I'm a bit late to this thread, but I thought I'd comment because I just got around to seeing the movies in full. Jackson's
Fellowship I found utterly appalling; his
Towers was somewhat better, and I was able to actually enjoy
The Return of the King. Or maybe I was just de-sensitized to the changes in the story as I kept watching.
The bottom line: the films contain abundant evidence that Jackson & co. either did not understand, or else chose to ignore many facets of, Tolkien's trilogy.
What Jackson omitted from the films is mostly forgivable. With the constraints presented by the time limits and the medium of film, I can understand the elimination the Old Forest or the scouring of the Shire at the end. What is less forgivable are the additions. Seriously: would Frodo actually dismiss Sam at
Gollum's bidding? And would Sam actually leave at that point? And the added scenes of Arwen with Aragorn and Arwen with Elrond--horrendous. And one other example: Isn't there enough battle and drama in the story to make Aragorn's "near death experience" in Jackson's
Towers a bit over the top?
What's more, the films almost totally miss the flashes of humor that appear in the books, even in some serious moments. And that makes the movies ponderous and stilted in a way the books never are. To take one example: in the film version of the council of Elrond, it is Legolas who confronts Boromir about Boromir's snubbing of Aragorn. In the book, of course, it's Bilbo who first defends Aragorn. And that scene, for all its tension, is funny, because here's a little old hobbit jumping up to defend the rightful king of Gondor and Arnor. Heck, even Aragorn chuckles at it. When an elf-prince comes to Aragorn's defense, though, all the humor is lost.
And then there are the character distortions. Glorfindel of Gondolin nailed most of them--an amazing feat, given that he fell two ages before the War of the Ring.
Of the ones Glorfindel mentioned, the ones that bothered me most were Frodo and Faramir. In the movies, Frodo is pretty much on the verge of swooning and giving the Ring to the Nazgul the whole time, and he is made an idiot. Which is totally unlike him: of the four hobbits, Frodo does emerge as the least valiant in battle, but he also emerges as by far the wisest. And Faramir was totally defamed, which not only disappointed me bitterly (he is perhaps my favorite character in the trilogy), but it also obscured the Boromir/Faramir contrast which provides an important subplot in the book.
To the list of painfully distorted characters I would add Treebeard, Elrond, and Aragorn. Why did Jackson think it would take Treebeard more than a moment to distinguish Merry and Pippin from Orcs? Or that Elrond frankly despised just about everyone except his daughter? And Aragorn--aside from candidly acknowledging "Isildur's fault," would you have gleaned from the books that he is deeply ashamed of his lineage and carries a paralyzing fear of its effects on himself?
But I'd better stop writing now, or else I'll just get too worked up.
<----- <goes off muttering and :cuss: >
“Doubt no longer, then, when you see death mocked and scorned by those who believe in Christ, that by Christ death was destroyed . . .”
Athanasius