I remember parking in this lot. Weird how my brain has so completely remapped itself around the current configuration. But it’s still in there somewhere: being little, going there in the back of the old Falcon station wagon, no seat belts (!), and you parked in that huge expanse (“Everybody remember: Bambi”), and you got the ticket book with those precious E’s and the D’s and C’s and B’s and there was always a leftover A that you were going to use on Mr. Lincoln on the way out if you weren’t too tired but of course you never did, that’s why the junk drawer at home was full of those old ticket books with only A’s, and someone gave you a piggyback ride because your feet were sore and at last the Falcon was there again and someone poured you in and you drifted off as the lights and shadows slid by.
The change to Faramir’s character in The Two Towers was by far my biggest disappointment with the movies. I discussed it with other fans back in the day, watched and rewatched the BTS features and listened to the commentary tracks, and ended up mostly defending the filmmakers’ decision in online debates. But it was always a little (or more than a little) sad for me that they did that.
I know the arguments on both sides. I know why they felt they had to do it. No one is giving me hundreds of millions of dollars to adapt a sprawling, multi-book epic to the big screen in a way that will justify its enormous budget and satisfy everyone from lifelong lovers of the source material (*waves*) to new fans and casual “eh, sure; I’ll watch it” types.
But I’ll always regret that they couldn’t find room for the actual character from the books, the one who wasn’t going to undercut Aragorn or his struggle just by existing, but also wasn’t going to beat up Gollum or send the Ring to Denethor, because those things were wrong, and he saw himself as bound by that.
There’s a clip of David Wenham describing how he went to Jackson/Boyens/Walsh (or maybe it was just a story recounted by one of the latter trio; I can’t remember now) after he’d read the books (which he hadn’t when he was cast), and saying hey, you know, this actually seems like a significant change to my character. And them telling him yeah, we know, but we need to for all these reasons (*enumerates reasons*) and anyway he ends up in the same place, right?
Yeah, no. I mean yeah, he ends up having made the same decision. But he’s not the same person. How he gets there matters.
I want to believe a movie could have been made that didn’t sacrifice his character in the name of storytelling. It wouldn’t have been the same movie; might not have been as successful a movie. But I would have loved it.
I’ve mentioned that I’m reading the books again, out loud with my co-conspirator at night, the way we used to do. We just finished the Council of Elrond, and it was a thrill to realize that the brother Boromir referred to (though not by name) was the real Faramir, my Faramir.
I can’t wait to meet him again.
I have a Grand Unified Theory of LOTR that I created to reconcile the books and the movies; it satisfactorily resolved the Faramir issue for me, among other things.
The basic idea is that the books and the movies are two different histories of the same events created by different cultures with different sources and agendas. (Inspired by Tolkien’s conceit that the books were translated from the Red Book the hobbits wrote.)
Book-LOTR is mostly drawn from first-person hobbit accounts, with added accounts of things the hobbits didn’t see from other people. Movie-LOTR is a Gondorian history made several centuries after the events, with a clear cultural bias toward humans and Gondor.
Thus, in the movies: the humans are more prominent, the hobbits are younger (because they look like children to Gondorians), the romance of Aragorn and Arwen (their legendary king and queen) gets a lot of screen time, and Faramir… well, he’s no more comprehensible to later Gondor than he was to his contemporaries. He’s a great hero of their history, and it’s on record that he let the hobbits go, but how do they reconcile that with their cultural values? By making his story all about loyalty to his liege lord and his emotions about his father, rather than letting him be the ethical intellectual (with considerable grasp of the lore and history of his world) that the hobbits met. Movie-Faramir is written to make sense to people with a worldview and priorities more like Boromir’s.
According to this theory, Frodo’s Red Book account of his philosophical conversation with Faramir about war, Gondor, the Ring, etc. is a much better historical source for the “real” Faramir than the stories people tell in Gondor centuries later about one of their ancestral heroes. This pleases me, since I too am attached to book Faramir.
……this is the most brilliant thing I have ever read. Like, the fact that the Scouring of the Shire was cut – well obviously that’s not something the Gondorians would consider critical to the story. It seems unlikely that anyone in Minas Tirith would even bother to write down the hobbits’ encounters with the barrow wights and Tom Bombadil – neither Aragorn nor Boromir were there, and it would merely seem a strange, disturbing anecdote from the far reaches of Eriador. The battles scenes are all a bit over-long, and exaggerated in silly ways sometimes? Obviously the work of an enthusiastic storyteller taking a few liberties. The wrong fucking elf shows up to a battle? Just a little bit of All Elves Look Alike, Whoops!
I am in general pretty chill about movie adaptations of books – the movies don’t replace the books, or change how they actually go, and I can understand and appreciate how a movie is going to have different pacing needs and character beats than a book would. But the Way they Did Faramir Wrong just angered me so much. LOTR was my first real online fandom – FOTR’s release coincided with my family getting cable internet, and my world suddenly expanded exponentially. I was intensely passionate about my Feels regarding Jackson’s interpretations. (In short: pretty good, wrong, Wrong, WRONG!!!!) This Grand Unified Theory not only makes a ton of sense, but retroactively makes me feel just, so much better about the movies.
Everything that was true last week about the Senate’s Repeal-and-Replace effort is still true this week. But now we have more (and more alarming) information:
The Senate has no intention of making the bill public, and has put measures in place to ensure it hits the floor for a vote before any public testimony, hearings, or awareness of it can be rallied.
Republican Senators are CLAIMING NOT TO KNOW THIS BILL EXISTS. This is tantamount to calling the constituents they’re in office to represent stupid.
Breaking with precedent, the Senate has banned filming of hallway interviews with Senators. They now require previously granted permission from a Senator AND the Rules Committee of Senate. This makes Senators less visible and less accountable.
1) CALL EVERY SINGLE DAY. Here’s the Capitol switchboard #: (202) 224-3121. Find numbers for your reps’ state offices here. If you have Dem Senators you know will vote against it, encourage them to withhold consent or filibuster unless the bill is made public. (Great guide on this from INDIVISIBLE.)
2) ENCOURAGE OTHERS TO CALL. Indivisible has created a tool that makes it easy as heck to reach out to Facebook friends who are in key (swing vote) states. If you’re not on Facebook, tap that email list. No time to be shy–you’ve got friends out there who just need a little nudge/encouragement/empowerment.
3) WRITE a Letter to the Editor. Pen a message and send it to your local
paper. Media isn’t doing its job covering this incredibly important issue, leaving room for
citizens to step in.
4) SHOW UP. Be a body on the ground at your Senator’s district offices (find those offices here and find others to team up with here). Be
loud. Be quiet but present. Be whatever you are, but be in that space,
demanding accountability. Congress works for us.
5) Take to social media and demand the Senate #ShowUsTheBill … but don’t JUST take to social media; that won’t get ‘er done.
As a part of our Kickstarter campaign, we’ll be hosting a fanart contest this week! Draw any of our characters, a scene you’ve imagined will be in the short–whatever your heart desires!
The Shipwrecked team will be judging the entries based on how well they capture the essence of the Gilded Lily, not on artistic merit, so artists of all skill levels may apply!
Be sure and include the Kickstarter link in your post and tag it #FigAndFord to be eligible for consideration. Entries are due Friday, June 16th at midnight Pacific time, and a winner will be announced during the following Sunday’s livestream. The winner will receive a signed character poster of their choice from the campaign!
Happy drawing, and drop a dime to solve the crime!
