Things Mike And I Talk About On Skype

[poliphilo]

Mike says he likes the Hobbit movie better than the Lord of the Rings movies because Bilbo is a proper character and Frodo is just a suffering cypher. I say that's how Tolkien wrote them. He says the only character that hooks him in Lord of the Rings is Boromir because he's conflicted and- besides- Sean Bean is a good actor. I say Bean was great as the butch trans-sexual in the Jimmy McGovern TV play last year; also as the bad guy in Red Riding. When that first came out, I say, I thought it was extreme and overblown but now, what with everything we've been learning about elite paedophile rings, I suspect it's only reflecting the truth. He says he has it recorded from when it first aired and he's been putting off watching it. If he watches it  he'll do it on his own because Su-Young doesn't dig dark stuff. They watch Branagh's Wallander together and she'll say things like- "Why doesn't he get out of that armchair and go to bed?" I say the TV series darkens up the books- sidelining themes like Wallander's troubled but ultimately cheering relationships with his father and daughter and the on-off girlfriend in Riga. He says...

Comments

[setsuled.livejournal.com]

I definitely agree on Bilbo coming off better in the new movie than Frodo did in the Lord of the Rings films, but not so much because one is a stronger character than the other (though I suppose that's probably true, too), but because Martin Freeman's performance is so much better than Elijah Wood's or Sean Astin's. As much as I do love the Lord of the Rings films, I never stopped feeling like Wood and Astin were a couple American kids pretending to be Victorian Englishmen. It just seems to come naturally to Freeman.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Freeman is a lovely actor. He was made to play Bilbo. Just as he was made to play Watson. He's become the go-to guy for Englishness.