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Elarie
Grey Havens
Jun 25 2015, 12:17am
Post #76 of 82
(850 views)
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That was fantastic! 
__________________
Gold is the strife of kinsmen,
and fire of the flood-tide,
and the path of the serpent.
(Old Icelandic Fe rune poem)
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Michelle Johnston
Rohan
Jun 25 2015, 5:24am
Post #77 of 82
(839 views)
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The Waterfall is in the North Eastern corner
The Eagles are flying from the North East with the Keep and the Signals on their left side as they fly over.
The army is approaching from the South West adjacent to the frozen river and unlike wonderful battle sequences in films like Sparticus or Tolkiens literature the 2nd army is a threat only by virtue of its existence rather than appearing to be part of an integrated battle plan. Sir Ian's lines on the subject do not constitute that and are undermined by being factually incorrect.
I am done with this because whilst you previously indicated you were not inclined to disagree with my interpretation which is crucial to understanding the dramatic implications of certain decisions the film makers made you have gone back to square one again. Your privilege but i am not learning anything about the story making but once again your desire for bait and twist debate.
My Dear Bilbo something is the matter with you! you are not the same hobbit that you were.
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Spriggan
Tol Eressea
Jun 25 2015, 4:34pm
Post #78 of 82
(826 views)
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Well the waterfall is on the Eastern edge of Ravenhill, North of the towers and South of the staircases where the dwarves fight the mercenaries (which is the real corner)
But I'm not sure what odds that makes.
http://www.artofvfx.com/...BIT3_WETA_ITW_08.jpg
This shows all the parties and (I thought) we agreed that Thorin's back and the edge of the waterfall face East so I'm not sure how else to interpret it (or how we get anywhere near Bolg coming from the South). But perhaps mine eyes deceive me.
I remain as perplexed as ever at the vast ire that me not sharing all of your interpretations seems to create.
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Michelle Johnston
Rohan
Jun 26 2015, 3:17pm
Post #79 of 82
(812 views)
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Definition of remote & further positioning clarification
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I think you may have taken my remark about remoteness as regards Ravenhill in the context of its relative position to the Erebor Gate returning it to the book location. If I may let me clarify this because it bares on the story telling.
I thought moving Ravenhill to its film location had positive story telling potential.
I also felt using it as the scene for the final denouement between Thorin and the antagonist was excellent.
Where they in my view made two errors :-
1) Was to make the third film location open sided from the South West side of the Ravenhill footprint so that random antagonists could arrive at will or not which lacked credibility and deflected from the crescendo.
I think the Ravenhill should have been a remote inaccessible location to arrive at from its base, both East and South, extremely difficult but possible to reach from the Western Spur it is attached to which would explain how Azog and a handful of scouts arrived un detected and only really accessible from the corner where the waterfall is frozen. Thorin rides up and appears on the right-hand of the screen on the side of the waterfall that is connected with the ruins on the westside of the Ravenhill footprint with the western spur ridges behind falling toward the remains. You see Azog on the signals looking down to his left (the north) watching Thorins arrival. That single entrance would have given dramatic focus and made the disappearance of Azog and his pals even more mysterious. The emphasis should have been on high up remote location full of mystery. It turns into Piccadilly Circus.
2) By placing the second army marching towards the Ravenhill ice sheet.
This has no tactical credibility. This army has swept down from the North passed the Mountain in secret on the westside. The obvious place to mass and make its attack is from the ridge that Thranduil appears on in the prologue which is North of the Ravenhill. The army could have swarmed down, cut off the Ravenhill and taken out Dains flank and driven a wedge between Dale and the remaining free peoples army. Indeed they would have been able to dash into Erebor from that position with Dain committed further South in the basin. Now thats not the story of the book but I am describing the failure of the internal logic of what we received so geography and all sorts of things would have needed to be altered to produce a cohesive and fascinating battle story like the fifth battle of the Ist Age with its ebbing and flowing and surprises.
For me this "failure" is like placing moons and suns in nice cinematographic locations which have no logic. The reason this army from the North went South of the Ravenhill and came in from the South West was merely for visual impact during the double death scene.
O S I do appreciate you tend to reference these matters by using the tie in books and compare the choices made against the book itself. In order to get the geography right for the story telling I use multiple reference points in the movies. The reason I use multiple reference points is because perspective changes very quickly when for instance a character stands still but the camera moves significantly in relation to the stationary object.
My apologies to you and others if I appear to become strident about certain matters. We can all have opinions about whether we like a portrayal or a storyline but when dialogue is wrong or contradictory or a story is left unfinished rather than left dramatically ambiguous those are finite points. Just as the placement of the Waterfall.
If anyone is left following the arcane argument about the foot print of the Ravenhill freeze frame the 2D version at 1.31.00, 1.32.13 and 1.32.16. The two sets of ruins one which includes the signals and the waterfall make it absolutely clear the geographic placement.
Finally if some one walks or flys by some thing for several hundred yards which is on its left and remains in the same relationship through out whilst it is flying or walking toward the West it means what they have passed is the South. So if the building they are flying by on their left is on the East then which way are they flying …..
Have a great weekend Tennis for two weeks.
I would have liked to see :-
1) A genuinely remote Ravenhill which a handful of the antagonists troops took over by stealth.
Ravenhill's original location does not provide a good tactical position for the Battle of Five Armies. It was a watch post; a watcher stationed there would have probably sent a raven back to report on a sighting.
My Dear Bilbo something is the matter with you! you are not the same hobbit that you were.
(This post was edited by Michelle Johnston on Jun 26 2015, 3:19pm)
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Otaku-sempai
Immortal
Jun 26 2015, 4:13pm
Post #80 of 82
(803 views)
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Keep in mind that I don't presently have a physical copy of the movie to reference; I have to rely on secondary sources. I see that you and I are not using 'remote' in quite the same way. Yes, Jackson could have isolated it more and made the approach more difficult while keeping it closer to the main battle.
It would be hard to march troops across a ridge, that is why Tolkien had the Orcs sweep around the spurs of the Mountain to attack from the east (although some actually did attack from the ridge-lines). However, you make an interesting point that there seems to be no reason why Bolg couldn't have had his forces approach from around the western side of the Mountain, which would have actually had them approach from the south-west. It still makes some tactical sense to have the goblin mercenaries coming over the ridge (and perhaps making use of the ice sheet).
"At the end of the journey, all men think that their youth was Arcadia..." - Phantom F. Harlock
(This post was edited by Otaku-sempai on Jun 26 2015, 4:27pm)
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Spriggan
Tol Eressea
Jun 26 2015, 4:21pm
Post #81 of 82
(799 views)
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The back of the ridge is much flatter
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Than the front in the films. It seems a relatively gentle gradient, which is allowing Bolg's army to approach (from the West!)
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Michelle Johnston
Rohan
Jun 28 2015, 10:41am
Post #82 of 82
(782 views)
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"And all things were in hue and shape other than the Valar Intended"
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I picked up on your point about the plausibility of Bolg's army marching over the Western Spur and referenced the Thranduil ridge moment Ist Film 08.23 and concluded it would not be any more difficult than Dains intervention on the opposite side or the Gandalf and Eomer at H.D. However I then ran the same scene looking up toward the ruined Ravenhill Keep in the third film where Thranduil is in a magnificent battle scene.(1.13.22 ) and noted the ridge that Thranduil had appeared on was now the summit of a hostile snow capped mountain ridge! So curiously enough in order to give credibility to the 2nd armies entrance further south the film makers have changed the geography. My apologies to Morgoth and the Valar whose intervention I had not noted. 
In trying to find that scene I came across another tracking shot at 1.16.56. You see Dale and the Ravenhill in this topography the waterfall is hidden behind the back of the signals which is consistent with 1.13.22 where it is at a 45 degree angle to the leading edge of the keep, rather than abutting the keep as it appears in the death throes scene. However the river flowing into the ice sheet is entirely absent and the topography looks nothing like that behind Azog in the denouement fight. !
I think the CGI is used like a series of moving paintings exaggerating perspective to make an artistic point rather than having a legitimate internal coherence. Thats not wrong and most would not notice it but it is entirely at odds with Tolkien who in the air graphs to Christopher in spring of 1944 would indicate his wrangling over detail to give this wonderful world a sense of realism through its internal logic.
I remain of the view that in story telling terms the Ravenhill should have been remote high up with only a handful of protagonists and the only late entrant should have been Bilbo warning Thorin of the strategic trap that a 2nd force is about to surround the Ravenhill which is fascinatingly what he actually says though the army would simply march over the ice sheet and occupy it rather than surround it from the Erebor side.
I will be interested in the winter when you have your EE to read your thoughts.
My Dear Bilbo something is the matter with you! you are not the same hobbit that you were.
(This post was edited by Michelle Johnston on Jun 28 2015, 10:45am)
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