The Last Goodbye

The Hobbit trilogy, standing as one of the most profitable movie franchises of all time, takes its share of criticism while l'm inclined to think that it has contributed a lot to offer us audience a more complete fantasy epic created by The Lord of the Rings, which is precisely why l finally determined to write this lengthy film review, or rather some feelings, after deliberation.

At the very end of the movie, silver-haired Bilbo Baggins stood right in front of his small but exquisite cabin located in Hobbiton, bent and wrinkled, gazing affectionately at the good and tilled earth of the Shire where people's hearts truly lie in peace, which grows even more poignant with the fact that he had already been a centenarian when he met Gandalf again after such a long separation. Then, I could not help bursting out in tears while seeing the sketches of the protagonists appear on the screen frame by frame with the lyrical melody of "The Last Goodbye" sang by 比利 Boyd who played Pippin in The Lord of the Rings trilogy. But there is nothing to be ashamed of as many people surrounded me who might be frenzied fans as well uncharacteristically sat still and waited quietly until all the subtitles were finished instead of clucking in impatience and swarming out of the hall in an indecent hurry.

However, no matter how reluctantly we behaved, how emotionally we denied, this is the last movie concerning Middle-earth shot by Peter 傑克森, and perhaps there will be no second opportunity for us to watch another film with regard to this fantastic land for the rest of our lives. From "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring" in 2001 to "The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies" this year, it's almost a dream lasting fourteen years, and l unfeignedly appreciate director Peter 傑克森 for painstakingly demonstrating us so vast a world and telling us such two long stories.

Actually, my first contact with this series could be traced back to "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" I watched in the cinema with my parents when l was a fourth-grade pupil. It goes without saying that the movie left an extremely deep impression on me and even led me to a brand new world l had never imagined before to some extent despite the fact that l was merely half-comprehended then. Frankly speaking, the enigmatic elvish remains obscure to me as it has always been while l have finished watching its two predecessors and reading all the original fictions besides The Silmarillion during my senior high school, but that hasn't put a damper on my passion for these extraordinary works at all.

Then, it was time for The Hobbit trilogy to be released in succession. From my perspective, as long as Peter 傑克森 could restore Middle-earth to its former magnificence; as long as the Shire, Bag End, Hobbits, Dwarfs, Elves, Orcs and Gandalf the Grey we are familiar with could stay active on the screen, whether the quality of the films is satisfactory doesn't matter to me anymore.

With all due respect, The Hobbit does appear to be kind of fairy-tale, especially when compared with The Lord of the Rings trilogy, as what it narrates is only a story of treasure hunt which is pretty much totally intimidated by the latter. But it deserves to be pointed out that the two legends perfectly echo each other in their own way. Several points that may support my opinion can be summarized as follows:

Firstly, if you have watched "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring", it will not be difficult to find that Elrond in Elf armour, the King of Rivendell, looks remarkably, stoically the same as the commanding Elrond who urged Isildur to throw the Ring captured from the Dark Lord Sauron who had been corrupted by his cruelty, malice and will to dominate all life by chopping off his finger into the fires of Mount Doom. However, although Elves are immortal, we could indistinctly tell the marks time and tide left on actor Hugo Weaving through his eye and brow.

Secondly, what astonished me a great deal is that Christopher Lee who played Saruman the White has been in his nineties in the real life, which means that he's nearly twenty years older than Ian McKellen who played Gandalf the Grey. But considering he has just made a rock album named "Metal Knight" before long, the senior citizen is apparently young at heart while his hair has been snowed by age. In the movie, Saruman calmly let Elrond and Galadriel take wounded Gandalf and go first by saying "Leave Sauron to me! ". And the later story has been known to all—there would be a traitor in White Council who was going to bring about untold sufferings to the Middle-earth and wreak unprecedented havoc on creatures beyond count.

Another point that deserves more words is that in this film Thranduil told his son Legolas to go towards the north for the Strider who is son of Arathorn, heir of Isildur. Associating that with the detail in "The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug" that Legolas discovered a pendant with a portrait of Glòin's son Gimli while frisking Dwarf Glòin and asked, "And what is this horrid creature, a Goblin-mutant?", with great contempt. Hard as this may be to believe, what would happen in the future seems to be predestined that time. How could Legolas possibly know that many years later, the Strider and Dwarf Gimli he once snapped his fingers at would fight alongside him when Sauron's army was bearing down in force? At such a critical moment when darkness crept back into the forests of the world where rumor grew of a shadow in the East whispered of a nameless fear, Gimli muttered to himself, "Never thought l'd die fighting side by side with an Elf." "What about side by side with a friend?", smiled Legolas. And then Gimli replied with a grin, "Aye. I could do that."

Legolas, the Elf who goes through the whole story besides Gandalf, has unconsciously kept us company for 14 years. So far as l can remember, l have watched the scene that Bloom gracefully dismounted from his horse and glanced back with a glamorous smile against the setting sun of the forest so many times in slow motion and in freeze frame that all the details are practically photographic in my mind. And it's quite pleased to notice that he remains nimble and vigorous at the age of 37, just like the Prince of the Elves who was fully equipped for the upcoming adventure is walking towards us from the past in spite of the thick foundation he wore to cover his wrinkles in The Hobbit.

Regrettably, Peter 傑克森 is statistically unlikely to direct any other film regarding Middle-earth. Even though there probably will be someone who remakes The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbits or brings The Silmarillion to the big screen in the foreseeable future, the memories of these fourteen years which oscillated between ups and downs can't be substituted.

There was a time when the little girl who had just watched "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" in 2004 firmly believed that there would be films far more marvelous than this series with the rapid development of technologies in movie, which turned out to be true indeed. From Avatar to Life of Pi, from the superhero films of Marvel to Intestellar, almost nothing would be as it is were it not for the innovating way that ever happened for the hot pursuit of the best movie-going experience, but l clearly and crisply realize that there won't be any fantasy film which could surpass the position of The Lord of the Rings trilogy, because l'm not the child who had just watched "The Return of the King" any longer.

Since these three-volume epic chronicles, l have read countless stories; l have seen the three kids of Hogwarts heal the whole magic world; l have watched the flames of war raging in the seven Kingdoms on Westeros; l have witnessed Logic compete against the Three-Body World by the Dark Forest Principle; let alone the legends with respect to the magician Yang Wen-li and the blond guy Reinhard, but l adore The Lord of the Rings more than any other story. It's neither a train platform nor disputes and dissension among families; it's neither unknown aliens nor fancies about spacecrafts; it's the era of Tolkien who spread out the prodigious parchment on which he built the unique Middle-earth and wrote the seminal epic chronicles on a non-precedential basis. And then history became legend…Legend became myth…

Perhaps many years later, l'll mention this legend to my children like Bilbo and Frodo who came back to Shire and tell them the auction at Bag End, the fireworks of the wizard in grey, the dragon in the Lonely Mountain, the trumpets of Rohan, the Orcs and the Nazgul in the Mordor…

To these memories l will hold
With your blessing l will go
To turn at last to paths that lead home
And though where the road then takes me l cannot tell
We came all this way
But now comes the day
To bid you farewell

I bid you all a very fond farewell but not goodbye.