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THE ESSENCE OF EVENTS

Peter Jackson's Adaptation of "The Fellowship of the Ring"

There are, inevitably, scenes which did not make it into the film in any form. Mostly, it is the wealth of small background details, insignificant to the plot, but an important part of the book’s rich atmosphere, which are lost. There is no mention of Lobelia, and no scene of the dwarves’ arrival at Bag End. I do not know whether they were present at the party, but if they were, I did not see them. Farmer Maggot is narrowly avoided, rather than visited.

One common factor of these small omissions is that they neither add to nor contradict the continuity of the main plot. Because of this, their non-existence on screen is not presented as a denial that these events actually occur. It is simply that there is no time or need to show them. We do not see the hobbits meet Elves within the Shire; but who is to say it doesn’t happen. In some respects it is best not to show this, because with only a short time on screen before Arwen appears, it could seem as if the wilderness has elves lurking behind every tree. Although Gimli does not visit Kheled Zaram, as the company exit Moria, the lake is visible in the distance. The hobbits cross the Brandywine in darkness and arrive at Bree on a rain-soaked night. Newcomers will assume that this is the same night, but this is not stated explicitly. Who knows what adventures the hobbits may have in the space of one edit?

And some things have been omitted for secrecy. In the journey down Anduin, there is no visible presence of a winged Nazgûl. On the page, descriptions can be foreboding but vague. On screen you must choose to show the effect in some form, or omit it. We have seen glimpses of Gollum. Winged Nazgûl will just have to wait.

Some omissions may not be lost forever. We can only comment on what we saw on screen, but as with most films, more was filmed than made it to the final cut. With a modern trend for directors revisiting their apparently completed works, some incidental material may be reinserted. It seems likely that future DVD releases will include more scenes at Lorien, most likely including the giving of gifts to the Fellowship. This is perhaps because those gifts will be revisited in the following film instalments.

However none of these omissions have significant impact on what Jackson calls the ‘A’ plot,8 the story of Frodo and the Ring. The most radical cut, in any terms, must be the loss of Tom Bombadil, together with the entire episodes of the Old Forest and the Barrow Downs. That these meanders on the way to Bree would slow the pace of the journey is undeniable, yet much of importance is contained in them. As for Tom Bombadil himself, my co-writer is more than happy to see the back of him, and I myself recognise that it would be nearly impossible to portray that ‘merry fellow’ convincingly on screen.* What actor, I wonder, would be so rash as to agree to play him, and run the risk of becoming a second Jar-jar Binks? With the added considerations of time, Tom was never realistically going to make it into the script.

Perhaps Tom himself is expendable, even though his resistance to the Ring adds some interesting dimensions to its role. However, the situations in which he plays a part are important, and in one case, crucial. The incident with Old man Willow foreshadows Fangorn, where the two young hobbits relate to Treebeard at least partly because they learned in the Old Forest, and from Tom, to respect the trees. Tom Bombadil’s house is a perfect blend between nature and civilised comfort, and the last place where Frodo knows unalloyed joy (for in Rivendell he is wounded, and the scar of the Witch-King’s knife never fully heals). Tom and Goldberry show the hobbits how magical a simple life can be; a vision eventually attained by the other hobbits, but never by Frodo, who returns home too emotionally damaged to attempt it.

The other episode, that of the Barrow-downs, may seem an equally inconsequential part of the journey. But what happens here in fact resonates through the rest of the book, particularly for one of the characters— Merry. We will return to him later.

* This section written by Christine

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