Book Éowyn and Movie Éowyn (and related issues)

[anthriel]

[Note: I split this off from the Hobbit review thread - VtF]

I always thought movie Éowyn was disappointing. Not that Miranda isn't a good actress, I suspect she is, but that Éowyn was just so powerful a figure to me, in the book. The Éowyn I saw in the movie was a pale shadow of the Éowyn she should have been.

I know writers are supposed to have a hard time "putting themselves in the shoes" of characters who are the opposite gender; Jane Austin was often accused of not being able to write men's characters particularly well. A difficult job, I am sure.

But Tolkien really impresses me with Éowyn. I think he captures that feeling of women having to accept the world as men make it, and the frustration that a strong woman can feel when she is not allowed to fight for what she feels is right. Éowyn is an incredible character. She is tall and strong and cold and sad and tragic and heroic, and not the pretty little thing worried about whether or not the handsome Ranger likes her stew.



But I digress. She did have one nice frock. I suppose that should suffice.

[axordil]

I rather liked the stew scene with Éowyn. Her *personal* tragedy (as opposed to the larger cultural issue, which JRRT sidesteps) was that there was a warm, caring person under the brittle exterior she put up in self-defense against her surroundings as Théoden declined and Wormtongue wheedled.

Aragorn gave her, for the first time in years, an opportunity to express those boarded-up aspects of herself, howsoever haltingly, and when he left for the POTD--and brushed her off--she decided she preferred death in battle to the alternative.

[anthriel]

I rather liked the stew scene with Éowyn.

What the...



Pistols at dawn?

[axordil]

I do not argue with redheads. I merely state my differences and..ooh, look, Halley's Comet!

[yovargas]

I rather liked the stew scene with Éowyn. Her *personal* tragedy (as opposed to the larger cultural issue, which JRRT sidesteps) was that there was a warm, caring person under the brittle exterior she put up in self-defense against her surroundings as Théoden declined and Wormtongue wheedled.

Aragorn gave her, for the first time in years, an opportunity to express those boarded-up aspects of herself, howsoever haltingly, and when he left for the POTD--and brushed her off--she decided she preferred death in battle to the alternative.

I would call that interpretation of that scene...charitable.

[Pearly Di]

I always thought movie Éowyn was disappointing. Not that Miranda isn't a good actress, I suspect she is, but that Éowyn was just so powerful a figure to me, in the book. The Éowyn I saw in the movie was a pale shadow of the Éowyn she should have been.

Ah, Anthy, Miranda's Éowyn is one of my favourite movie characterisations! I always felt that Canon Éowyn was vulnerable beneath her 'ice maiden' exterior, and that's why I like Miranda's Éowyn so much. And she does convey Éowyn's emotional strength, too.

But I digress. She did have one nice frock. I suppose that should suffice.

She had several! E.g. her white wool dress, her green gown, the royal-blue gown she wore at Théoden's funeral, the gold-coloured gown at Aragorn's coronation. I also really like the plain outfit she wore when practising her sword moves in Théoden's hall and when she led the people of Rohan to Helm's Deep. (I have an inventory of All The Frocks. Thanks to the Art movie books! )

But I too thought the stew scene was stupid. Insulting to Aragorn - what sensible Ranger refuses food in the middle of a war? - and insulting to Éowyn - who says a shieldmaiden can't cook? One of the additions to the TTT:EE that should have been axed!

Otherwise, love the Aragorn-Éowyn interaction in the film. Love that sword scene!

Although he should have told her about Arwen, for pete's sake. Same goes for Canon Aragorn, IMO.

[JewelSong]

Although he should have told her about Arwen, for pete's sake. Same goes for Canon Aragorn, IMO.

Typical man.

[Pearly Di]

Typical man.

Another reason why Faramir is my favourite.

[anthriel]

I always thought movie Éowyn was disappointing. Not that Miranda isn't a good actress, I suspect she is, but that Éowyn was just so powerful a figure to me, in the book. The Éowyn I saw in the movie was a pale shadow of the Éowyn she should have been.

Ah, Anthy, Miranda's Éowyn is one of my favourite movie characterisations! I always felt that Canon Éowyn was vulnerable beneath her 'ice maiden' exterior, and that's why I like Miranda's Éowyn so much. And she does convey Éowyn's emotional strength, too.

You and I always have such opposite views, Di! Although I am sure I would have liked movie Éowyn better had I not met the more complex (and interesting!) Éowyn in the book.

I, also, knew that book Éowyn was vulnerable under that cold exterior. That truly was her magic!! So strong, so... damaged, somehow. Icy cold and hopelessly fair. Distant but intense. Sad but passionate. I love that Éowyn, her frustration and honor and strength. I love her ultimately heroic act (I am no man!!) and then the peace she ends up finding with Faramir (she deserves it!). Such a complicated character.

Movie Éowyn was just so vulnerable ALL the time. It was like she was a different character than the book, not an uninteresting one, but certainly not the Éowyn who knocked my socks off in the book.

My favorite Éowyn moment in the movie was the one with Wormtongue, when he was winding his words around her, preying on her loneliness and grief. Brad was amazing in that sequence, but Miranda was as well... her facial expressions as she starts to become hypnotized to his voice, and then her flare of strength as she sees him as he truly is... shivers. Oh yeah.





Sorry folks. This is a Hobbit thread, I know. I'll squelch my book Éowyn fan girl self.

[Primula Baggins]

Don't squelch! All of this is relevant to a discussion of Tolkien being adapted to film. Since this is the HoF review thread, this is where we can all talk about the whole context of our reactions to all the films.

[SirDennis]

Typical man.

Another reason why Faramir is my favourite.

Speaking as someone who always leads with my partner's name and our relationship status, Aragorn can't help it if some still find him irresistible.

[River]

Yes, but if you lead with your partner's name and relationship status, you've at least given the signal that you're off the market. What happens next is entirely on the person you introduced yourself to.

That said, Aragorn in both the books and the movies comes off to me as just oblivious to her overtures, rather than as a jerk who deliberately led her on. Obviously, he eventually figured it out (and IIRC her brother had some things to say, as all good brothers do).

[Elentári]

In the books Aragorn was confident in his destiny and that Arwen would wait for him - she sent the banner and message of encouragement with her brothers - whereas in the movie Aragorn had basically told Arwen to forget him and sail to the West. I won't say he exactly encouraged Éowyn but he certainly enjoyed her company until it dawned on him that she had a full-blown crush...

And yes, Éomer brings the topic up in the Houses of Healing, but holds Aragorn blameless for his sister's state of mind.

ETA: Here's the passage:

But Aragorn came to Éowyn, and he said: 'Here there is a grievous hurt and a heavy blow. The arm that was broken has been tended with due skill, and it will mend in time, if she has the strength to live. It is the shield-arm that is maimed; but the chief evil comes through the sword-arm. In that there now seems no life, although it is unbroken.

'Alas! For she was pitted against a foe beyond the strength of her mind or body. And those who will take a weapon to such an enemy must be sterner than steel, if the very shock shall not destroy them. It was an evil doom that set her in his path. For she is a fair maiden, fairest lady of a house of queens. And yet I know not how I should speak of her. When I first looked on her and perceived her unhappiness, it seemed to me that I saw a white flower standing straight and proud, shapely as a lily, and yet knew that it was hard, as if wrought by elf-wrights out of steel. Or was it, maybe, a frost that had turned its sap to ice, and so it stood, bitter-sweet, still fair to see, but stricken, soon to fall and die? Her malady begins far back before this day, does it not, Éomer?'

'I marvel that you should ask me, lord,' he answered. 'For I hold you blameless in this matter, as in all else; yet I knew not that Éowyn, my sister, was touched by any frost, until she first looked on you. Care and dread she had, and shared with me, in the days of Wormtongue and the king's bewitchment; and she tended the king in growing fear. But that did not bring her to this pass!'
'My friend,' said Gandalf, 'you had horses, and deeds of arms, and the free fields; but she, born in the body of a maid, had a spirit and courage at least the match of yours. Yet she was doomed to wait upon an old man, whom she loved as a father, and watch him falling into a mean dishonoured dotage; and her part seemed to her more ignoble than that of the staff he leaned on.

'Think you that Wormtongue had poison only for Théoden's ears? Dotard! What is the house of Eorl but a thatched barn where brigands drink in the reek, and their brats roll on the floor among their dogs? Have you not heard those words before? Saruman spoke them, the teacher of Wormtongue. Though I do not doubt that Wormtongue at home wrapped their meaning in terms more cunning. My lord, if your sister's love for you, and her will still bent to her duty, had not restrained her lips; you might have heard even such things as these escape them. But who knows what she spoke to the darkness, alone, in the bitter watches of the night, when all her life seemed shrinking, and the walls of her bower closing in about her, a hutch to trammel some wild thing in?'

Then Éomer was silent, and looked on his sister, as if pondering anew all the days of their past life together. But Aragorn said: 'I saw also what you saw, Éomer. Few other griefs amid the ill chances of this world have more bitterness and shame for a man's heart than to behold the love of a lady so fair and brave that cannot be returned. Sorrow and pity have followed me ever since I left her desperate in Dunharrow and rode to the Paths of the Dead; and no fear upon that way was so present as the fear for what might befall her. And yet, Éomer, I say to you that she loves you more truly than me; for you she loves and knows; but in me she loves only a shadow and a thought: a hope of glory and great deeds, and lands far from the fields of Rohan.

'I have, maybe, the power to heal her body, and to recall her from the dark valley. But to what she will awake: hope, or forgetfulness, or despair, I do not know. And if to despair, then she will die, unless other healing comes which I cannot bring. Alas! for her deeds have set her among the queens of great renown.'

[anthriel]

'My friend,' said Gandalf, 'you had horses, and deeds of arms, and the free fields; but she, born in the body of a maid, had a spirit and courage at least the match of yours. Yet she was doomed to wait upon an old man, whom she loved as a father, and watch him falling into a mean dishonoured dotage; and her part seemed to her more ignoble than that of the staff he leaned on.

<squeee!!>

It's just... SO good. I love that this character is in this story... she could have been so minor, so cookie-cutter princess, and she is so much more. I think that's why the very emotionally expressive Éowyn of the movies leaves me a bit flat. Tolkien really weaves a many layered picture with Éowyn, and many times she is described as seeming hard and cold. She isn't, of course, and Tolkien allows us to glimpse that fact, from time to time. An elegant portrayal of a complicated woman.



Jackson makes her fuss on about what a poor cook she is.



So instead of this fair and quietly desperate Éowyn, the Éowyn whose bower felt to her as a cage of a wild thing, the woman whose deeds set her among the queens of great renown, we get... bad cook Éowyn. We get to snicker at her subpar stew and the accompanying nervous disclaimers. Good thing that gosh-isn't-he-tuff Aragorn tries to choke it down, 'cause she might get all sniffly and upset if that good-looking fella she liked didn't like the stew. You know wimmen and their cooking. Jeez. Poor goofy girly Éowyn.

The REAL Éowyn, Prof. Tolkien's Éowyn, has so much... potential and honor and strength. And yet she is so constrained by her circumstance. A white flower, straight and tall.

Spirit and courage. And yet also an ignoble part in a desperate situation.

Bittersweet.


<sigh>

Thank you, Prof. Tolkien.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

The stew scene is only in the EE; it wasn't in the theatrical version. A better representation of Éowyn was the scene where she crosses swords with Aragorn. That is very much 'the fair and quietly desperate Éowyn, the Éowyn whose bower felt to her as a cage of a wild thing, the woman whose deeds set her among the queens of great renown.'

[yovargas]

Yeah....I thought the stew scene was quite bad but otherwise, Éowyn's portrayal struck me as one of the most faithful to the book (plus I loved her performance). Of course it's been quite a while since I read the book but she certainly matched my memory of her, bad cooking aside.

[SirDennis]

she crosses swords with Aragorn

that settles it then

ETA: Oh look over there!

"And those who will take a weapon to such an enemy must be sterner than steel, if the very shock shall not destroy them."

I never noticed before but this is a Beowulf-ism

Also, now that you mention it River, though he spoke of Arwen, it was sort of in the past tense. I still have difficulty seeing him as leading her on (in the movie) but he definitely didn't discourage her, until that moment at Dunharrow. I'd always read it as him being oblivious (perhaps wilfully) to any signals she was sending. Plus she was way too young for him... yeah men are kind of dense when it comes to this sort of thing (present company excluded, of course).

[Primula Baggins]

Anthy, I will have your posts about Éowyn clearly in mind at my next reading of LotR, and I know they will help me love the book even more.

(There's a good chance I'll have a fairly long time when I can read and not do much else this spring, and I can't think of anything better to do with the time.)

[Pearly Di]

In case there was any doubt, let it be known that I think Book Éowyn is awesome. For all the reasons that Anthy expressed so eloquently. (Thank you, Anthy!) It's just that Miranda's Éowyn made me love Book Éowyn even more. In the same way that Sean's Boromir made me love Book Boromir more.

You and I always have such opposite views, Di!

We do? Always? I'm puzzled by this, as the only time I've ever seen you disagree with me was when I recently expressed my keen enthusiasm for 'hot' Dwarves. I like Armitage's casting and I love his brooding intensity as Thorin.

The stew scene is only in the EE; it wasn't in the theatrical version. A better representation of Éowyn was the scene where she crosses swords with Aragorn. That is very much 'the fair and quietly desperate Éowyn, the Éowyn whose bower felt to her as a cage of a wild thing, the woman whose deeds set her among the queens of great renown.'

Absolutely.

I also saw that Éowyn in the tense scene with Gríma. Gríma is given Gandalf's words - "oh, but you are alone ... in the bitter watches of the night, when all your life seems to be shrinking," etc., - and he uses them to taunt her. It's very effective.

Back to The Hobbit, I am very keen to see it for a third time. I am suffering from Freeman-Armitage withdrawal symptoms.

[kzer_za]

She's also quite good singing at Theodred's funeral, I think. People sometimes say she sounds awkward there. Given the grief that she and the people of Rohan are suffering, I think that's the point. I love movie Éowyn.