Forget about movies. Read the books! ;p

I saw the first two movies, but I never read the books.
The Hobbit, however, will be a different story. I read the book a while ago, so I should be familiar with what happens in the movie.

Actually try 4.

yeah, I know they're all 4 hours give or take, but because he specified over 2 hours, I increased it to over three.

also, Otaku, it should be noted that over 2 hours is a normal length fora big movie. I think that was the length of the theatrical releases. as Sleet said, the extended cuts are all around 4 hours, making the entire trilogy run over 12 hours.

Will there be extended cuts of the Hobbit movies, or does spreading one book over 3 movies make that unnecessary?

They're including stories from the Simarillion so I don't really know how big the extended cuts will be.

needless to say, anyone marathoning would need to separate the LotR trilogy from the Hobbit trilogy. Unless they have an entire day of free time.

I know that once they're all out on DVD, I will most definitely be giving a shot to watching all 6 of them in one sitting. Probably only if I can convince some friends to be stupid with me, though.

You'd have to plan all of the meals beforehand so you at least had something substantial to eat for the day, but I think it'd be awesome. Start off at midnight (maybe take a nap the afternoon/evening beforehand) with the usual popcorn and other junk foods. Cereal, oatmeal, and fruit for breakfast after the first two films or so. Break out some cheese/veggie platters and some pre-made sandwiches for lunch after the third film. Then about a half hour before the fifth movie ends, order some pizza or take-out Chinese or something and make a mad-dash to pick it up once the film is over. And then you've got dinner and leftovers from everything else for the last one.

Some theaters around Raleigh have been playing all three films in a marathon to take advantage of the buzz around "The Hobbit" coming out. I have a hard cover book with all three volumes of "The Lord of the Rings" in it. I have just started reading it. My mind keeps going to all the differences between it and the films.

I also have a copy of "The Hobbit". I really should read it.



It did not tell me anything that I did not already know.

I know that(still seems rather long though), but to watch a SERIES of 2 hour movies IN ONE GO is rather shocking...and rather impressive.

Nah fantasy literature isn't my thing. The books would probably serve as a good sleep aid though.

Exactly! And everyone imagines everything in a different way, depending on what details the author adds.

I watched an adaptation of H. P. Lovecraft's "Pickman's Model" and their characters looked nothing like how I imagined them. If anything they looked worse because the monster looked more like a large bipedal mouse instead of the canine like creatures described in the story.

Another good example is the film version of F. Paul Wilson's novel "The Keep". Michael Mann took that book in some really weird directions.

I read all the Narnia books and yeah, better than watching the few movies they actually made.

When I was in elementary school, one of my teachers read "The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe" to us, and I thought it was the greatest thing ever written.

It had talking animals and monsters! What's not to love?

I wish the sorcerer's nephew had a movie

The third Narnia movie didn't go over too well (partially because apparently they really butchered the book?), so I'm not sure if all seven will see movies. Which is a shame, because the first two movies were good.

I always have problems watching movie based on a book I read. Literature allow me to understand what the author truly meant, and by his work, I am able to use my imagination to see the world he created. The movie not only cuts parts or modifies something, but forces me to see director's suggestive point of view. That's why it's hard to find a really good movie truly based on a book.

I read the first book, but I wasn't a fan of the remaining novels. I didn't like the movie very much.

Did anyone else feel like the movie producers destroyed the last Harry Potter movie? What was up with that final fight scene?!

Well both forms of media have their own advantages and disadvantages. I always just go into book movies with tempered expectations.



I'd rather read something good.

They changed a good deal but I think they made good movies. The same goes for the 6th movie. The 5th was just pure butchery though.

i liked all these movies

Another medium that is worth mention: Audio Books.

I love audio books when they are done right. Reading books and watching films requires constant attention. You can't read a book without looking at the pages and you can't watch a movie without looking at the screen. Listening doesn't require as much focus, so I can multitask while listening to an audio book.

My favorite audio books are the ones for the Starcatchers series of books, which set a back story for Peter Pan and Captain Hook. They are done by the same man who did the Harry Potter audio books. He is absolutely fantastic at voicing the characters and giving them a unique personality.

Harry Potter never appealed to me. I just could not get into it.

Speaking of film adaptations that don't stick to the source material and suck, I was disappointed and mad at the "I Am Legend".

The novel "I Am Legend" is one of the best horror novels ever written. They basically just used the title and turned it into a vehicle for Will Smith to show off his "magnificence".

Gripe #1: The monsters in the novel were not screaming mutant things like from "28 Days Later". They were vampires. Like the title of the book implies, this book is about legends and the sources behind them. It is about rationalizing vampirism. The virus in the novel is one that has been with human kind for thousands of years, occurring in isolated incidents. The virus mutates to become more communicable. The protagonist of the novel goes through every legend concerning vampires and finds out why they work. Stakes cause massive organ damage that cannot be regenerated. Garlic causes allergic reactions. Sunlight poisons them. And, religious iconography causes hysterical blindness.

Gripe #2: The dog. It was nice that they gave him a Mad Max-style little buddy, but it defeats the isolation and paranoia of the book. The novel is about a man and his crushing loneliness. He finds a dog, but it is skiddish and shell shocked from running from the vampires, so Neville can't go anywhere near it. But, in a world where he has no one, that dog becomes the center of his universe. And, when it dies, he loses that much more hope.

Gripe #3: The ending. In the film, Neville finds a cure and becomes the new messiah for the survivors. Yet another way for Will Smith to pat himself on the back. The novel ends when Neville discovers that their are people who are infected with the vampire virus but keep it in remission with the use of drugs. During the day, when Neville hunts and stakes the vampires, he has been killing them too! And these people come after him to kill him. Before he dies, Neville realizes that in a world populated by vampires, the last human is the monster! He is the horrible thing that comes to kill them in their sleep. A creature that parents will tell their children will come and get them if they misbehave. He has become the thing of nightmares that will live on in stories. He is the new LEGEND. So they missed the point entirely to put a crappy happy ending on it.

There have been two other film versions. "The Omega Man" was as stupid and off point as the Will Smith film. The first time it was adaptation was "The Last Man On Earth" with Vincent Price. It has its flaws but it is the best adaptation,

Sleeeeeeeeet, this random fox wandered into this thread and told me that he's a fan of Peter and the Starcatchers, one of my favorite books. Can we keep him? I'll brush his fur every night and be really good to him and- *shot*

No, seriously, I read that book a few years ago and I still own a copy of it.

My friend's dad is all over audio books. I get the shivers at the smell of a brand new book and fresh pages, though. Although I'm slowly starting to read the classics on my iPod Touch every now and again.

Absolutely not. Foxes spread disease.

Are you wearing a hazard suit then, good sir?

Bu-but.. I don't spread diseases! D:

They actually shot an ending that's faithful to the novel's, but it was changed at the last minute because the suits thought their audience was braindead and would leave the theaters in flocks or something.

plus they smell funny and bring down property values.

I swear I shower every day.

And they eat the neighbor's chickens... and the neighbors.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oktUNoKCnmM



Once again, Hollywood messes everything up! Its a horror film! It does not need a happy ending!

You people should feel ashamed of yourselves; we've actually got a senior member coming back here, and you all are scaring him off.

It's okay my foxy friends! I still like you two!

*squirts Sleet with a water bottle and runs away giggling* Who smells funny now?

Hey guys, I got around the profanity filter! Watch! Bleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep, also, sorry for the bad joke

Sooooo...

You know you take your badminton way too seriously when your right leg has been hurting all day because of playing it too hard in gym.

It was worth it though. We ended up winning the final game on the King's court.

Orange soda for everyone!

Badmitton: Serious business


great now it smells like wet fox..............


I feel your pain. I wish the mainstream movie industry had the (geez what's a pg way to say this........) manly fortitutde to rip the audience's guts out every so often. Some movies are just more powerful with a bleak ending (American psycho comes to mind)

I'm not a huge fan of racquet sports. Whenever I go up to hit the ball/shuttlecock, I usually end up missing. And when I do hit it, it usually ends up out of bounds.

In other words, I suck.

I like badminton, not big on tennis, but I have fun at it.

When you mention bleak ending, I think of Woody Allen.

Well what's your point?
I suck at hockey and I've played that my whole life.