The Two Towers
| State of body | Not actually dead. |
|---|---|
| Detail of inspection | Inspected five times to make sure. |
| Forensic Investigator | shellshear |
| Comments | A puzzling case – initially thought to be dead, then seriously ill, and now seems to be fine, though with a slight cough. |
I really like the Lord of the Rings films. I’m not even beginning to suggest that I could have done a better job on them overall – in fact, I think that’s true for all but the worst films – but despite my overall happiness with the themes and plot, there are several moments in The Two Towers especially that don’t work very well. This forensic examination with will therefore be more piecemeal than usual: my suggestions are more nitpicky than sweeping. And, of course, the Lord of the Rings films have been very thoroughly examined, so I will try to confine myself to comments that I haven’t read elsewhere.
When I first saw “The Two Towers”, I came out of the cinema somewhat disappointed. It had been spectacular, certainly, and there were many points to admire (especially the sequences with Gollum, about which I have no complaints), but at some level it had been unsatisfying. At first, I thought this feeling might go away. It certainly did with “The Fellowship of the Ring”, which suffered a little from the fact that every five minutes I would surface out of the film and think: “Wow! They really did it! I’m watching The Lord of the Rings!” Yes. I had watched the trailer dozens of times, followed every spoilerific link, read every bit of news and every advance review before I saw it. So the first viewing was an odd experience, and I enjoyed it a great deal more on the second viewing. Remembering that, I was hoping for a similar thing to happen with The Two Towers. To a limited extent, it did. However, of the three Lord of the Rings films, it is the most uneven and the least satisfying.
My first problems were with the setup of Rohan. Wormtongue was too obviously a villain, right from the start. A more interesting choice might be for him to appear utterly sincere. One of the pleasures of the book “Over Sea, Under Stone” was that the villains were able to construct an entirely plausible reading of the events that made everything the good guys did appear weak and childish; the optimism of youth being gently crushed by the realities of fact. I would have liked to have seen a more honest effort to try and twist the audience to Wormtongue’s point of view, at least while he was speaking.
Theoden’s possession/dramatic recovery also didn’t quite work for me: it made me wander why Wormtongue was still necessary to give orders by proxy, if they could make Theoden say and do things directly. I could see the problem they were faced with. Theoden has to be very weak at the beginning, under the influence of Wormtongue. And yet, very shortly after Gandalf arrives, he’s throwing Wormtongue down the stairs and threatening to kill him. I’d have rather seen a less dramatic visual effect, relying more on Bernard Hill’s acting, and have Theoden’s visual recovery take several more days. And certainly not have Saruman speaking through Theoden’s mouth. By all means, hearing through his ears and seeing through his eyes, so that we can see just how far advanced the cancer has spread. But if we are to get big speeches from Saruman, let them come from Saruman’s mouth – they used that device when the fellowship were trying to cross the snowy mountain pass in “The Fellowship of the Ring” (to reasonable effect); it would have worked well here.
One significant change of having a more sympathetic-sounding Wormtongue would be to highlight Gandalf’s rather unsubtle manipulation that follows. He puts the sword into Theoden’s hand and councils strongly for war – it wouldn’t take much to push this a little further, and perhaps even having Aragorn treating Gandalf with a little more wariness (though we already see a little of that, as when Aragorn asks Theoden to spare Wormtongue just when he is about to execute him – though I’m not convinced that scene is as strongly motivated as it ought to be either. It plays a little like a plot contrivance, as it currently stands).
Then, there is the issue of the death of Theoden’s son. Unfortunately, it was shown without enough context to make us care very much (which the extended edition did a little to correct, but not enough). During the mourning and speeches, we feel distanced from the proceedings: it’s the funeral for someone we don’t know, and the raw emotions on display make us uncomfortable and restless, which is probably not what the filmmakers are trying for. We need to either show more back-story for Theoden’s son (impractical, given the already-bulging length of the film) or at least show it more from the point of view of an outsider, like Aragorn (who is, at that point, still the character with whom it is easiest to identify) rather than Gandalf, to at least acknowledge the discomfort of the audience.
It is rather tempting to try and change the introduction of the Rohan section of the film. We see several scenes of Theoden, Eowyn, Eomer and Wormtongue before the fellowship arrives, establishing the problems that are facing them. Have the audience follow the fellowship instead. The introduction to the Rohirrim would have been when the fellowship first encounters the riders of Rohan. Eomer might have given hints about the troubles they might expect. They arrive at the hall, spend rather longer sparring with Wormtongue (who is more confident of his hold over Theoden, not requiring a big gang of thugs), manage to get in to see Theoden but fail to cure him (Gandalf, perhaps, having been disarmed of his staff), then have to deal with the distorted Rohan politics for a day or so (returning our excised introduction to Eowyn and Wormtongue) while Wormtongue poisons Theoden’s son and has a death warrant issued against each of them. Then, finally, breaking back in to see Theoden and effecting the cure. In the movie as it stands, Wormtongue was a bit of a straw-man pushover.
There was one minor bit of dialogue I’d have changed at around this point: Eowyn telling Aragorn that “the women of Rohan have learned that those who do not use the sword can still die on it”, or words to that effect, after she shows off a little of her fighting ability. It sets up the entirely unrealistic expectation that the women of Rohan (besides Eowyn) are going to put up some kind of a fight at any point in the next two films, something that just doesn’t happen. The women cower, even as the very old and very young men are called upon to fight. In the absence of a corps of shield-maiden-guides, we realise that Eowyn’s fighting ability is actually kinda special. Which should have been made apparent from the start.
The criticisms of Faramir have been widely covered, so I’ll just restrict myself to saying that I agree with Ms. Boyens from the Director’s commentary: the changes to Faramir’s character were necessary to keep the ring from looking rather weak and feeble. However, I think they still didn’t handle this as well as they might have. Faramir is tempted once, when he first finds out about the ring, and then appears to ignore it for the rest of the journey back to Osgiliath. Some of his strength of character (and parallels/contrasts with Boromir) could have been brought out by showing his ability to let the ring go, despite his very evident on-going temptation. In the extended edition farewell to Frodo and Sam, he doesn’t even look at it.
My most petty but persistent annoyances come during the siege of Helm’s Deep, starting with the front gate and the drain. The drain seems to be particularly poor. The enemies were able to get right in under the wall, where there were some rusty iron bars between them and the defenders. If it was impossible for them to get through the bars, they could still have shot people inside the walls from there. From a defensive standpoint, it would have been more sensible to have several smaller drains, or at least have somebody watching it. From a film-making standpoint, having charges shaped for the smaller drains would still work, or they could have extended the beginning of the siege to have a day or two while sappers got to work digging a small tunnel.
The front gate was rather puzzling, too. The defenders seemed completely unprepared for the idea that the attackers might try and ram it. They had no bar across it, no obvious metal reinforcement, no portcullis, no drawbridge, no murder holes or boiling oil or giant rocks poised above it. The excuse, I suppose, was that the stone ramp leading up to the gate was exposed to a lot of bow fire, and that actual defences would have slowed the pace of the battle without changing the course of it, and made it less exciting. However, the rudimentary precaution of a drawbridge could have been put in; the orcs could have trundled in a platform of the correct height and no time lost.
The eventual mounted counter-attack was oddly unconvincing as well. While I have no doubt (from accounts from history) that a cavalry charge could have been as effective as the one portrayed, Theoden’s mounted charge didn’t appear to quite have enough force to utterly convince us that what was happening was “real”. For this, though, I think we just needed some slightly different shot choices: a shot from above showing their speed and force would have been more effective, and I would have liked some shots from the points of view of the orcs being charged. The cavalry charge in “The Return of the King” was much more successful in conveying the power of mounted attackers against foot-soldiers. In addition, they didn’t show an important part of the charge in “The Two Towers”. We had to see that the charge, while initially successful, was an act of desperation and would have eventually been overwhelmed. We could have been shown that the Uruk-hai were allowing them through in order to surround them, on the plain outside – perhaps scenes showing them setting pikes; Aragorn seeing this and smiling grimly, spurring forward; Uruk-hai bringing down some of the chargers; and then: Gandalf and Eomer’s reinforcements. Just to squeeze out that extra bit of drama.
Having said that, they certainly had enough drama at the end. Simultaneous victories in Isengard and Helm’s Deep, emotionally narrated by Sam as he stands, tormented, in Osgiliath: it was a terrific conclusion, and an extra tweak to the Helm’s Deep sequence is quibbling of the most petty kind. “The Two Towers”, while the weakest of the three films, is still brilliant and powerful (and the Extended Edition is even better, rendering several other quibbles redundant). All “Film Forensics” examinations are born of frustration. With most films, that frustration arises from the feeling that I could have done better with the same tools. The frustration of “The Two Towers”, however, is very different. A flaw in a masterwork is much more irritating that one in a crudely crafted factory piece.