Original Desmond

http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0077869/

is it any good ?

PixyJunket

Not I.. but I'd like to sometime.

DGibFen

I hated them. Bluth compressed so much material in so short of a time.

And he was angry, from what I can remember, about not being asked to help with the Jackson-directed movies.

caligulathegod

I kind of like the Pop Art style of Bakshi's version. I even like the rotoscoping. There's lots of annoyance things for fans, like mispronouncing almost all the names, but it's still pretty close to faithful. It ends right about the same place PJ's Two Towers ends, but without the Ents storming Isengard. The voice of Gollum is Peter Woodthorpe who also did the well-regarded BBC radio version. PJ did use a couple shots from it, like Proudfoot's feet on the table as he yelled, "PROUDFEET!" and also the Wraith's first encounter with Frodo over tree roots.

DonnachaOne

You mean Bakshi, right?

Damn, a Bluth version would be AWESOME.

mllefoo

Hated it. If you watch closely, you will see a rotoscoped Pope in one of the orc battle scenes. I thought the rotoscoping went way too far. Easily Bakshi's worst film. I'm just glad someone else finally did a *good* version of the story.

The Hobbit wasn't too bad, if you're into musicals. Plus the characters look kind of 70s funky.

DVD Polizei

It's Bakshi. Sooooo, what I mean is, if you're used to Bakshi's interpretations...well, you know.

Jepthah

I like many of Bakshi's movies, but this thing is an abomination. Ugly, boring, you name it and this movie suffers from it.

Some people like being contrarian and prefer it over the Jacksonian version because it's more 'faithful to the text.' I love Tolkien's books but I say...whatever.

Rivero

Awful. Absolutely awful. Not even good enough to watch for some laughs. Boromir looks like a Viking with a ridulous horned helmet and a dress. Legolas is the same height as Gimli. Saruman for some inexplicable reason is called 'Aruman'. Gandalf's staff looks like an old stick with a big blob of dried s*** on one end. The Balrog is a rotoscoped guy in a wet suit wearing a big lion's mask. Bakshi's career never quite recovered and lived up to it's initial promise after his cool movie Wizards, and this is the reason why. Awful in every sense of the word.

RoboDad

I love the critique found over at The Tolkien Sarcasm Page. One especially funny part (at least to me) is this description of the the encounter between Eomer's company of riders and the Orcs who had captured Merry and Pippin:

mike45

I saw it in the theater when it first came out. I thought it was terrible. Though, I never liked Bakshi's animation style.

Has anyone seen the Rankin and Bass version of "The Return of the King"? I never managed to see it. I avoided it because Rankin and Bass make children's cartoons. I know it's available on DVD.

rushmore223

The Bakshi Movie was AWFUL! The movie was actually only half of the story, but when it came out and tanked they decided not to make the second half. Later Rankin and Bass, who made the Hobbit animated (for TV?) went and tried to tie things up with a Return of the King animated tv movie. Pretty sad when Rankin and Bass TV Movie is sooo much better than Bakshi attempt.

Jepthah

The Rankin/Bass ROTK at least has its moments (some nice artwork and music here and there...I mean, you have to LOVE "Where There's A Whip There's A Way" for camp value alone), but it too is some rank shit.

However, I still am very fond of the R/B The Hobbit--partially perhaps out of sentimental value, but I really do especially love the voices--John Huston as Gandalf, Brother Theodore who gives Andy Serkis a run for his money as Gollum, Orson Bean, etc. The music is 'dated' but very charming to me, and the tale is still a fun one to watch.

mllefoo

There is one thing you need to understand about Bakshi: he winds up spending all his money up front, loses interest in the project about midway through, then cuts a lot of corners to finish the movie. He actually made Wizards somewhere in the middle of making Lord of the Rings because he got bored.

All that rotoscoping was sheer laziness. He took shots from Zulu, and a Pope visit, and drew over the film. Actually, he didn't even draw so much as he colored and added a few horns.

Anyway, you'll notice that Bakshi films, pretty much without exception, start off okay but then rapidly go downhill in quality near the middle of the film.

Seeker

The Hobbit: actually sort of fun, once you buy into it.

LOTR (Bakshi): starts out good, ends TERRIBLY (Bakshi definitely got bored).

ROTK (Rankin Bass): actually not a bad pinch hitter to finish LOTR by Bakshi. "Where there's a Whip" and "Frodo of the Nine Fingers" are actually fun little songs.


Final assessment: good enough to own on DVD (all three), for their novelty sake alone. Watch at least once so you can comment on them, then pop in for a few scenes now and then... I still really like "The Greatest Adventure" song in the hobbit...

Jason

And it was parodied so well in the recent South Park episode with Lemmiwinks the gerbil going... somewhere.

finbogg

Yeah, it's pretty crappy. I especially HATED the way they drew the orcs. Boromoir looks pretty stupid too, kind of like a Viking with a stupid fur vest. Yuck. The Hobbit cartoon is fantastic in comparison.

Seeker

haven't seen that - sounds like fun.

Jason

http://www.southparkstudios.com/down/guide.html?id=614

wendersfan

I've seen the Bakshi vesrion, a long time ago. I thought it was OK.

funkyryno

I first saw the Bakshi version when I was about five and I loved it then. For some reason it made a big impression on me. It was a cool movie for a kid. When I finally read the books about six years later, I pictured many of the characters as how I saw them in the movie *shudder*. I've since formed my own image of what the characters look like independent of by Jackson's and Bakshi's movie.

I saw Bakshi's movie about 5 years ago and realized that it was really just a big turd of a movie, although it does have some cool scenes. I like it now mostly for sentimental reasons and will probably add it to my DVD collection someday.

DGibFen

Yeah, that's what I meant. Thanks for pointing that out.

I haven't seen the Rankin/Bass ROTK yet, so I might rent that one this week.

Giles

it's an animated film, not a "Cartoon"

the only positive thing I can say is that I love the music score for Bakshi's version. Shore's score for the Jackson trilogy I can't stand.

Also in the Bakshi version. The watcher in the lake actually closes the door so as to suggest that it's its job to watch the door and close it, not destroy it as Jackson so vividly depicted. In the Bakshi version, it is interesting that Frodo actually decides the route through the snowy Mountains, as he put it "if Gandalf demands it?" essentially shrugging it off and placing the blame not himself but Gandalf's.

mwdkill

no the animated movie sucked so bad and i couldnt even stand to watch it.

DGibFen

[Tom Servo]It's not a comic book, it's a graphic novel[/Tom Servo]