greek texts to Arabic, keeping them in existence.
But the time Tolkien wrote about was not based on the happenings of the middle ages but on the events of and surrounding WWI. He expressed his frustration in the political leaders before WWII because he could not stand their passive stance against the growing evil that he saw coming. He saw what a great evil was rising to power and wrote about a fictional circumstance with the same themes. He put this story in a time which he knew best, midevil times, because he was a doctor of midevil literature

-Jade

P.S. that book about the plague sounds facinating. I love any kind of "what-if." And no joke about Frodo's fingernails, gross!

[PoolMan]

I dunno, Jade, I've heard many, many times that Tolkien insisted that his books were not commentaries or parables of real world politics (specifically, WWII). Not saying you're wrong, but I've always heard different.

[druidGirl]

I was just about to post that Pool. Tolkien was very adamant about Lord of the Rings not being about WWII. Or any other real event in history. He was actually anti-war. He hated being apart of WWI and felt that it (the war) was a waste of life. But, he also knew that war, at times, was necessary. Which is quite obvious in his writings.

One of the themes I think that is missed in LotR is about how awful war is. How it changes people so completely, and not always for the better. Frodo being the best example of in the story. He wasn't fighting in a war, per se, but he was fighting himself and the lure of the ring (which was a fight he lost) to save the world. And in the end, he was so messed up by the whole thing he "never healed" and had to leave the world entirely. Tolkien was really effected fighting during WWI, and got emotionally scarred after loosing some close friends in battle. I think Frodo represents all the emotional casualties of war. And I think that's missed by people wrapped up in the friendship and fight for freedom themes.

[Magill]

Jade said:

P.S. that book about the plague sounds facinating. I love any kind of "what-if."

I'll start another thread in the Books forum, so I don't hijack this one any further

[Jade]

I guess I was speaking out of my own ignorance about the WWI thing, won't happen again:)

I agree that Tolkien did a great job in expressing the pain of war. Frodo was definately the epidemy of that. They didn't have it in the movie, but when the hobbits get back to the Shire, everything is changed for the worse. It was so different from the memory they had held onto during the war. When I was little I just remember reading that for the first time and thinking how absolutely horrible that after everything they went through their Shire wasn't even the same.

-Jade