Simon Tolkien: 'I don't think JRR would have enjoyed watching the films' | BBC Sounds

Simon Tolkien shares his view on the Lord of the Rings trilogy and the latest adaptation of his grandfather's books The Hobbit on 5 live Breakfast with Nicky Campbell and Rachel Burden.

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#JRRTolkien #LordOfTheRings #BBCSounds

Simon Tolkien: "I don't think JRR would have enjoyed watching the films" | BBC Sounds

[suba]

To have gotten a Trilogy which did not absolutely slaughter the source material is a miracle, if you know anything about Hollywood. Count your blessings.

[aashiv]

I have never understood this saltiness from the Tolkien estate towards Peter Jackson's movies. Jackson was a fan who put his heart in the movies and never intended it as a half-thought, cheap cashgrab. Something as extensive as Lotr could never be perfectly adapted but the movies were extremely good and almost single handedly introduced an entire generation to Tolkien's works. If that's not a fitting tribute, I don't know what is.

[rockheimr]

I think it's a mistake to assume Tolkien would have hated everything about the new movies. I read once he had an artist paint Frodo and Sam (iirc) and when shown the picture we clearly quite moved and surprised, saying 'There they are ... there they are.' under his breath. That suggests to me, at the very least, he'd have had amazing moments of 'oh! there they are' at various times throughout the movies. (I'm sure he'd not approve of all the changes to the plot -or maybe any of them- though.)

[mclarenrob]

imagine being able to live off your grandads work for your entire life

[solame]

“Too faithful”. God this guy would be the worst at parties.

[TheLiam]

I'll never know for sure but I feel he would have loved Viggo Mortensen as Aragorn.

[southernhawkstudios]

Let's all be thankful Disney didn't get it.

[NickonPlanetRipple]

Wow... Simon's opinion of the films seems to be the complete opposite of how Christopher feels.

[TheEz]

I’m getting tired of hearing from other people what Tolkien would and would not have liked

[shastasilverchairsg]

Without the films, there wouldn't be millions of new readers.

[GussieBabes]

I think Tolkein would have been mightily impressed with the work that went into the films. The things are riddled with love and passion. I think he would have been able to separate his works from the films and enjoy them as a great work of someone else's. How could a man who created such a world, of people of different sorts coming to admire and love each other for their differences, not at least admire the craftsmanship of the people involved in the films?

[ColCaffran]

I think the part of the films that Tolkien would have liked the most would have been Howard Shore's music. Tolkien was a linguist and Shore's incorporation of Tolkien's written songs and Tolkien's various Languages in the Score would have been appreciated I feel.

[cinemastudios]

The fact that Sir Christopher Lee approved of them is the highest guarantee that Tolkien would have liked them. Lee saw the hard work that went into everything and I'm sure Tolkien would have appreciated even more.

[CLBOO]

Anybody might have hated the movies adaptations, but I got to know Tolkien after I saw the movies. I read the LOTR & now I'm almost done with the Silmarillion and I thanked Peter Jackson for bringing the Middle Earth to me as I'm not an English and English is not my first language and I wouldn't have known this world if it was not because of the movies.

[zootsanchez]

Tolkien was fine with other people doing pictures and paintings based on his work, and, surprisingly, was okay with the idea of people running with his ball. He understood that people would want to dig further into his legendarium and put flesh on the bones of his sketched ideas, and said so quite explicitly in one of his letters. He'd probably not have liked Jackson's elves very much, and would have found the vulgarisations distasteful, but I think he would have appreciated the amount of effort and detail that went into the films.

[thesalanian]

Tolkien's dream was to make a new mythology, for his stories to be held in the hearts of people as myths, as far as I'm concerned, seeing a dedicated fan take great steps to retell his stories would have thrilled him, no matter how he felt about the depiction of his work.

[handbanana]

Shadow of War: "Shelob can become a sexy goth lady and did nothing wrong, she was just misunderstood and heartbroken"
Tolkien: *Spinning in his grave fast and constantly enough to give mankind perpetual energy*

[wizzyxy]

Maybe it's true, as is true that Tolkien itself rewrite over and over his books for around 40 years because he did't like it. Was a complicated man 👌

[Chronocrits]

Just consider yourself lucky Disney didn’t make it. I can’t even imagine.

[xxindigoAphrodithexx]

This interview didn't age well. This is the man who gave a blank check to Amazon to create RoP whichever way they liked.