tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8020282.post110209465109392750..comments2023-10-24T04:51:33.141-07:00Comments on Ash Tree: CriticHenry Baumhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09222144871856444411noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8020282.post-1102353297879646182004-12-06T09:14:00.000-08:002004-12-06T09:14:00.000-08:00I have to admit I haven’t read the books. I’m sur...I have to admit I haven’t read the books. I’m sure the books are more multi-layered, they always are. People seem to think that the movies are too profound a statement, like those people who say that Harry Potter shows that our society is becoming more accepting of the occult. If that’s the case, then "Bewitched" is groundbreaking. <br /><br />CGI imagery seems like all of the cleverness without the soul. Everything is a spectacle, which I find alienating, as much as it is entertaining and impressive. I think those movies were successful because the "Star Wars" movies were so disappointing. I grew up on "Star Wars." I had the Death Star, played with the action figures. Natalia, you were in high school for the first LOTR? Man, I’m old. That second new "Star Wars" movie angered the shit out of me--all special effects detail, no meaning. Not that the original "Star Wars" movies were so meaningful, but they had spirit, they didn’t seem wholly mechanical. I get a similar feeling from LOTR, though not as bad.Henry Baumhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09222144871856444411noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8020282.post-1102321821494167042004-12-06T00:30:00.000-08:002004-12-06T00:30:00.000-08:00As a Tolkien nerd who was drawn into the whole thi...As a Tolkien nerd who was drawn into the whole thing by the first film (and largely disappointed by the second and third), I think it's the whole mythical aspect of the stuff that reaches out to me. It taps into my inner kid. It beguiles me, really. Thought it really is kind of a moral black-hole, as the sum of its parts. Some of the individual characters are more complex than others (and this is more true of the book), but all of them together in a pile just don't work as any kind of serious commentary on the issues the work deals with. <br /><br />Then again, there are some who prefer to see it from a religious point of view. And as for me, in my senior year of high school, when the first film hit and swept me away, the ring was a symbol of evil corporations.Nataliahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01995697364352031578noreply@blogger.com