Historical swordplay in Lord of the Rings???

[James Hudec]

"I agree that the plate armour for the Gondorians was a lot more feeble in numerous instances than plate would actually be."

I certainly think you're right. There's one part in the extended DVD where a soldier gets shot by an arrow from a short composite bow, and it goes straight through the most heavily sloped part of his breastplate.

As for the orcs swarming, in the books themselves this is how Tolkien describes the fighting; the tall, heavily armoured Gondorians would only be overcome by a small crowd of the smaller, weaker orcs.

[Martin,Younger]

ok i have a question on the archory on houres back did the eropeans have archory on houres back. i know that the japanese did. also were the gondors catapolts correct.

[James Hudec]

The Byzantines made use of mounted archers. I'm sure other European cultures did but I can't offer any specifics.

[Craig Peters]

As best as I can remember, Gondor did have reasonably accurate trebuchets, although I am not sure how accurate their size is. Take a look here: http://www.trebuchet.com/

[Jake_Norwood]

The Byzantines made use of mounted archers. I'm sure other European cultures did but I can't offer any specifics.

The Poles did.

Jake

[James_Knowles]

Hollywood puts armor on the bad guys and the cannon fodder as a uniform.

If you study film making at all, there is a convention where those for whom one is supposed to feel a connection with do not have their face covered, while the faces of the bad are covered in order to dehumanize them.

This humanizing/dehumanizing by means of leaving the face visible or covered can be seen through almost any movie, even when it's momentary. Uncovering the face of a dehumanized character at a dramatic end is sterotypical also.

Film is almost(?) fatally tied to rules and conventions.

I don't go to many films anymore because they're so predictable and boring for the most part. I mostly watch old films on DVD because many of them are very cleverly done with the limited budgets and technologies.

You'd think that with nine-figure budgets and limitless technology we could get some great innovations these days, but noooo... endlessly regurgitated formulae gussied up in even cooler fx. That the fighting lacks any new creativity, let alone any accuracy is not surprising.

[M Wallgren]

I liked LOTR and tried not to think about technical stuff, but I was really bothered by the Gondor soldiers cavalry charge, with no lances !!!?? Also Aragorn unarmored (or certainly unhelmeted) wading into a dozen opponents laying about himself confidently...

He spent a lot of hero-points... hehehehe...

[Benjamin Abbott]

The fightning was generally rather bad (from a technical standpoint). Standard Hollywood stuff. I especially disliked the way armour was treated as totally useless (except for Frodo's mithril mail).

It's sad, too, 'coz I think Tolkien himself had actually read enough old works to have some idea about what he was talking about. The fightning described in the books is generally very good...