Heretic

I'm back in London overnight at least. Tomorrow I'm off to Marlow for the annual wine and games fest that is Martin sans LJ's birthday. What a bad bit of planning, a birthday on New Years Eve. Still, the wee lamb is 40 this year, and as one who passed that milestone a while back it behooves me to prove that life does in fact continue. Well, sort of...

Already I am missing the crisp cold weather of Shropshire, which is preferable to the damp, clammy cold of London. On the other hand, all my stuff is here, as are many of my friends - although a quick stock-take on that front shows that the nexus of friends is moving north and now has its centre of gravity somewhere just south of Birmingham.

I am also in sole control of the remote, which is good.

Yesterday I finally saw Return of the King.

Uber-nerd that I am, I was disappointed. There were several places where the cutting was amateurish and rather spoiled the flow of the story. Don't get me wrong, we are still talking four and a half stars out of five, but I am with Christopher Lee on this; the confrontation with Sauman should have been left in. Even my silver haired Old Mum, who's never read the book nudged me and said 'that doesn't make sense.' Personally, given that they left out the Scouring of the Shire, too, I should have put the confrontation in, and ended the movie with Aragorn's wedding and coronation.

And where was the sense of dread followed by elation when the ships turned up? You are supposed to think that Southron reinforcements are arriving, and the end of Gondor is nigh - but then the royal standard unfurls and Aragorn turns up with reinforcements (and not just the dead, methinks). But we end up with a scene like a second-rate outtake from Pirates of the Carribbean.

Still, I expect it will all be there in the 6 hour DVD release.

Heretic

I'm back in London overnight at least. Tomorrow I'm off to Marlow for the annual wine and games fest that is Martin sans LJ's birthday. What a bad bit of planning, a birthday on New Years Eve. Still, the wee lamb is 40 this year, and as one who passed that milestone a while back it behooves me to prove that life does in fact continue. Well, sort of...

Already I am missing the crisp cold weather of Shropshire, which is preferable to the damp, clammy cold of London. On the other hand, all my stuff is here, as are many of my friends - although a quick stock-take on that front shows that the nexus of friends is moving north and now has its centre of gravity somewhere just south of Birmingham.

I am also in sole control of the remote, which is good.

Yesterday I finally saw Return of the King.

Uber-nerd that I am, I was disappointed. There were several places where the cutting was amateurish and rather spoiled the flow of the story. Don't get me wrong, we are still talking four and a half stars out of five, but I am with Christopher Lee on this; the confrontation with Sauman should have been left in. Even my silver haired Old Mum, who's never read the book nudged me and said 'that doesn't make sense.' Personally, given that they left out the Scouring of the Shire, too, I should have put the confrontation in, and ended the movie with Aragorn's wedding and coronation.

And where was the sense of dread followed by elation when the ships turned up? You are supposed to think that Southron reinforcements are arriving, and the end of Gondor is nigh - but then the royal standard unfurls and Aragorn turns up with reinforcements (and not just the dead, methinks). But we end up with a scene like a second-rate outtake from Pirates of the Carribbean.

Still, I expect it will all be there in the 6 hour DVD release.