DVDizzy Forum

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April 2010

Whenever people ask me what the worst cinematic adaptation of all time is, I just point them towards this cinematic gem. Truly horrendous in every way, shape, and form.

I have no interest in seeing this, especially since I can just watch the extended versions of Peter Jackson's adaptations (Which should have been released on Blu-Ray instead of the theatrical editions).

SpringHeelJack wrote:Whenever people ask me what the worst cinematic adaptation of all time is, I just point them towards this cinematic gem. Truly horrendous in every way, shape, and form.

You must read a critique of the film I discovered years ago. It's hilarious. For example, the dramatic gesture the characters make involving raising their hands then squeezing them into fists and dropping them when the characters want to make a point is nicknamed 'milking the giant cow'.

Here's the critique:
http://flyingmoose.org/tolksarc/bakshi/bakshi.htm

It's hard to pick one favorite WTF thing listed in the critique but here are four of my favorites:

4. Late '70s Hair.
Everybody in this movie has unspeakably big hair. Pounds and pounds and pounds of it. I swear, I keep waiting for Gandalf to fall over under the sheer weight of it. And Saruman... it's perhaps better not to even talk about Saruman. I mean, he shouldn't have even been able to stand up.

20. An Interesting Look.
Once Frodo recovers from the wound of the Morgul-knife, there's a scene where he lies in bed while Gandalf tells him of his escape from Isengard. At the very end of the scene, Gandalf leans over Frodo and tells him to rest. Intriguingly, Frodo turns away from Gandalf and looks directly into the camera, his eyes curiously tortured and beseeching. It's almost as if he's saying to the audience: "Please, please find a way to get me out of this ludicrous movie."

31. The Balrog.
- It has big red-and-black wings, kind of like a Monarch butterfly.
- It has the head of a big stuffed lion.
- It has big silly-looking feet. In fact, the Balrog is clearly wearing oversized fluffy bedroom-slippers.
...It's also noisy as hell, and makes a lot of big roaring Balrog-style noises. Obviously Bakshi had no access to Tolkien's Letters, particularly #210 to Forrest Ackerman:

"The Balrog never speaks or makes any vocal sound at all... [he] may think he knows more about Balrogs than I do, but he cannot expect me to agree with him."

Most curious, though, is this: unlike the original, Bakshi's Balrog can fly. This addition to the story raises an obvious question: if the Balrog can fly, why didn't it just fly back out of the chasm when Gandalf broke the Bridge?

50. Sam's Concern For His Master.
"After that?" Frodo asks sadly, when Sam asks about how they'll eat after reaching Mount Doom. "If the Ring goes into the Fire, and we're at hand? After that? Dear Sam! I wouldn't worry. Just to get there... just to get there! Oh, the Ring is so heavy now, Sam..." And Frodo casts his eyes downward, feeling again the acute weight of his burden.
After a moment Sam gets bored, stands up and begins to walk about whistling to himself.

So is this all three parts, or just the Fellowship and the Two Towers? The VHS is divided into two tapes The Lord of the Rings and The Return of the King. I hope the DVD won't be as well.

Widdi, the animated "film" "Lord of the Rings" in this case is a Cliffs Notes of a Cliffs Notes of "Fellowship" and "Two Towers". The animated "Return of the King" was made by a different team several years after the fact. It will presumably not be included here, unless by some weird shot it ends up as a special feature.

Sky Syndrome, I've actually seen that before! I love the "milking the giant cow". Agony Booth also does a much longer but very funny recap with various captioned screencaps. My favorite one is the scene where Gandalf is waltzing around Bilbo's house explaining the One Ring to Frodo, and beneath a picture of it, it says "Sauron may be the Lord of the Rings, but I am LORD OF THE DANCE!" It makes me giggle.

Out of sheer morbid curiosity, I watched the first half hour of this. OMG, I laughed so hard that my mom actually had to tell me to shut up. Everyone has really, really insane facial expressions. Milking the Giant Cow was just hilarious. And all of the hopping up and down that Frodo did when Gandalf walked in!? WTF!? It was one of those "so bad it's funny" things, or something you watch at 3 in the morning when you're sleep deprived and feel like everything's hilarious.

And the scene in the inn where the hobbits are rotoscoped and everyone else is just basically live-action.... There are simply no words....

Unfortunately (or is it fortunately?) I didn't stick around long enough to see the elves. They sounded pretty funny as described by the review Sky Syndrome posted.

Margos, if you ever feel like seeing something really long and terrible, you owe it to yourself to see the rest of the film. AND IN BLU-RAY! Now it's awfulness can be appreciated on a higher level.

Seriously, though, I can only imagine how more awful the jarringly bad rotoscoping will look in hi-def.

I did try to watch the rest, but YouTube kept freezing up. It stopped itself at around the point where the "Idiot Cousins" were complaining about the mosquitos and whining to "Herman" after the attack of the "Black Cheerleaders." It was as if my Internet Explorer was trying to say "NOOO! I refuse to let something this revolting be displayed upon my precious window!!!!"

*facepalm at Bakshi's LotR*

Seriously, it's not just bad as an adaptation of LotR, it's bad as a general movie, unlike Rankin-Bass's Hobbit and Return of the King (which may not be great adaptations of the books in terms of content) but at least they're enjoyable movies xD

Remastered Blu-Ray Edition of Bakshi’s ‘The Lord of the Rings’ Spins Tomorrow
https://www.animationmagazine.net/2025/ ... -tomorrow/