Seigneur des anneaux : Les Deux Tours (Le) (english version)
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The Two Towers
États-Unis, 2002
De Peter Jackson
Scénario : Philippa Boyens, Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh
Avec : Sean Astin, Orlando Bloom, Billy Boyd, Ian McKellen, Viggo Mortensen, John Rhys-Davies, Elijah Wood
Durée : 2h59
Sortie : 01/01/2002
The two towers, Orthanc and Barâd-Dûr, are united and their shadow is beginning to darken the world of men. The Fellowship of the Ring is broken but each of its surviving members has a destiny to accomplish in order for the Ring to be destroyed.
Once again, Peter Jackson is up to the task placed before him. Since the three films of the saga were shot together, it was doubtful there would be any major shift in tone or quality between each one of them, but there was still nonetheless a few reasons to worry. A lot of people consider The Two Towers to be the best of the three books but also the hardest to translate on screen. And Jackson delivers once more with an absolutely flawless adaptation that extracts the novel’s heart and soul and puts it on the silver screen in a completely cinematic fashion: lots of battles, but characters that still exist and are even more numerous than before. The movie is divided into two parts: the first follows the different storylines of each of the members of the disbanded Fellowship; and the other deals mainly with Helm’s Deep and the Ents’ assault on Isengard. And in the midst of this vast, blood-filled epic, each and every one of the characters never ceases to exist.
The Two Towers is entirely based on oppositions, duality, relationship between big and small. Everyone seems to be overwhelmed by the events that are unfolding before their eyes: the entire world is dislocating and the wheel of Destiny is slowly turning. We follow Grima with Théoden, then with Saruman; we see Gimli and Legolas become friends; Aragorn and Eowyn; and, above all, Frodo and Gollum, who himself is dual since he is both his twisted self and the former Hobbit Sméagol. He’s constantly tortured by his needs, desires and schizophrenia. Gollum is the most powerful, human and heart-breaking character of the movie. The work of Andy Serkis (as Gollum’s voice) and Weta for his CG incarnation is masterful.
Tolkien’s spirit infuses the entire picture. How could he not be proud of his world’s representation on screen ? The ruin of a people, the end of an era, genocide and chaos are at the heart of The Two Towers where the struggle for power takes an all too realistic roads that remind us of our own cynical world. Rarely before has war, the fear of fighting, confusion or suffering been conveyed so convincingly on screen. Even the most realistic of movies don’t show these things with such power. You constantly feel throughout the movie the desire for a true unity with nature, a real understanding between people that contrasts violently with the individualism and harsh industrialisation that Saruman is rooting for.
The way in which Peter Jackson tells his story truly deserves applause. Starting from the very first shot of the film (which is quite surprising), the movie is an enterprise conducted with the utmost respect and talent. The movie gets darker and darker has it advances in its storyline, and is frequently shot through with moments of pure cinematic genius. As opposed to, for example, Harry Potter, The Two Towers is not an adaptation that stays stupidly faithful to the novel, just for the sake of being faithful; it’s a real auteur’s point of view on Tolkien’s masterpiece. The editing flows in the smoothest of ways from one storyline to the next and each actor seems to be truly living his part through.
Bigger, better, more beautiful, more exciting than The Fellowship of the Ring. Words are not enough to convey the absolutely stunning quality of The Two Towers. Peter Jackson's achievement is just plain breathtaking. Never before has someone put on the screen such pure, unaltered beauty. And one can only worry what will happen after The Return of the King is released next year: will we have anything left to dream about then ?
