Christopher Rush

In the “Book Reviews” section of our previous issue, I included some thoughts from Katharyn W. Crabbe on heroism in her article “The Quest as Legend: The Lord of the Rings,” taken from Harold Bloom’s Modern Critical Interpretations work on J.R.R. Tolkien’s masterpiece.  Reprinted below is the quotation in question:

The difference between Boromir and Faramir is an expression of the difference in what they have inherited from their Númenórean past….  It is not only knowledge of the past but reverence for it and understanding of it that set Faramir apart, and that knowledge, reverence, and understanding are his links to the golden age….  By exemplifying a hero who values the spiritual life of a culture as well as its physical life, Faramir links the Rohirrim to Aragorn, King of the Númenóreans.

I bring this up again because we are already coming up to the 10^th anniversary of the release of Peter Jackson’s The Fellowship of the Ring.  Most of you grew up with these movies as commonplace childhood experiences; the rest of us, though, grew up wondering if a live-action version of these classic novels (or novel, depending on how literate you are in things Tolkien) would ever happen.  The trailers for The Fellowship of the Ring were an exciting promise, made even more encouraging with the declaration The Two Towers and The Return of the King would be coming out in the next two years.  Watching The Fellowship of the Ring was a great experience in the theater; we went knowing that some changes from the book were bound to occur — some were easier to live with (such as the time compression of events for the sake of film pacing, the absence of Tom Bombadil and the Barrow-wight) than others (Arwen — enough said).  Fortunately, despite a fair amount of substantial changes (the fate of Saruman, the absence of the scouring of the Shire), The Return of the King in 2003 brought the movie trilogy to an enjoyable and moving conclusion.  The real problem, though, came in 2002 with The Two Towers.

Peter Jackson’s decision to move some of the narrative elements from The Two Towers to occur simultaneously with events in The Return of the King was a good decision — he captures in film what Tolkien didn’t quite capture with the division of narrations in books three through five.  Still, the final sentences of The Two Towers are some of the most chilling and spine-tingling final sentences in all of literature.  The absence of the greatest use of onomatopoeia is not the real problem, however; the real problem is that Peter Jackson’s movie adaptation had each of the three main groups of characters make the opposite decision they made in Tolkien’s original plotline: the Ents reject Pippin and Merry’s request to join against Saruman; Théoden is an anti-Free Peoples bigot and the battle of Helm’s Deep is blown out of proportion; and Faramir absconds with Frodo, Sam, and the Ring to defend Osgiliath.  The bonus dvds from the four-disc extended edition supplied us with the directorial team’s reasoning behind these decisions: essentially, Peter Jackson thought his version was better than Tolkien’s.

Putting aside the other differences, the most hurtful change was the total destruction of Faramir.  Katharyn Crabbe made the point that Faramir was truly a hero because he knew his people’s past.  He “values the spiritual life of [his] culture as well as its physical life,” linking Faramir in a substantial way to both Aragorn the true king and the halcyon days of Númenor in the Second Age.  The original movie release of The Two Towers gave us no substantial reason for Faramir’s decision to take Frodo and Sam to Osgiliath; at least the extended dvd version supplied some fabricated backstory of the brotherly rivalry with Boromir for their father Denethor’s affections.  The brothers already had enough tension built in with their different valuations of their own cultural past; Jackson needn’t have brought in filial rivalry (a much less interesting motivation).  Faramir also is at least tacitly complicit with the Rangers’ beating of Gollum in the movie, a brutal attribute for one who originally was characterized by “knowledge, reverence, and understanding.”

We were told by the directorial staff that they made these changes to give the characters room to grow (as if the Ents would realistically change their minds just by seeing the destruction Isengard was perpetrating on the forests).  Faramir, though, the real Faramir, does not need to grow — certainly not in the stereotypical Hollywood character arc fashion.  He does not need to see the damage the Ring can do (and apparently does to Frodo after the brief repellence of the Orcs from Osgiliath).  Faramir has already arrived as a hero.  He is the model that Frodo needs to experience and from which to learn, not the other way around.  The danger from this type of Hollywood movie and television series is their message that children and youth are smarter than adults, and that adults need to change their behavior and values based on what the younger generations (or people groups) enjoy.  It’s not about Jesus’ exhortation to let the little ones come to Him — it’s about our culture’s kowtowing to ignorant youths with disposable income; youths need adults to model appropriate behavior and acculturate them into the traditional values of classical/Christian Western Civilization.  Just watch Happy Feet like an intelligent person for a clear example to what Peter Jackson’s total change of The Two Towers can lead.

Faramir knows his culture’s past, he knows the ways of Rangers and thus the natural world, and he knows the spiritual and physical values of the Free Peoples.  This is exactly what Frodo as a heretofore insular being needs to know.  This is why Faramir is a hero, why he can resist the lure of the Ring.  He does not need to be tested to make his character more interesting, nor does he need to fail for a time so his later apologetic reversal seems more dramatic.  The Lord of the Rings already has enough characters who go through growth, maturation, and decline — that’s the whole purpose of the Sam/Gollum/Frodo storyline!  Faramir is a source of stability, a reminder of what has been lost (and even abjured by Aragorn for a time), and a significant element of the ultimate restoration of Middle-earth.  Bringing Faramir down to the level of a typical movie/story character is an embarrassing and unnecessary change.  The directorial staff was wrong.  Faramir is not a better or more interesting character by having faults.  Overcoming sins is not better or a more rewarding story than not sinning in the first place.  A heroic character who does what is right all the time for the right reasons (with a believable context and backstory, unlike frothy, vanilla-flavored Christian fiction) is not boring — it is admirable and enjoyable.  Two words: Atticus Finch.

Changing The Lord of the Rings is akin to covering “With or Without You”: if you don’t know what you’re doing, you are in big trouble.  As mentioned above, if one can tolerate Arwen and the absence of the scouring of the Shire (and all the other unnecessary changes), Peter Jackson’s movies can be rather enjoyable — I doubt we will ever see another adaptation of this work in cinema.  As with other adaptations, such as Daniel Day-Lewis’s The Last of the Mohicans, it helps if you just consider it “a different version” of the story.  If you want “the real thing,” just read the book.  That way, you’ll get to know and help restore the real Faramir, the hero.