# Tolkien Estate Disavows Film Starring Nicholas Hoult



## CirdanLinweilin (Apr 23, 2019)

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2...vows-forthcoming-film-starring-nicholas-hoult

Well, this seems interesting!

CL


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## Ithilethiel (Apr 26, 2019)

CirdanLinweilin said:


> https://www.theguardian.com/books/2...vows-forthcoming-film-starring-nicholas-hoult
> 
> Well, this seems interesting!
> 
> CL



Are any of us really that surprised? I love the quote by CT...so spot on and very sad.

Thanks CL...


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## CirdanLinweilin (Apr 26, 2019)

Ithilethiel said:


> Are any of us really that surprised? I love the quote by CT...so spot on and very sad.
> 
> Thanks CL...


True.



And welcome.


CL


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## Desert Loon (Apr 30, 2019)

I'm still trying to decide if I want to see it. Honestly, the way big studios tend to make movies, I almost think that as long as it doesn't put in a sex scene it'll be okay.


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## CirdanLinweilin (Apr 30, 2019)

Desert Loon said:


> I'm still trying to decide if I want to see it. Honestly, the way big studios tend to make movies, I almost think that as long as it doesn't put in a sex scene it'll be okay.


I don't think I will, I don't need to see Catholicism beat into the mud by Hollywood yet again, with the poor man as their vehicle. If you see it, post on here and give us a fair review!


CL


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## Erestor Arcamen (Apr 30, 2019)

The Chair of the Tolkien Society, Shaun Gunner, saw the biopic and has posted a review in this Twitter thread. It's an interesting read. Sounds like they took some artistic liberties when they filmed.


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## CirdanLinweilin (Apr 30, 2019)

Erestor Arcamen said:


> The Chair of the Tolkien Society, Shaun Gunner, saw the biopic and has posted a review in this Twitter thread. It's an interesting read. Sounds like they took some artistic liberties when they filmed.


Thanks Erestor.




CL


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## Gloer (May 2, 2019)

But of course they do. They disavow to make certain there is no room to interpret that the movie has a "seal of approval" which it of course should not have. I am cerrtain Tolkien estate would be unable to create a biopic of Tolkien that could get their seal of approval. So how can anyone else!

Nevertheless, this movie is bound to be better than anything filmed of Tolkien so far.


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## Rivendell_librarian (May 11, 2019)

I've seen the film. There are many distortions as expected and Tolkien's Christian faith is downplayed - also expected. Father Francis Morgan isn't portrayed as a stuffy monster which was a relief. Lily Collins is beautiful but then so was Edith Bratt. They were bound to make a lot of Edith dancing in the woods but it is an important part of their joint story. It mainly covers Tolkien's time in school and university in flashbacks from the WW1 trenches - graphically depicted (similar to but not as good as Kubrick's Paths of Glory). 

There's a lovely coda of Tolkien encouraging the mother of his schoolfriend, Geoffrey Smith, to publish his poetry (_A Spring Harvest_) for which Tolkien offered to write a foreword - and Derek Jacobi as his Oxford philology Professor always adds to any drama. 

So don't look for an accurate portrayal here. But if you lay that aside it's better than a lot of the pap you see in cinemas these days.

_A Spring Harvest_ is available online:
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/48371/48371-h/48371-h.html


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## Ithilethiel (May 11, 2019)

Rivendell_librarian said:


> I've seen the film. There are many distortions as expected and Tolkien's Christian faith is downplayed - also expected. Father Francis Morgan isn't portrayed as a stuffy monster which was a relief. Lily Collins is beautiful but then so was Edith Bratt. They were bound to make a lot of Edith dancing in the woods but it is an important part of their joint story. It mainly covers Tolkien's time in school and university in flashbacks from the WW1 trenches - graphically depicted (similar to but not as good as Kubrick's Paths of Glory).
> 
> There's a lovely coda of Tolkien encouraging the mother of his schoolfriend, Geoffrey Smith, to publish his poetry (_A Spring Harvest_) for which Tolkien offered to write a foreword - and Derek Jacobi as his Oxford philology Professor always adds to any drama.
> 
> ...



Thanks for the review Rivendell_librarian. I've read numerous online reviews and knew Tolkien's faith was greatly underplayed in the movie. It's similar in the CS Lewis movie, _Shadowlands. _That was a beautifully filmed and acted movie that I enjoy even though we are somewhat led to believe that Joy Gresham's death caused a break in Lewis' faith. It did not. 

I could forgive it in _Shadowlands _because it was less the theme of the movie. But for Tolkien his faith played a major role in his writings. You cannot separate the two. Did the movie not examine this? And if so, what did they use as the impetus of his storytelling if not his faith? Thanks!


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## Rivendell_librarian (May 11, 2019)

The film uses an accurate quote from his schoolfriend, Geoffrey Smith, as an implied motivating factor:

_My chief consolation is that if I am scuppered tonight there will still be left a member [of our School group] to voice what I dreamed and what we all agreed upon. For the death of one of its members cannot, I am determined, dissolve [the group]. Death can make us loathsome and helpless as individuals, but it cannot put an end to the immortal four! May God bless you my dear John Ronald and may you say things I have tried to say long after I am not there to say them if such be my lot_

Geoffrey Smith was killed at the Somme. The film shows Tolkien looking for him in the trenches even though Tolkien was going down with trench fever. I don't know how accurate that is.

But, the film only goes very briefly into his time as an Oxford professor (and only as a young man with small children). There's no Inklings or C S Lewis so maybe one shouldn't expect too much analysis of the gestation of his writings. One couldn't help notice a similarity between WWI no man's land and Mordor but the film did not make that connection explicit. There was an odd parallel between a German flame thrower attack and a PJ style Balrog! (to appeal to PJ fans I would think).

However, I think this film would provoke some people to read, say John Garth's _Tolkien and the Great War_ (or the letters) in the way that PJ's films provoked people to read Tolkien (again).


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## Ithilethiel (May 12, 2019)

Rivendell_librarian said:


> The film uses an accurate quote from his schoolfriend, Geoffrey Smith, as an implied motivating factor:
> 
> _My chief consolation is that if I am scuppered tonight there will still be left a member [of our School group] to voice what I dreamed and what we all agreed upon. For the death of one of its members cannot, I am determined, dissolve [the group]. Death can make us loathsome and helpless as individuals, but it cannot put an end to the immortal four! May God bless you my dear John Ronald and may you say things I have tried to say long after I am not there to say them if such be my lot_
> 
> ...



Thank you for your thorough reply. I imagine it would be difficult for a film to encompass the entirety of the Professor's prolific and extraordinary life. Still, I believe the story would have been more authentic if his faith had at least been examined in part. 

I just don't understand why faith, particularly Christian faith is such a taboo subject. Perhaps it is best screenwriters with jaded views of Christianity do not attempt to write of things they do not fully understand. If the film spurs individuals to dig deeper to discover the true Tolkien than I imagine it is in some small way a success. Thank you again.


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## Rivendell_librarian (May 12, 2019)

It's all part of our post Christian age. Da Vinci's Last Supper is discussed in terms of its preservation or as a lad's night out or the da Vinci code, and the religious significance of the event portrayed is often ignored.


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## Kolbitar (May 12, 2019)

I’m not sure we can ever expect any exemplary and untainted work, in particular one about a man like Tolkien, in this postmodern age—but I found the film to be an opportunity to fellowship with my Inkling-esque friends and drink in a fresh draught of something like what resembles a lovely, if faded dream—although perhaps it was more like looking into Galadriel’s mirror, or Sarumen’s palantir-sans-will, with shadows and glimpses of what might have been, knowing that much of it wasn’t—none-the-less, the honor it did by preserving memory of the TCBS as something valuable to the great author, even though his faith was paramount, was nice. It could have been great. It was inaccurate. But it was nice,


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## Ithilethiel (May 13, 2019)

Rivendell_librarian said:


> It's all part of our post Christian age. Da Vinci's Last Supper is discussed in terms of its preservation or as a lad's night out or the da Vinci code, and the religious significance of the event portrayed is often ignored.



You are so right. Mores the pity...thanks again


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## Squint-eyed Southerner (Oct 5, 2019)

I don't know why, but this review just popped up on my newsfeed:





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<em>Tolkien</em>: Biopic of author J.R.R. Tolkien rings false


The film about the author of <em>The Hobbit</em> and <em>The Lord of the Rings</em> oversimplifies the impact of World War I on the author.



www.wsws.org





Leaving aside the platform, it seems to jibe with the concensus of judgments -- although it's a bit odd to be publishing a review at such a late date.

I still haven't seen the film, but the article criticizes the lack of coverage of the postwar period, and its effects on Tolkien's writing. I guess that's a fair point, but where, exactly, does the film end, chronologically? 

Of course, the oversimplification of the origins of the legendarium comes in for the usual criticisms, but as a couple of the comments point out, that's what biopics do, in order to make a complex process "easier to understand". I don't happen to think audiences are necessarily so simpleminded, but what do I know? I'm not a movie producer, and it's a film convention with a long history -- although it gives the impression that screenwriters have about as much insight into historical origins and motivations as Herodotus. You'd think scriptwriters would have come a little further than that, over a couple of millenia.  

One other thing: the review mentions everyone, including Tolkien, being "surprised" by the outbreak of war but wasn't that pretty much the case? Europe had been obsessed with maintaining a "balance of powers" since the end of the Napoleonic Wars, and it had worked fairly well through the 19th century -- at least to the extent of preventing a continent-wide conflagration -- and the concensus seemed to be that a major war was becoming increasingly impossible. This was wrong, of course, and I recall a history professor saying that by the turn of the century, a truer image would have been a complex of "coiled springs", which the least misstep could set off -- as indeed happened.

Well, that's OT, so over to you; who else has now seen it?


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## CirdanLinweilin (Oct 5, 2019)

Squint-eyed Southerner said:


> although it gives the impression that screenwriters have about as much insight into historical origins and motivations as Herodotus.


I understood that reference.



CL


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## Squint-eyed Southerner (Dec 27, 2019)

*Bump*

Anyone else here seen it yet?

At any rate, the reviews can at least be seen as more positive, over all, than those for the new "Cats" movie -- on that one, one critic said "If this was shown on an airplane, I'd still walk out"!


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## CirdanLinweilin (Dec 27, 2019)

Squint-eyed Southerner said:


> At any rate, the reviews can at least be seen as more positive, over all, than those for the new "Cats" movie -- on that one, one critic said "If this was shown on an airplane, I'd still walk out"!


Oh.....dear....... 😲💀☠



CL


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## Olorgando (Dec 28, 2019)

Squint-eyed Southerner said:


> Anyone else here seen it yet?


No, and it's probably not in any cinemas here by now, possibly since a long time.
I might buy the DVD, if they produce one. I mean, I have a bit more than a handful of books by Daniel Grotta and David Day (and some spoofs, entirely about "The Hobbit" - only an excerpt from "Bored of the Rings") mostly from the early 1990s (100th birthday) that are looked down on disdainfully by serious JRRT scholars - often rightly so. So why not this?
I have a dim memory (though I have not found the posts in those other sites) that the scene mentioned by Rivendell_librarian above - "Geoffrey Smith was killed at the Somme. The film shows Tolkien looking for him in the trenches even though Tolkien was going down with trench fever. I don't know how accurate that is." (probably Baloney Slices, for tons of practical reasons) - was meant to imply, by the understanding of a member of another site, as being the germ of LoTR, and perhaps TH. JRRT had done some "Kullervo" stuff (from the Finnish Kalevala) by then, he didn't really get started on the Sil until after returning to England a while after the Battle of the Somme in 2016. TH was created beginning when he was a four-fold father, after Priscilla's birth in 1929. Even John, the eldest, was not born until November 1917. LoTR, begun twenty years after John's birth, was an amalgamation of TH and The Sil, that JRRT had been working on for just about those twenty years. No "visions" during a battle where he was, apparently in the film, in a place he could never have reached in real life (and in that, he only learned of G.B. Smith's death quite a bit after the fact, IIRC).


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## Squint-eyed Southerner (Dec 28, 2019)

It doesn't seem to have been big enough for a pitch meeting -- but here's the one for Cats:


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## Miguel (Dec 28, 2019)

Haven't seen it yet but as i said before, i think this world works better in traditional animation but that's just me. I'm up for some live action with the show though.


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## 1stvermont (Dec 28, 2019)

I will not watch it for this reason. I also herd they removed his faith totally.


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## Miguel (Dec 28, 2019)

Books are king regardless, we'll live.


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## Shieldmaiden of Rohan (Dec 29, 2019)

I have watched the Tolkien biopic and wonder how much artistic freedom was taken. Watching it I felt that most things didn’t happen like that, it felt too much like the storyline was written for a movie but then I do not know so much about Tolkien’s life yet. Can anybody enlighten me?


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## Olorgando (Dec 29, 2019)

There is already a discussion of that topic in another thread:









Tolkien Estate Disavows Film Starring Nicholas Hoult


https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/apr/23/tolkien-estate-disavows-forthcoming-film-starring-nicholas-hoult Well, this seems interesting! CL




www.thetolkienforum.com





You might want to check that out.


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## Erestor Arcamen (Dec 29, 2019)

Merged the threads since it's the same topic 😁


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## 1stvermont (Dec 29, 2019)

Shieldmaiden of Rohan said:


> I have watched the Tolkien biopic and wonder how much artistic freedom was taken. Watching it I felt that most things didn’t happen like that, it felt too much like the storyline was written for a movie but then I do not know so much about Tolkien’s life yet. Can anybody enlighten me?








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J.r.r. Tolkien: A Biography [Carpenter, Humphrey] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. J.r.r. Tolkien: A Biography



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Amazon.com: The Letters Of J.r.r. Tolkien: 9780618056996: Tolkien, J.R.R.: Books


Amazon.com: The Letters Of J.r.r. Tolkien: 9780618056996: Tolkien, J.R.R.: Books



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Amazon.com: The Inklings: 9780007748693: Carpenter, Humphrey: Books


Amazon.com: The Inklings: 9780007748693: Carpenter, Humphrey: Books



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## Starbrow (Jan 19, 2020)

I watched the biopic today. It was better than I thought. I know their was "artistic license" taken with the movie, but I enjoyed it.


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## Þráinn Þórhallsson (Jan 20, 2020)

Ithilethiel said:


> Thanks for the review Rivendell_librarian. I've read numerous online reviews and knew Tolkien's faith was greatly underplayed in the movie. It's similar in the CS Lewis movie, _Shadowlands. _That was a beautifully filmed and acted movie that I enjoy even though we are somewhat led to believe that Joy Gresham's death caused a break in Lewis' faith. It did not.
> 
> I could forgive it in _Shadowlands _because it was less the theme of the movie. But for Tolkien his faith played a major role in his writings. You cannot separate the two. Did the movie not examine this? And if so, what did they use as the impetus of his storytelling if not his faith? Thanks!



I have actually always been a bit confused regarding Tolkien's statement regarding fate and his writing. On one hand his says ''I am a Christian that should be apparent from my writing'' and one the other hand he apparently hated metaphors and allegories and came up with a lot of his fantasies as a way of escaping the real world as opposed to make him care more about the real world during difficult times in his life which the movie actually portrays very well.

Regardless I actually prefer Tolkien's work to that of writers like C. S. Lewis and Philip Pullman because unlike those guys his writing never came of as propaganda for his associate world view.


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## Olorgando (Jan 20, 2020)

I read a fairly detailed comment on the biopic on another site which definitely made me decide to give the biopic a pass.
The bit about JRRT, injured and accompanied by his batman Sam, stumbling around the battlefield of the Somme looking for R.Q. Gilson (?), his close friend from the TCBS at King Edward's School in Birmingham who was killed on the first day of action of that battle, 01 July 2016. Both "Sam" and the stumbling around are pure Baloney Slices, as is the apparent implication that he got (hallucinated?) parts of what was to become LoTR at the time.

As some people have difficulty distinguishing between biopic and documentary (not that the latter need be totally accurate, they can also be highly misleading by selection of what to depict and what not), I can imagine urban legends springing up as this being the inspiration of the book … 💩


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