messiah

Found the book I pinched from school about 15 years ago and thought I'd have another go at reading it,

Not very far through it yet but noticing huge differences between the original book and the new films (like frodo being 50 for instance).

Who's read it and thought the book is better than the films (or vice versa)?

weapon69

I thought LOTR was better as a book. But then most books are better than the films i think.

SPEN555

I am sure someone will have done a **** version Beat the book and the movie lol!

vindaloo

<LOTR nerd warning>

The ring exerted an influence over both Bilbo and Frodo which 'kept them young looking'. See how old Bilbo looked @ Rivendell after he gave the ring to Frodo though.

</LOTR nerd warning>

I quite like the way they changed some things, hate others. Hate the way Gandalf 'frees' Theoden from Saruman's influence - more like watching a Christmas panto than a serious film. Hate the way Theoden's judgement is questioned after that re. Helm's Deep.

Love the start of TT with the Gandalf/Balrog fight and most of the character interactions. Love the Uruk Hai for the phrase "looks like meat's back on the menu boys" when they fought the other Orcs/goblins

Bit confused (to the point of yelling "where did all them f*ing elves come from") when Celeborn's Elves turned up at Helm's Deep.

J.

moses

movie was excellent but the book will always be better with more details etc

and the legend tom bombadil was missing in the movie and farmer maggot was a friend of merry and a pippin, they didnt steal veg from his farm but only frodo did when he was a young lad and farmer maggot give him a doon


and alot of other stuff was missing

fitzscoob

only one thing bugged me about the books

"and they walked, and they walked, and they walked" lets hope they had a decent pair of nikes

moses

lol nothing like the way u said it mate

Geezer

I think it's difficult to compare books and films, because things that work in books won't necessarily work on the big screen, and vice versa.

There will always be people who are disappointed with the transformation, but I think you should try to look at the films totally seperately, as if the book had not been written. As such, they are a remarkable piece of film entertainment in their own right.

The books do trudge along a bit in places, especially the first one. The bit with Tom Bombadil doesn't actually add anything to the story, and all those bloody elven and hobbitt verses and songs!

There are also bits of the films which do not work quite as well as they should, but overall, they compliment each other.

Geezer

messiah

Have to admit to skipping past the songs - and after watching the extra's on the two towers dvd I'm thinking about missing the Tom Bomdadil section out too.

Read a bit of the appendices (relating to Aragorn being raised in rivendell) but didn't carry on and decided to leave it later on - when the characters are more relavant.

Any recommendations on when to read sections of the appendices - ie - incorporating them into the story?

Fosters

frodo was 33 (age of maturity) when the lord of the rings trilogy started, hence the combined birthday party for bilbo and frodo. of all the book/film combos, I've never found the film to be better than the book - including lotr. tolkien is flowery in his prose, but that still makes for far more detail, even though quite often tedious.