This week around finds me talking to Joanna from For Cinephiles by a Cinefille all about Howard Hawks with his film Bringing Up Baby. We discuss comedy, where it went in modern cinema and all sorts of other things as well as just generally loving all over this classic film. So stop reading and start listening, and enjoy

This time around I reach out to the internet and find one of the most enjoyable writers of one of the most hilariously titled websites with Andreas Stoehr from PussyGoesGrrr. Andreas takes the podcast into the 40s as we discuss French expressionistic art as well as fantasy against fairy tales. So enjoy our discussion on the classic French 40s adaptation of Beauty and the Beast.

Go Subscribe to the show via iTunes here, or on Stitcher. Let me know what you think and go review and rate the show there. So go do it guys.

A couple hours late, but I blame that on too much work and me falling asleep at the keyboard last night — I’m sorry. Otherwise, as scheduled here is the next episode of the Movies You Love Podcast where I talk to my second Toronto film enthusiast and podcast extraordinaire – Matthew Price. He’s the host of MaMo (and all episodes and anything else he’s working on can be found at MaMo.ca; you can also follow him on twitter @mattmovies). So here enjoy the episode:

Go Subscribe to the show via iTunes here, or on Stitcher. Let me know what you think and go review and rate the show there. So go do it guys.

Holy crap! It’s another episode. Can this actually be a running thing now? This week I get to talk with Tom Clift (of Movie Reviews by Tom Clift, Moviedex and Movie Mezzanine) and we talk all things Chrisopher Nolan along with a very interesting discussion on Memento.

Go Subscribe to the show via iTunes here, would be great to get some reviews and ratings going. So go do it guys.

So Yes. I’m giving up the hours of transcriptions and switching it up here. Instead of transcribing I’m spending hours on end editing audio files for your joyful ears to consume. The Movies You Love is now a podcast.

In my first outing of podcast lovingness I got a chance to sit down with Andrew Parker (of DorkShelf) to talk all things noire and grit with the Los Angeles tale of L.A. Confidential.

As this is the first episode there is no iTunes channel just yet (but keep on a lookout for that), but feel free to leave all your thoughts below in the comments section or feel free to email me at andrew.robinson@gmanreviews.com.

UPDATE:

Go Subscribe to the show via iTunes here, would be great to get some reviews and ratings going. So go do it guys.

The last time I posted an article in this category it was August of 2012 — shame on me — which is bad. I love doing this series of posts I hope to be more diligent about getting them out there.

This time around I’m taken into the world of John Wayne Westerns to discuss his film by Howard Hawks, Rio Bravo. You can follow all of Rupert’s writings over at Rupert Pupkin Speaks, where he’s constantly championing forgotten classics. He’s been on a stint of posting guest articles of people’s favourite classic discoveries of the last year… may be some inspiration for me.

Regardless, check out the discussion below:

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Me: Rio Bravo was first released theatrically in 1959. When was the first time you saw the film and tell me a bit of the context of how you ended up seeing it that first time.

RP: I first saw RIO BRAVO in college(circa 1995). I was attending the University of Wisconsin Madison and had just started taking film classes. This was an introductory film class and I loved it. I had already been a big fan of movies(had worked in video stores since High School) but this class really gave me an appreciation for two things that are very dear to me now: Howard Hawks and John Wayne. We watched THE SEARCHERS, RED RIVER and RIO BRAVO in this class and I suddenly understood the appeal Wayne had. He kind of blew me away. I had always felt he was a bit overrated to that point in my life and this class turned me around completely. The man is a legend for a reason.

Me: So what does John Wayne mean to you?

RP: Hmmm. Good Question. I guess I came to Wayne in a roundabout way. My first exposure to him was actually via Kurt Russell’s take on Wayne via his performance in BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA. I enjoyed that very much. I guess I had just assumed Wayne was too all-american for me and I guess that misconception was what lead me to be so taken with him when I saw him in films like THE SEARCHERS and RED RIVER. In both those films he played characters that were far from perfect, but absolutely compelling. And then with RIO BRAVO he was just the man so I just thought of him as an all-around very talented actor.

Me: Going back to that first viewing of the film in college for you. Can you remember the point in time when you switched from being skeptical of all these things (Wayne and such) to actually being won over by the film?

RP: I think it was a gradual process that occurred across the viewings of the three films in the class. One moment I always remember though was the remarkable, basically dialogue-less opening sequence of RIO BRAVO. That blew me away. And later in the film when Wayne’s character Chance says, “You want that gun, pick it up. I wish you would.” One of the great lines of all time.

Me: One of the main points of this series is to discuss movies that influenced your love for films. I know you mentioned that you saw this as part of a class’ curriculum. How did Rio Bravo (and possibly the rest of that courses’ films) change not only what you associated with good movies but also what you tried to help guide what you wanted to watch from then on?

RP: I remember we talked a lot about Auteur theory in that class and that had a big impact on the way I watched films. I was already aware of directors and how they could have a certain stamp they might put on a movie, but studying Howard Hawk’s and the thematic of professionalism that is a big part of most of his films helped make the whole auteur theory a bit more concrete to me. Our professor talked about Hawk’s professionalism in reference to ONLY ANGELS HAVE WINGS and that scene after a pilot dies and his dinner is still sitting on the table. Somebody asks, “Where’s Joe?”(the deceased pilot) and Cary Grant responds, “Who’s Joe?”. The idea being that he wasn’t “good enough” and so he ceased to exist. I think the Hawksian ideas and character types stuck with me and stood out. From then on I begin to examine films a bit more closely for common thematics, character types, and even the use of the same actors and how all those things brought about a possible directorial “stamp”.

Me: Bringing in that theme of professionalism into Rio Bravo we must definitely look at Chance (being the sheriff) and even the villain of Burdette to some degree. Do you ever fond yourself besmirching characters for being professional to a fault? I think the best example of this for me comes from Hawk’s His Girl Friday with Hildy.

RP: Yeah I think so. RIO BRAVO strikes the right balance with that for sure(both the heroes and the villains), but Hildy is a character that’s come to trouble me a bit over time. HIS GIRL FRIDAY was an absolute revelation the first time I saw it. I could not believe a film from the 1930s could be so snappy, so clever. But yes, Hildy for me started to become one of those characters that was less fulfilling to watch because of that “do or die” professionalism. I get that it’s supposed to be funny(and maybe comically tragic), but over time, I’ve veered away from the film to other Hawks movies because of it.

Me: You’re first viewing of this film was near two decades ago. How over time has the film changed for you as you watch it now as opposed to that first time in college?

RP: I’ve really come to love the characters and the film more and more with each viewing. It’s become a film I try to watch once a year or so. Like visiting old friends

Me: Back in the days of Wayne and such westerns were given a slightly romantic tone, as if filmmakers longed for that time to return. Today, in films like the remake of True Grit and Unforgiven, we see filmmakers trying to remove all the romance and making the films (for lack of a better word) more real. How do you feel about this transition that the genre has gone through over the years? Do you agree with this assessment in general?

RP: Honestly, I’ll always love westerns, but the bleak realism you mention gets a bit tiresome for me personally over time. Thankfully there are plenty of older westerns I’ve yet to see!

Me: A question, which I always like to ask about films that people have spent so much time adoring, is about criticism of film. Regardless of our crazed love for these films it still doesn’t remove any room for criticism. Are there any criticisms of this film that you’ve had over the years? Have you come to terms with those at all and how? If you could change anything about this movie would you and if so what would that be?

RP: Not sure I’d ever presume to change anything about it, but a few of the romantic scenes with Wayne and Angie Dickinson don’t play quite as charming as they used to.

Me: She definitely plays the part of the woman begging to be noticed by our hero a bit too loud at times. Is it something that you feel could’ve been reworked for today or just a subplot that distracts from the story of Chance and his deputies keeping to their duties?

RP: It might be able to be reworked, but I’m not sure how. It’s the way Wayne’s character plays it too. That said, it doesn’t bother me all that much, if it did, the film wouldn’t be my second favorite of all time. With some films, rue watching over and over really makes certain parts stad out like sore thumbs. That’s not the case here really. I’ve noticed for instance that the more I’ve watched THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK(which is a film I love obviously) for example, the more I really tire of certain sections( see: Dagobah). It kind of bums me out when I get to that point with a movie, so I try not to dwell on it.

Me: Before we end off this discussion I wanted to ask you, as a fan of Hawks, about his filmography. Howard Hawks is a filmmaker loved by many and also massive blindspot in my cinematic education. It’s noted that throughout his career of over 40 films directed he’s only been nominated once at the Oscars, and the only time he left with any prize was in 1975 when he was given an honorary award. As a film lover who’s yet to dive deeply into Hawks filmography which of his films do you feel essential to sum up his particular stamp on cinema?

RP: It always saddens me when a remarkable filmmaker is not really recognized in his time. Like Douglas Sirk though, I think Hawks was just seen as a commercial filmmaker in his day. Thankfully, the wonderful thing about films is that they have the amazing ability to live on and find appreciation and significance in the many years following their release. It does still take us lovers of older cinema to keep their legacy alive though. With my blog and online interactions in general, it’s been a wonderful thing to find that there are so many folks out there that still have an interest in older films and are hungry to seek them out. This pleases me greatly. Hawks is a guy that has certainly lived on and thanks to filmmakers like Quentin Tarantino and others who love him, hopefully he’ll be relevant for a long while. In terms of his films that are most dear to me, I’d say there are a ton of them(and I’m still not done seeing them all). My favorites are probably RIO BRAVO, ONLY ANGELS HAVE WINGS, BRINGING UP BABY & BALL OF FIRE, TO HAVE AND HAVE NOT and THE BIG SLEEP have a special place for me as they were two of the first of his that I ever saw. TWENTIETH CENTURY is worth your time as well. There’s a lot of good stuff there to dig into in his filmography and I hope you enjoying exploring it.

Let me know what your thoughts are on John Wayne, Howard Hawks, Rio Bravo and the interview in the comments below.

Weirdly enough, with six other interviews posted on the site, I don’t believe I’ve got a guest who’s gotten into the cult section of film just yet. So low and behold when I finally wrangle Scott Alldden (from Celluloidical & @celluloidical) to talk to me he decided to pick the brohemoth of films as we sit down to discuss Joel and Ethan Coen’s detective comedy about the laziest man alive just trying to get a rug.

Personally I’ve been very on and off again with this movie ever since my first viewing of it back in 2005 when my roommate was deeply offended to discover I had never seen the film. I still think that the idea of the film, and it’s jokes, are worth enough to offset how little I laugh at the movie at times, but you’re not here to find out what I think, so here’s how my discussion with Scott went.

Me: The Big Lebowski was first released in March, 1998, which dates the film over a decade old now. When was the first time you saw the film and what were your initial reactions to the film?

Scott: Whoa 1998?!? Christ I feel old…

The first time I saw the film was back in 2001 – I was 15 and I wasn’t the huge movie buff I am today but I knew of the obvious ‘classics’. Completely fell in love with the film – It just struck a chord in me that no other film has since. The highlights for me are the characters. Absolutely memorable from beginning to end.

Me: You say the film’s characters are what stand out for you above all else. In a film that features pacifists, nihilists, Vietnam vets, pornographers as well as cowboy narrators, which of the characters do you find yourself aligning more with over the years and why if possible?

Scott: Interesting question – but easily I’d have to say The Dude. Not because he’s the lead, but rather his approach to life and his attitude in response to the dilemmas and obstacles he faces during the film. I really resonate with that. He sort of had those kinds of qualities that I admire in a human being

Me: The Dude is what many believe to be the beginning of the era of the slacker on screen. While I personally don’t believe him to be a first in this regard he does come off as one of the most memorable ones. What do you believe to be the true attraction to this character who’s so beloved by so many while he manages to do almost nothing, or a close approximation if he had anything to say about it?

Scott: What I love about Jeff, is that despite everything – his laziness, and blissful ignorance. Fundamentally he’s actually a very good person at heart. He’s a bum, yeah, but that doesn’t automatically make him a bad person, He helps Maude, and of course The Big Lebowski, with no real obligation. Perhaps he’d just rather see justice be done!

Me: One of the main points of these discussions is to talk about a movie which was instrumental in your love of film. What do you think was it about your viewing of The Big Lebowski which changed the way you approached films on a whole?

Scott: It kinda broadened my horizons in terms of what I could appreciate from a comedy film. The humour was far beyond anything I’d seen previously – your John Candy, Steve Martin, Jim Carrey schlock. Lebowski was probably the first comedy I’d seen that had an interesting narrative, and interesting, diverse characters. So I guess these days I’m always looking past the laughter- for what’s behind a film’s characters. Their internal emotions, motivations.

Me: So now we’re getting into the idea of “high concept” comedy. Do you feel sometimes watching films now that you see the idea a lot more interesting than the actual punch line?

Scott: Oh without a doubt. An online vlogger called TJ Kincaid said once – “In movies – Big tits and big explosions are favoured over big ideas”. And I kinda stand by that. Sure you want to be entertained, you want your laughs. But still, you want your mind to be stimulated. And that’s what I try to look for when I’m watching a film. Also it’s beneficial when I’m trying to review a film. The more low-brow, the harder it is to analyse accurately other than wading through shit

Me: Well this is the kind of film with a notable rewatchable quality. How has it grown on/with you over the years and what do you notice more now than you ever did the first time you saw it?

Scott: I was very skeptical about recommending it. I thought it was ‘above’ comprehension for my friends. But now it’s always brought up in film conversation. Good question you raise there actually – the soundtrack, my god what an amazing soundtrack. Only really taken time out to listen to it fully in the last couple years. But it’s one of the film’s most notable aspects

Me: One thing i truly believe is that no movie is perfect, though that’s not the point of the movie anyways. So one of the questions I like to ask everyone in this series is if you had to change one thing about this movie what would it be?

Scott: That’s actually quite difficult for me… I straight out love it end to end….. Hmm, if I’m honest I would’ve loved to see some more interaction between Dude and Donny. There’s this big conspiracy always circulating implying that Donny was a figment of Walter’s imagination – a lost comrade from Vietnam. Obviously that’s inaccurate, but still… more Dude and Donny – that would be my only wish

Me: Well thank you for talking to me and giving me your time.

Scott: Your welcome man.

Let me know what you think of The Big Lebowski as well as the interview below in the comments.

Inspired by Robert K. Elder’s book (The Film That Changed My Life) I thought it would be fun to take that very idea and point that question in the direction of fellow bloggers and cinema enthusiasts such as myself and see what the result ends up being.

This time around Andrew James, of RowThree and @Andrew_James, joins me to discuss Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange.

My relationship with Stanley Kubrick and his film A Clockwork Orange has been one of mutual respect and nightmares. It’s taken me near eight years of movie watching to be able to sit through this film without needing the same treatment that McDowell himself had done to him in the procedure. I’m actually happy that this interview forced me to rewatch the film because I found a lot more to love this time around. Anyways hope you enjoy the interview below:

Me: Well, tell me about the first time you actually saw this film.

A. James: The first time I saw A Clockwork Orange I was over at a friend’s house, I was about fourteen years old, maybe fifteen, and I was just sleeping over and we were looking for a movie to watch and we’re going through all the usual suspects: the John Hughes’ and Vacation and all this stuff and then his Dad comes down and says, “you guys want to see something really crazy? Something you’ve never seen before.” We we’re like, “I don’t know old man. I don’t know if we want to watch your kind of stuff, but, alright sure. Show us something CRAZY,” and he’s like, “it’s called A Clockwork Orange, it’s from the early 70s, I think you guys will love it.” He popped it in, and we watched the thing, and I was mesmerized. I was actually really surprised that I liked it so much, because up until that point, for the most part, I was into just mainstream blockbuster type stuff; the Steven Spielbergs, the Robert Zemeckis or John Hughes, like I said. So all of a sudden there’s this thing that I’ve never seen anything like it before. I watched it and just went, “WOW. You can do this?” I think from there that is what just made me branch out to other things.

Me: You said that at that age you were watching a lot of “blockbusters” like John Hughes and such, did you come from a home where you were restricted in your movie watching?

A. James: Not at that age. In fact, when I was a kid we had Showtime and HBO, which showed all the movies and my mom was a little bit strict on stuff, but she couldn’t watch me all the time. I saw some horror movies and I saw some John Carpenter stuff and whatnot. For the most part though, I wasn’t quite interested in anything that was remotely art house I guess. I always thought that foreign films were stuffy boring dramas and had not interest.

I watched a lot of stuff, just most of it was really fantastical or action.

Me: Getting onto the ultra-violence of this film, being a sticking point with a lot of people. The way that Kubrick, not necessarily, glorifies violence, sex and youth overtaking age in the film, especially with that early scene with the bum under the tunnel. You say you were mesmerized by this film. Did that sort of imagery help or hurt at all?

A. James: Definitely. That was the first time I had seen violence and sex played for, I hesitate to say, comedy, but definitely like in a humourous way. At the same time though it’s very brutal and hard to stomach and I think that is what was so great about it, because I felt uncomfortable watching this stuff, but at the same time it was thrilling andyou have a smile on your face. There’s that really intense rape scene where they go in and beat up an old guy and rape his wife but the whole time he’s singing Signin’ In The Rain and kicking the guy, in rhythm, and they’re dressed up in these crazy costumes. It’s this thing where you’re disgusted but you just can’t look away because it’s so surreal.

I still think that’s one of the greatest sex scenes ever with this sped up William Tell overture and he’s got the two girls in his room. Not only that, but there’s other nudity. Malcolm McDowell is naked a couple of times, where you ‘see’ stuff, and the jail warden sticks a flashlight up his butthole and you’re watching this and for me that was all new stuff that I had never seen before.

Me:  You said you watched it for the first time when you were fourteen years old. I’m going to make a leap and assume that you didn’t get all of the nuances of the story at that point in your life.

A. James: Probably not.  I’m thirty-six now. I feel like everytime I watch it I gather something new from it. At the time though I was more shocked than anything else. Not that the movie is that shocking, especially today. If a kid who’s fourteen today who’s seen everything on the internet then watches this he might not be shocked, but I was. I had just watched Back to the Future. I’d seen some brutal stuff, sure, but it was like The Beastmaster and stuff. It was all fantastical and fun. This put a heightened realism on everything that was just really intense.

Of course there’s also all this commentary and Stanley Kubrick is working with the idea of behavioural modification and I’m not sure if I got into all that political stuff and realized exactly everything that was going on, but it was fun just watching it.

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This feature has been missing for too long. So when I put a call out for what the world of the internet wanted to return to the site this was the most responded long lost feature.

Inspired by Robert K. Elder’s book (The Film That Changed My Life) I thought it would be fun to take that very idea and point that question in the direction of fellow bloggers and cinema enthusiasts such as myself and see what the result ends up being.

This time around Anna, of Defiant Success and @MovieNut14, joins me to discuss Billy Wilder’s classic: The Apartment. Enjoy:

Me: The first question I always like to ask anyone doing these interviews is when was the first time you say this film, and I think you’re going to be the first person I talk to who’s picked a film which I’m willing to guess wasn’t just released while you were still alive.

Anna: My parents were only four when this movie was released, so don’t count on it.

Me: So how was the first time you ended up seeing this film and when was it?

Anna: I saw it back in 2009. I was getting a little more interested into movies. I’d already seen Citizen Kane, The Godfather, basically the essential classics. When I saw The Apartment I just felt like seeing it on a whim, instead of sitting in the library I just said, “what the heck, I’ll see it”. Then when it was over I thought, “this is really good,” it wasn’t until I rewatched it that I realized, “oh my God, I’m in love with this movie.”

Me: On the first time you watched it you said that you didn’t really realize how good it was, but what was it that pushed you to see it again?

Anna: It’s just… It just works. The story flows, the acting’s wonderful. It’s just the usual specs with most movies.

Me: What me and my friends refer to as the ‘checklist’.

Anna: Fair enough. When I saw it, I hadn’t seen that many classics – as I stated before – and this was the first ‘old movie’ so-to-speak that I just fell in love with on the spot. It also spurred on my now very known interest in the classic films.

Me: Well I guess the question I have to ask is: Jack Lemmon or Billy Wilder?

Anna: You have to make me choose? Wow. That was actually the second Billy Wilder movie I had seen, the first one being The Lost Weekend. The Apartment was the first Jack Lemmon movie I had seen and I’m going, “this guy is really good.” I had never even heard of him prior to seeing this, so this is kind of a surprise for me.

Me: I have to say I’m a bit surprised to hear it’s the first Jack Lemmon movie you’ve ever seen, because this might’ve been the first film of his that I ever saw seeing the classic Jack Lemmon, but I had known him from Grumpy Old Men and all of his older roles.

Anna: Like Glengarry Glen Ross?

Me: Ye.

What everyone talking about The Apartment tends to gravitate towards is the weird line that the film takes in not really being sure whether you’re watching a comedy or a drama. Jack Lemmon is one of those few people who finds that line so well and you don’t think about whether it’s one or the other, you just laugh and cry. Do you agree/disagree with those thoughts in relation to the film and Lemmon’s performance?

Anna: Well I just like him because he’s one of those actors who can do comedy and drama with immense ease. With drama you have Days of Wine and Roses and comedy you have Some Like It Hot, The Odd Couple. With The Apartment it’s a combination of both, and personally with me anyone who can do drama and comedy with equal ease is a damn good actor.

Me: One of the things this film talks about a lot has to do with amoral thoughts. Where a nice guy is doing something that maybe isn’t quite so likeable. Do you think that the film ever really decides whether he’s a good or a bad person based on this fact?

Anna: I think it does show that he’s a good person, but considering the people that he’s loaning out his apartment to can help him get a better job I think it makes him go to ‘that side’ of himself. It’s hard to say actually.

We know he’s a good person, it’s just the temptation of a better job is a little too great for him.

Me: You say, “you know he’s a good person.” How is it you know he is one at all?

Anna: Well, you see the conversations he has with Ms. Kubelick and pretty much everyone else in the office. He’s just a nice guy. He doesn’t really feel that he’s a bad person. He doesn’t shout at anyone, or rude, he’s just a nice guy.

Me: This reminds me of a discussion I was having a work a while back where we were talking about the difference between nice and morally good. I feel you can be morally questionable, in that you’re doing things or allowing things that aren’t so well thought of in the world, but you can be doing it with a nice smile on your face, but does that end up making you a good person?

Anna: Well if it’s  immoral, like murder, then not so much, but if it’s something that might come and bite you in the butt later then not so much, like with him loaning out his apartment to his married coworkers so they can fool around with their mistresses. That’s not generally a good thing…

Me: One of the things this movie discusses which has to do with, slightly – and I hate to use this term in films, especially in historical context because I wasn’t really there so I can’t really tell how much it was – groundbreaking in the fact not many movies back then talked about the topics of adultery and suicide. Not many films even did it as overtly as this did. How did you see the film’s thoughts on these issues? Not just on the men, but also everyone else affected?

Anna: Bear in mind, as I said, I hadn’t seen that many old movies at that time. I didn’t really know going in what previous views on suicide and adultery and things like that. Now that I do I see this as a really daring move. But then again, Billy Wilder was a bit on the daring side with some of his work.

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This time around I got a chance to sit down with Corey Atad (check out his blog and follow him on twitter) and discuss the movie that helped him fall in love with films which happened to be Peter Jackson’s first of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, The Fellowship of the Ring. Hope you enjoy the interview below:

Me:  You wanted to talk about Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring and I find it very interesting because most people I talk to about this film, or this series of films, they don’t usually specify one. Even though I told you in the email to pick a film, you know people will cheat, and I found it very interesting that you didn’t even bother to try and just lump in the trilogy. What made The Fellowship of the Ring stick out over the other two, or is it just the fact that you didn’t think of it?

Corey:  I think, first of all, I would say that Fellowship is my favourite of the three. So when you say “choose one film” that was the obvious choice, but even then that’s sort of the movie that did it for me. That’s the one. It got me into that series of movies. When you ask the question “what movies developed my love for movies” Fellowship of the Ring is really the one that crystallized everything for me.

It wasn’t the first movie that I loved, obviously I loved movies before Fellowship of the Ring, but that was the one where it kind of all came together and I really realized that I’m totally into this.

Me: Well, the film was released in December 10, 2001 and I’m assuming you saw it for the first time around then in the theatre?

Corey: Yeah, I’m pretty sure opening day.

Me: Tell me about that experience about going and seeing the film.

Corey:  What I remember was that I went with this friend of mine and we had been following the development of the movie and I had read The Hobbit a while before that and I had read The Lord of the Rings, I think, a couple years before the movie came out. Then I think it was a year before Fellowship was released they did a trailer for the entire trilogy. I don’t know if you remember that? They just did a trailer with them sort of just walking on mountains and it’s like “Lord of the Rings: Christmas 2001, Christmas 2002, Christmas 2003” and that sort of blew my mind. I was just, “Oh my God. They’re making a Lord of the Rings movie. Three of them!” So at that point I started following the entire progress of the trilogy.

That was one of the first movies that had a really big online presence, thanks to Peter Jackson. There was the official website and a lot of information on there and I was kind of following it and I had this other friend who was really into it, so we were following it together. Then on the day that the movie came out we went, there’s a theatre (I live near Toronto)just north of Toronto that has an IMAX screen and they were playing Lord of the Rings, just 35mm but projected onto the IMAX screen so it was really big and we were like, “we gotta go see that.” I remember that we went to the theatre and at the time I was still 13 and the movie was rated 14A, it’s the rating we’ve got here in Ontario, and I didn’t realise it was rated 14A. I mean, why would I think that it would be rated 14A? I didn’t realize the level of violence that would be in it. So the person asked me, “how old are you?” and I said, “I’m 13” and the guy said, “I’m sorry I can’t sell you a ticket.” So I promptly went to, at that theatre at the time they had another box office on the other side of the building so I just went there and bought a ticket and went into the movie.

If you want to talk about going into a movie with extremely high expectations and it meeting every single one of those expectations and exceeding them, Fellowship of the Ring is the one. The other two, not necessarily that they fall short but I don’t think that they quite lived up the way that Fellowship of the Ring did, that movie to me was just incredible.

Me: You said that you had read the books a couple years before the film had come out. How did the film compare to the book for you or did you just not care at all?

Corey:  I don’t want to say that the movies are better than the books because I don’t know as to whether that’s fair and maybe I should give those books another try. At the time that I read them I had read The Hobbit and I really enjoyed that. It’s not the easiest book to read as a young kid but it’s definitely a fun book for a kid. Then I read Lord of the Rings and I think it took me almost a year to read that whole trilogy and I found it very difficult. The overall story arcs in that series is quite amazing and the imagination of it and the world building is all pretty amazing, but the prose is just so dull and boring. It’s not a joke. There is like literally pages and pages in that book that are about describing the forest floor and crap like that. So, I can’t say that I was a true fan of Lord of the Rings going into Fellowship of the Ring, but it was one of those things where I was like, “Oh my god. Someone is making a movie out this. How are they going to do that? This could be amazing,” because I recognized that there was an amazing story within the books. Certainly Fellowship, as a book, is the most straight-forward. It has the most linear story and it has the most cinematic story, to an extent, in that series.

There’s a lot that’s changed from the book, there’s a lot that’s cut out, re-jiggered and moved around and all that, but I’d say that Fellowship of the Ring is probably one of the more faithful adaptations in terms of getting the book right, in getting the spirit of the book right and the general arc of the story. It never feels like they changed the heart of the book, it really feels like the book on screen even though so much of it is different.

Me: I knew as a child that they had made a Hobbit film, but I didn’t know that they had made a Lord of the Rings animated film back in 1978. Have you ever seen it?

Corey: Yes. It’s the Ralph Bakshi film. I’ve seen The Hobbit, which was alright, and I had seen Lord of the Rings and there was another one which was a TV film, Return of the King, which kind of completed it, because they never got to make the second movie they were planning on making. It’s not very good though. It really is sort of a shitty movie.

It is what it is. It’s one of those things; I just watched Fellowship of the Ring yesterday – just to kind of prep myself -  and it just sort of struck me all over again how amazingly ambitious that movie was, the whole series. Peter Jackson up to that point, The Frighteners was maybe his biggest movie up to that point, and went to the studio and said, “I’m going to make three movies and they’re going to be the biggest movies you’ve ever produced, they’re going to have the most amazing effects ever in movies so far, we’re going to have to literally invent technologies to be able to make this movie while we’re making it and we don’t know if those technologies are going to work,” and yet you watch the movie and  it really all works. It works not just from the special effects and the technology but as an adaptation it’s pretty stellar. Up to that point people had thought that these movies were “un-filmable”, at least in live-action, there’s no way you can get all that imagination and all those different bits of the story and make it all work and somehow Peter Jackson did which is really an amazing feat.

It’s probably one of the most ambitious films ever made. It’s certainly the most successful ambitious film ever made.

Me: Well going back to the 1978 film. I remember seeing – at the very least – bits of the film and I remember noticing something that I don’t think was as prevalent, or as obvious, as it was in the Peter Jackson trilogy. You can tell me if it was in the book and I want to ask you more about your feelings as to its change when it came to the Jackson trilogy. What I’m referring to is the relationship between Frodo and Sam which in the 1978 film was, in my eyes at least, was a little less platonic.

Corey: Well to a certain extent that’s there in the Peter Jackson movies too. You have them jumping on the bed at the end of Return of the King and that stuff.

I wouldn’t say that there’s anything necessarily “gay” about Lord of the Rings. I don’t know if it was ever intended, but certainly when you have a cast of characters that’s almost all male and they’re all really good friends and holding each other up and getting each other through hard times you can’t really help but have the homo-eroticism creep in. I mean, it’s going to happen.

One of the things that I really appreciate in Peter Jackson’s movies is that everything is done really earnestly. So even though that’s there and you can laugh at it and you can laugh at it – and again, at the end of Return of the King it does get to the point of being silly almost…

Me: Is it weird that right now I’m just closing my eyes and seeing Gandalf laughing at them with his pipe…

Corey: Yeah. You can argue that that wasn’t exactly the best scene in the trilogy. With that said though I think it still remains that because he treated everything so earnestly and you can laugh at it, while you’re watching the movie it’s not that big a deal. It feels natural to the characters. They’re really on this quest that’s bearing down on their shoulders. It makes sense that they would turn to each other for comfort, not necessarily sleeping together, but modern eyes would see it that way.

Me: The film was released in 2001. The 74^th Academy Awards in 2002 nominated this film, I believe, 11 times and it won 4 awards, mostly technical…

Corey: Was it 11? I thought it was 13. If I’m remembering it right Fellowship was nominated for 13 and Return of the King got 11 and won all 11…

Me: You actually are right; I got those numbers mixed up. But that year Fellowship did only win 4. One of the awards it was nominated for was Best Picture. That year also nominated was Ron Howard’s A Beautiful Mind, Todd Field’s In The Bedroom, Baz Luhrman’s Moulin Rouge and Robert Altman’s Gosford Park. Many critics in 2002 would all agree to A Beautiful Mind winning over Fellowship of the Ring, but since hindsight is always 20/20 vision do you think that Fellowship was cheated that year?

Corey: I don’t know if cheated is the right word because I don’t think anyone was necessarily expecting them to win. I do think looking back if you look at the scale of filmmaking that’s going on in Fellowship of the Ring and while the movie doesn’t quite have an ending, but even the structure of that movie then it scales you back down and gives you this story about these Hobbits and then it slowly unfolds the world again and it really does play out like an adventure film whereas the other two play out like war films. It’s a classic quest movie; it doesn’t have an ending but you feel like all the structure is there that you think that people would think of it as, “hey here’s this amazing movie.”

I suspect though that even at the time that a lot of people were sitting there hedging their bets going, “well, this one was really good. We’ll see if he can pull the hat trick and pull off the entire trilogy.” This isn’t like The Godfather where you have this one movie and they happen to make a sequel afterward. It was known that there was going to be three movies. So I feel that even with the first movie, even though people liked it and really got on board with it, they were still kind of waiting to see if Jackson could pull it off and then if he did they would give it to him at the end.

Me: That’s the idea I was coming around to. The idea that now that they’re done we can now give you an Oscar for the trilogy as opposed to being just for Return of the King.

Corey: That’s the thing. There’re a lot of people out there who will say that Return of the King is the best movie. I think that if you look at any given year, I think it isn’t a stretch to say that each one of them could’ve won in their respective years. I don’t know what was nominated in 2002. 2003 I think had Master and Commander…

Me: The year that Return of the King won it was up against: Seabiscuit, Mystic River, Master and Commander and Lost in Translation.

Corey: Right. A lot of people would put Lost in Translation ahead of Return of the King. I would actually probably put Master and Commander ahead but that’s when you look at them on an individual basis. When you look at the year Return of the King won I think there’s a lot, maybe not a lot but at least a few, awards that it won. I believe it won Best Original Song which was fine but there’re some funny awards that it got it was obvious that they’re just giving everything to the film. I don’t really see a problem with it. It’s a way to honour the achievement in filmmaking. Never mind the fact that they’re phenomenal films, as pieces of art, but just as filmmaking achievements they’re quite incredible.

Me: This film is just about a decade old at this point, not even if you consider the fact that it was released in December. The one question I like to ask everyone is: looking back if you could change anything about the film – a casting, writing decision, maybe you wanted him to film page for page the entire book – what would you change about the film?

Corey: It’s weird. Watching it again so recently I don’t think there’s anything specific I would change. Maybe here and there there’re some weird shots.

It’s funny because Peter Jackson, as epic as those movies are, he still came from that weird Raimi style horror kind of thing. Back in the early 90s and that shows up in the movie. Sometimes it works and sometimes it kind of clashes, so I think there are a few of those weird choices that’re made. But overall I think that it’s a pretty, I don’t like to use the word perfect but there’s nothing I would necessarily change in it. In the other two movies there are things that I would change, or things that I would do differently…

Me: Anything specific?

Corey: Well, I think the biggest one is that as the series went on I think he got a little bit more confident in the way that he used CGI. To the point where, I just watched Two Towers today and there most of the stuff still holds up, I know because I remember pretty well even at the time in Return of the King some of the big battle stuff, he did a few things here and there that pushed the limits of the CGI to the point where it started to look a little bit cartoony. It doesn’t look terrible by any means but again I sort of feel like he got too confident.

One of the things I love in Fellowship of the Ring, or in the whole series, is the use of practical effects and large scale miniatures to supplement the CGI. So you’re watching Helms Deep and they show a full shot of it and the fortress and nowadays that would be all CGI and it would look CGI. There’s no getting around that.  At the time they weren’t sure whether the CGI would work or not, but for whatever reason they decided to make a full model of it and they shot it that way and it looks amazing. It looks tactile and amazing.

Again in The Two Towers there’s the scene where the Ents come into Eisengard and destroy it by and they break this damn and the water all kind of rushes in. You watch a scene like that today, maybe in a film like 2012 and it’s all CGI water destroying CGI objects and it all looks like a really cheesy bad animated movie. At the time I’m sure there was a lot of CGI to supplement it but at the time he just took a big bucket of water and like poured it into a giant model or Eisengard and it looks fantastic. If you know what you’re looking for you can actually tell it’s done with miniatures but at least it has that tactile feeling. He sort of started to give that up somewhere along the way with Return of the King and then King Kong there was a lot of stuff which was just way too much CGI.

Fellowship however has that perfect balance. It’s amazing how well the effects hold up. This is the same year that the first Harry Potter film came out and both of these films had scenes with CGI trolls in it. In Harry Potter the troll looked terrible, even for then, and you look at the troll in Fellowship and it looks like CGI but the way that it’s shot and the effort that was put into this it sells the illusion. You really feel that there’s this troll there that’s banging up the room and obliterating everybody.

Even when you watch movies today, because when I was watching that I was thinking of the movie Thor – which just came out this year – and it’s got this similar scene on whatever that planet is with the frost giants and there’s that big action scene there. It’s very similar in the way it’s shot, it’s very dark and yet it looks awful. The CGI looks terrible, obvious and fake, but somehow this movie from ten years ago looks infinitely superior.

One thing that I really appreciate this series for is that it got me into appreciating how movies are made. With the release of the extended editions they basically showed you how literally everything was done and instead of spoiling the illusion it makes me just appreciate it even more because they basically go through the scene and basically explain how they shot that scene with handheld cameras, which at the time you couldn’t do for a CGI character it was unheard of. The software was not available to be able to do that. Everything needed to be fixed cameras or those computer controlled cameras, but Jackson says no. WETA says that they can figure this out and the only way to make this feel tactile and maybe make it a little bit blurry or do that Jurassic Park thing of obscuring the CGI a little bit was to do it with handheld. So he went ahead and did it and WETA managed to drum up the software and they got it all done. So if you look at the scene thanks to all that it looks amazing.

That’s one of the things that amazes me about this movie. You’ve got this incredible creative guy who basically said, “here’s these things on the page that I can see in my head and I don’t care what anyone says I’m going to find a way to put it on screen,” and he really did. There’s no question about how successful everything looks. You can argue about whether the movies are boring or not but certainly they look incredible.

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