The Fellowship of the Ring | Through the Shattered Lens

It’s been 13 years since the first film in what will ultimately become Peter Jackson’s Middle-Earth Saga and now we’re in the stretch run. The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies is set to arrive in North America this December 17. The film premiered in London on December 1, 2014.

Kids who first saw The Fellowship of the Ring in 2001 are now young adults. For adults who have returned time and time again to the world Peter Jackson built for over a decade of limitless imagination and hard work of thousands this final film will be the culmination of watching what many in years past have called unfilmable.

So, it’s with both joy and sadness that the book finally closes on Peter Jackson’s Middle-Earth journey and what better way than the final end credits song “The Last Goodbye” written and recorded by Peregrin Took himself, Billy Boyd.

The video itself mixes in scenes from both The Battle of the Five Armies and the previous five films. We also get some behind-the-scenes footage of the cast making their final farewells as filming closes to an end.

Damn people cutting onions.

The Last Goodbye

I saw the light fade from the sky
On the wind I heard a sigh
As the snowflakes cover my fallen brothers
I will say this last goodbye

Night is now falling
So ends this day
The road is now calling
And I must away
Over hill and under tree
Through lands where never light has shone
By silver streams that run down to the sea

Under cloud, beneath the stars
Over snow one winter’s morn
I turn at last to paths that lead home
And though where the road then takes me
I cannot tell
We came all this way
But now comes the day
To bid you farewell
Many places I have been
Many sorrows I have seen
But I don’t regret
Nor will I forget
All who took the road with me

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

I bid you all a very fond farewell.

“I would have would have followed you, my brother… my captain… my king.” – Boromir, Captain and High Warden of the White Tower

It’s been five days since the season finale of the first season of Game of Thrones and the withdrawal symptoms are definitely starting to kick in. Season two of this fabolous series won’t be back for at least ten months. To help alleviate some of the withdrawal symptoms I decided to go on The Lord of the Rings Trilogy marathon all weekend. Tonight will be The Fellowship of the Ring (Extended Edition). It’s from this first leg of the trilogy that I choose today’s scene that I love.

The scene I have chosen is very close to the end of the film and it’s a scene between Viggo Mortensen’s Aragorn and Sean Bean’s Boromir. It’s soon after the attack of Saruman’s Uruk-Hai on the group. Boromir valiantly tries to protect and save Merry and Pippin from the Lurtz and his band of Uruk-Hai. It’s the scene which arrives after that really hits home for me just how great Peter Jackson’s adaptation of the first part of Tolkien’s massive tome.

This quiet and heartbreaking scene between Aragorn and Boromir cements Viggo’s performance as the reluctant hero moving towards embracing his legacy and destiny while at the same adding complexities to Sean Bean’s performance as Boromir being a flawed and tragic hero in his own right. It is a scene that will cause more than just a few tears to be shed.