It is a great loss for humanity that the works of J.R.R. Tolkien have become a cinematic franchise, like “Star Wars” or the Marvel Universe. Yes, the films and TV adaptations of recent years have introduced new generations to the master’s works, but the damage has been extensive: Tolkien is one of the most subtle, profound, and undervalued artistic minds of the 20th century, and yet so much of his genius — and his art — are lost in the recent adaptations.
But there is no going back, so we might as well keep watching — especially when the results are enjoyable, as in the new animated film “The War of the Rohirrim,” released in theaters Dec. 13 and now streaming on Amazon and Google Play.
“Rohirrim” is set in a civil war, which is ironic and appropriate given the civil war underway for the cinematic rights to the British master’s stories.
Early adaptations of “The Lord of the Rings” were animated projects with small aspirations, still influenced by the misguided notion that Tolkien was primarily a children’s author. Then came the ambitious Peter Jackson trilogies of the early 2000s (“The Lord of the Rings” and “The Hobbit”), which raised the stakes.
Amazon stepped in with “The Rings of Power” (2022), a TV prequel to “The Lord of the Rings” which no one really liked. Visually stunning but dogged by poor writing, it felt as empty and lifeless as the ghostly Ringwraiths of “The Lord of the Rings.”
Of the three major works of Tolkien’s literary career, two — “The Hobbit” and “The Lord of The Rings” — brought him worldwide fame and success. But the work of his lifetime, which he began writing in the trenches of World War I, was “The Silmarillion,” which covers the creation and early ages of Tolkien’s fantasy world. He never managed to complete it, and his son Christopher published an edited version of it posthumously in 1977.
The Tolkien estate has not released the rights to “The Silmarillion” yet. Eventually, either Peter Jackson or Amazon’s Jeff Bezos will become masters of “The Silmarillion,” and a new Dark Lord will rule over all of Tolkien’s fans.
Meanwhile, the two creative camps are working on separate projects that fill in the blanks between the books, relying largely on the appendices to “The Lord of the Rings.” While the Amazon series takes place in the vast gap between “The Silmarillion” and “The Hobbit,” “The War of the Rohirrim” is produced by Peter Jackson and set some 200 years before “The Lord of the Rings.”
There are some big novelties here: “The War of the Rohirrim” is not just animated, but is an “anime” film directed by Japanese director Kenji Kamiyama and rendered in the style of Japanese animated TV series and films. Audiences will either love it or hate it, and I found it refreshing: the bold, ambitious drawings delight the imagination and pump new life into the movie’s visual aesthetics.
Unlike the major Tolkien-based cinematic works, there is no connection to Sauron or his designs in “The War of the Rohirrim.” This is a tale about a fight for power between lords of the Rohirrim, a tribe of horse-riding warriors who inhabit a region of Middle-earth, spurred by Helm Hammerhead’s involuntary murder of one of his lieges, the wicked Freca, which sets the latter’s son (Wolf) on a quest for revenge.
Female characters are very important in Tolkien’s world (especially in “The Silmarillion”) but their role in “The Lord of the Rings” is secondary. “The War of the Rohirrim” tries to redress the balance with a female protagonist, the king’s daughter Hera. Thankfully, her character is far more complex than your average Disney princess seeking to dismantle traditional gender roles.
Hera is fierce, brave, and free. She rejects marriage early on, but not with the intention of taking the place of men in war or politics. Her mission is vocational rather than aspirational: she does what the circumstances demand of her, not what she secretly longs to do.
She is a being of a spiritual kind. In the first scene of the movie, she converses with eagles, creatures directly tied in Tolkien’s world to the angelic Valar (archangels who participate in the creation of the world).
Hera’s communion with the eagles suggests an inclination toward the spiritual, which is reaffirmed in the radical choice she makes at the end of the movie. The plot seems influenced by stories of female saints in the Anglo-Saxon Middle Ages, who were offered in marriage to barbaric princes in exchange for peace, but refused in order to pursue a monastic vocation.
In “Rohirrim,” connections to the Tolkien books are thematic rather than plot driven (unlike in the Amazon series).
As an example, “Rohirrim” emphasizes Tolkien’s insistence on hoping beyond hope. In the author’s world, true heroism was not so much about abounding in courage, strength, or wit, but rather the ability to not lose hope in the most desperate circumstances.
At the center of “The War of the Rohirrim” is a long fight at the fortress of Helm’s Deep, a sequence reminiscent of a major episode in “The Lord of the Rings.” In this desperate fight, Hera’s blind hope, founded on the persuasion that a good power is at work in the world and won’t let evil prevail, is the reason of her success.
Also similar to “The Lord of the Rings” is the idea that evil cannot be conquered by a force, but by the least likely to succeed: the seemingly weak and humble. The story of Hera anticipates the role played by Rohirrim princess Éowyn, one of her descendants who unexpectedly succeeds in killing one of the Ringwraiths in “The Lord of the Rings.”
“The War of the Rohirrim” is not perfect but is a step in the right direction. Here’s to hoping (beyond hope) that new projects in the Jackson universe will follow on the same track.
