Now matter how many times I watch it, when the Lord of the Rings music begins to play at the beginning of An Unexpected Journey, "it makes me want to cry".
Lord of the Rings is, to me, what Star Wars is to most people. My childhood can be summed up with Scooby Doo, Lord of the Rings, and Jurassic Park and reading more than should be humanly possibly along with the freedom to do as I pleased (which was basically watch those three and read and play with our animals). I fell in love with the world of Middle Earth, with the elves and the dwarves and the bad guys that got what they deserved. Fellowship of the Ring is one of my favorite movies and has been for nearly as long as Jurassic Park has been my favorite movie. Jurassic Park has been my favorite movie since I was four which should tell you how long I've been in love with these worlds and ideas. But that should also tell you how much I love Lord of the Rings. Those movies aren't short. They're frankly ridiculously long and I loved them enough to focus all the way through the extended edition of Fellowship of the Ring and even Two Towers. I've been watching them nearly as long as I can remember, and remember I was like six when Fellowship came out and I don't even remember watching it the first time. But it captivated me and I squirreled it away into my room until I had the first disk of the extended edition nearly memorized. (It remains my favorite disk of the now six (or ten if we count the first two Hobbit movies) in the extended editions. When other kids my age were watching cartoons and stuff, not that I didn't watch my fair share of Tom and Jerry and other various cartoons, I was off on the quest with Frodo or running from t-rexes with Dr. Grant or sailing with Captain Jack or running from the Mummy with Rick O'Connell. Those were my worlds and they inspired a love of the fantastic and epic, but also of finding joy in what moments one can.
Don't get me wrong, I like Star Wars. But there is something beautiful about the world of Middle Earth that I fell in love with long before I read the books. Sword fights and magic and epic quests to save the world from the evil ruler. How could I resist?
But to bring me back to my original point, about the music, I have such strong emotional attachments to the music that Howard Shore composed that hearing even a bar of it brings me back. The music is part of that world as much as the fighting and the journeying and the Ring are. And that world is part of my childhood and something that I love fiercely to this day.
I love the Hobbit movies despite their shortcomings because they brought me back home. And I am so incredibly grateful for being old enough to be grateful for the opportunity to watch I've had to watch something new that helped shape my childhood. I know I'll feel the same way when Jurassic World comes out (cried when I saw the trailer and every time since that I've seen it I've either cried or seriously teared up). I'm cautious right now but I will love it because it too comes from a world that helped to shape my childhood and my career choices (see that one post on one of my two blogs about why Jurassic Park means so much to me).
I'm so grateful for Peter Jackson for bringing us back to Middle Earth (even if he got a few things wrong or added certain details). He and the cast and crew will never know how grateful I am. I am grateful for being able to go home again.
I would love most dearly to be able to be part of a Jurassic Park movie or something about Middle Earth. Considering the Silmarillion is still a possibility and Jurassic Park is coming back, I may yet have my wish granted but I also understand the level of work I'm going to have to do if I want to succeed in that.
The reason for the sappiness right now is I'm going to go see Battle of the Five Armies again tomorrow (technically today) and I felt like expressing emotions because I'm going to be swarmed with them tomorrow (technically today).
I don't know what my parents were thinking, letting me watch such violent, beautiful shows at such an impressionable age, but I'm grateful that they did. I'm also grateful because I got to share Lord of the Rings with my best friend and even more grateful that she also loves them too. Some people started watching horror movies at a young age. I like horror. But action, adventure, and science fiction and fantasy will always be more beautiful for me.
Maybe I should do a post on my favorite movies growing up.
Anyway, here's some Lord of the Rings or Hobbit stuff. Mostly Youtube videos. And as soon as I find the video I want and can't find, I will be adding that one.
BotFA trailer that came out the day after my birthday
BotFA trailer that came out exactly a week after my birthday
BotFA that makes me want to cry
Lord of the Rings in 99 Seconds (Yes, I know all the words...)
AUJ Announcement Trailer
RotK trailer
TT trailer
Lord of the Rings and Frozen. Literally not sure what to make of it.
An Unexpected Parody
