Filming Possibilities

Aureentuluva

@ hObBiTzWiLlEaTyOu: Fantastic picture.. would absolutely suit the scene u described..

Felagund

Ok here's my honest POV.

The first portions of the Silmarillion which essentially deal with Elves and Valar are not really good screen material. They are just too beautiful and complex for cinema. The other problem is CONTINUITY. Not everyone who goes to see these movies will be die hard TOLKIEN fans, many will just have liked the LOTR films and expect much the same. For a wide commerical spread these films need continuity of characters which means that some slight liberty may have to be taken with dates of events and some more minor characters may have to be cut out or combined.

Everything from the Music of the Ainur to the start of the Siege of Angband should be covered and condensed into a 15 minure intro to the first movie, leaving many details out to draw the viewers interests and be discovered as the films progress eg Finrod and Amarie love story.

The first movie proper after the intro should begin with the Battle of Sudden flame and the death of Fingolfin in his fight with Morgoth. This can then lead perfectly on too the Beren and Luthien. We have Movie 1. In this film the relationship between Beren and Hurin and his brother can be made more significant, as if they actually are friends. This is because a movie cannot have whole random lists of characters with no relationship to one another. The first film will end with Luthien defeating Sauron and Hurin and Hour leaving for the Battle of Unnumbered Tears. The timeframe between these two events can be condensed and Turin and Tuor can be made a little older than in the book (instead of being just born older children eg 11 or 13) and be visible characters so that the end of this film can lead onto the second with continuity of main characters.

Movie two should begin with Beren and Luthien stealing the Silmaril from Morgoth and the remainder of that tale. It will deal with the tragedy of Unnumbered Tears and will follow the story of the two sets of cousins Turin and Tuor, continually shifting back to Hurin sitting on Morgoth's seat having to watch his family being torn apart. It will end with Tuor reaching Gondolin and Turin Nargothrond where he meets Finduilas.

Movie will begin again with a vision of Hurin still sitting on Morgoth's seat and will complete the tales of the Children of Hurin, the Fall of Gondolin and Beren and Luthien. It will involve Beren and Luthien giving birth to their child Dior and the Sack of Menegroth, Fall of Gondolin etc. It will end with Beren and Dior routing the Dwarves, Gondolin falling and Tuor and his family safely escaping. Dior will be crowned King of Doriath. It will show his death and the fall of Doriath but the survival of Elwing who will meet her future husband Earendil. The film can end with Earendil leaving on his ship and finding Valinor and petinioning to the Valar on behalf of Beren and Luthien, thus completeing the quest set up by his forefathers and Elwing's (Beren and Luthien, Tuor, Dior). In the final sequences of the movie there can be images of the final battle and the sinking of Beleriand.

A perfect trilogy in my POV but I know "puritans" won't like it, but we have to be realistic.

Zard0z

It would probably take a series of movies to convey the story properly...

I like Otto's idea of how to portray the Music of Auir.

Odo Banks

zard0z wrote:It would probably take a series of movies to convey the story properly...

I agree of course.

Eldorion

Odo Banks wrote:

zard0z wrote:It would probably take a series of movies to convey the story properly...

I agree of course.

A series is not nearly enough unless it's at least 6+ movies, largely unrelated and with mostly different characters....

Tuor and the Coming to Gondolin

This story, unfinished though it was is so magnificent a movie of stellar proportions could be made of it. But I think it would be great only if relatively unknown actors , English, Irish, Scottish etc were used. The immense talent that seems to come out of those places when given a chance is astounding.I saw a couple of times your Britain's got talent or whatever it was called. And the wonder of Paul Potts and that tiny lady, I usually remember her name just astound me. Completely faerie tale and wondrous. rags to riches. Such a wealth of talented people should be unearthed there and used for Tuor.

I think every country is the same, full of talented people who never get a chance, or just never find out what their talent is through lack of opportunity. Thats the sad thing. I agree Tuor would be epic cinema but how would you deal with the unfinished nature of it?

You are so right Petty(wait, was that me saying that?) It is sad. Oh right I just remembered the tiny person was Susan Boyle. She is much admired here in Canada.
How would you deal with the unfinished aspect? Well I have thought about it and there is some precident. I think of some of Hitchcock's work,like Rebecca, well others were in my mind, but I am exhausted so my Elven brain is stuck on zero right now. But one treatment could be the visionary one. Sometimes in a story you have the hero, heroine thinking , daydreaming as it were, as he or she moves on the path to ultimate destiny. One could have him after the coming to the great hall, lead there by the swans fall into a dream where he reaches his destiny and is greeted, and all he hopes and desires upon coming there, along with snatches of what has happened to him. Because in daydreams or visions when you finally get to the place intended you can safely leave off and let the reader or viewer take over and finish it in his or her own mind. I don't know, but something could be worked out because there is information in other works isn't there about the time after that time, could not one vaguely fill in the cracks in a noble way like Christopher himself so the integrity is there and the strong possibility based on previous of Tolkien's works suggesting this or that may have happened I don't know now. I shall have to think more clearly on this.

Now I may be completely off the mark with this one, and my reading of The Silmarillion, is well far from extensive, but owing to the fact I've spend years on various internet looking at LOTR things, was Tuor the one who got lost at sea? I remember someone telling me that he got lost at sea, but there is a more than good chance that I've misrembered that. But if it's true that could be a possible ending.



"English, Irish, Scottish"

Oh, and I feel obliged to stick up for the Welsh actors at this point! They can be good actors too y'know...sometimes at least!

Well the tale of Tuor in Unfinished Tales is really the start of a new and updated Fall of Gondolin of course, long prose version. So it's unfinished in that state. In a very very early state and within the context of The Book of Lost Tales it was 'basically finished' (long prose version), and also, as Leelee refers to, was 'finished' in Qenta Noldorinwa for example (relatively early short prose version).

As Leelee suggested I think one could use the 1977 Silmarillion (short prose) to finish the tale with respect to the major points (at least); and of course Tuor lives beyond the fall of that city, and ultimately there is a tradition that he sailed into the West and was accounted among the Eldar.

A nice enough 'ending'; but then there is Earendil...

Ah Earandil. Saradoc it was Veronwe, the awesome elf that was saved from shipwreck by Ulmo though all his beloved commrades did not make it. He was put upon the rocks outside the great hall that Tuor emerged from fully clad like his ancestors.Veronwe, exhausted in mind and body and knowing the absolute dangers of going in the surpising easterly direction obed Ulmo and took Tuor through the hazardous, orc infested trek,freezing in the abnormally frigid winter with little to eat save some way bread. When all hope had basically fled they met up with other elves and finally Veronwe met up with one of his comrades. It is a magnificent story. And in the long prose mentioned in the above post you do have Tuor coming finally after a series of unbelievable stone gates and elves in different livery to an open place where many of the residents of Gondolin including the King stood in amaze seeing Tuor garbed in rainment they themselves had seen so long ago and knew were still or were supposed to be still hanging on the wall near the high seat of the king. The movie could end on just that, for he had finished his initial quest, this quest itself alone stands as a complete story. Well to me it does at any rate.

Well, I think the fall of Gondolin would be spectalucar if done correctly! I feel like it's the most epic of all battles in Middle Earth! The absolute best vs. the absolute worse.

Agreed, Queen Tin...

Oooh... Earendil! I hope they get someun spunky to play him!

Did you not realise that this is somewhat of a sensible thread, Porgy... I don't think admiring exhultations about male characters is what's wanted here.