Question: This is an odd question, but have any historians commented on the battle scenes? Aside from the heroes' fights (such as Legolas, Gimili and Aragorn defeating hundreds of orcs by themselves), how true to life are the battles compared to real medieval sieges / battles?
Gary O'Reilly
29th Dec 2005
The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002)
22nd Nov 2005
Father Ted (1995)
Question: In this episode, the actor who plays the priest who turns into a hippy seems to drop his accent occasionally, for instance when he says "Blind faith, that's all we have to go on", his accent sounds more London-ish when he says "go on". Is this normal for an Irish accent or what?
Chosen answer: It's characteristic of someone putting on a fake Irish accent.
7th Nov 2005
Unleashed (2005)
Question: This is a very strange question but I cannot think of anywhere else to put it. In the UK, a poster-advert for this film that is stuck on phone boxes has me confused. The bottom half of the window has Danny (Jet Li) lying down with his face to the camera, looking up slightly (as he is seen during the film sometimes), but the top half has an arm/fist with what looks like a Christmas pudding (on fire and all) on top of it. What is the thing on his fist, and what's its relevance to the film? I've seen the film but I can't remember anything like it.
Chosen answer: If I am thinking of the same poster, it is someone's foot standing on his wrist. The shoe is really shiny.
31st Aug 2005
The Running Man (1987)
Question: Has Stephen King ever commented on this film? It's an enjoyable film in it's own right but the only thing it has in common with the book is the title and some character names.
Chosen answer: Several movies (The Lawnmower Man, Maximum Overdrive, The Running Man, etc.) have been made from King stories that bear little or no resemblance to the original story. King has commented that this is unfortunate but normal movie-making.
31st Aug 2005
General questions
I can remember seeing a film on TV ages ago (at least, I think it was a film, might have been a TV series or something, but I'm assuming it was straight-to-TV) where a coachload of people crash because the bus driver is watching a couple have sex in another car, or something, and all the people on the coach become attached to a baby (they're dead) and they can't stray out of a certain range of the person. Then I remember the baby grows up into a pretty nasty/arrogant businessman and the people aren't happy about it, and then I remember a bus (driven by the driver who got them all killed) coming to take them to heaven and apologising for being so late. Does anyone know what this film/show was called?
Chosen answer: It's a movie called "Heart and Souls". It stars Robert Downey, Jr. and Elizabeth Shue among others.
6th Jul 2005
General questions
I remember seeing a film on the Sci-Fi channel ages ago. At the start of the film, there's a shot of a spaceship that looks like an earth vehicle (a car or something, and I'm not thinking of Spaceballs). It was a comedy film, with the main "funny" thing being that aliens that look like humans have either hijacked or accidentally stolen a ship of their species (I can remember a scene where a hi-ranking one of these aliens is pretty angry about them), and they crash land on earth, but turn out to be stupider than the average human. The scene clearest in my mind is where one of the "aliens" is trying to show off his advanced technology, which turns out to be a pen, by drawing a squiggly line on a piece of paper. Does anyone know what this film is called?
Chosen answer: That'll be 'Morons From Outer Space' then.
1st Apr 2005
Mystery Science Theatre 3000 (1996)
Question: This applies to the TV series as well as the Movie. How are the "watching the movie" segments filmed? Are they literally sitting in front of a large screen? In some of the TV episodes, Joel/Mike is seen pointing to something on the screen. And do they film each segment as one, or is it cut into different takes?
Chosen answer: They sit in front of a big screen -- or rather Joel or Mike sat. The puppeteers crouch down below the row of seats and hold up special black puppets to project the silhouettes. They did do takes for segments of the movies. I imagine it would be painful for the puppeteers to crouch for 90 minutes!
The robot puppeteers laid down on the floor and the human host deeply reclined in front of a piece of plywood cut in the shape of the seatbacks. There were TV monitors playing the raw cut of the film in front of them with their lines on a teleprompter. The theater screen itself was simply a giant green screen which had the movie video added to it in post production. Search for "Last Dance RAW" for a few behind-the-scenes and some in-theater excerpts from the last TV broadcast episode.
28th Feb 2005
Orgazmo (1997)
Question: Are "Happy Tarts" an actual product in America? They're displayed throughout the film as an obvious product placement joke, but is it a product made up for the benefit of the joke, or did the film makers make a real product placement into a joke?
Chosen answer: No, Happy Tarts is not a real product (unless you live in South Park where Cartman sometimes has them along with Cheesy Poofs and Snacky Cakes).
18th Oct 2004
Hellboy (2004)
Question: Rasputin and Hellboy each say Hellboy's real name towards the end. I didn't catch it properly, what exactly do they say, and what (if anything) does the phrase/name mean in English?
Chosen answer: According to the comic books, his name is Anung Un Rama, or 'World Destroyer, The Great Beast.'
6th Jul 2004
BASEketball (1998)
Question: When the player is saying "...I'm proud to finally play here in the fine city of Miami", who is the guy who stands up and corrects him? He looks really familiar but it isn't an important enough role to show up anywhere as far as I can tell.
Chosen answer: He's been a non-essential extra in a lot of films, but in a supporting role he is the the leader of the "3 sisters" group of male rapists in the Shawshank Redemption.
Chosen answer: The LOTR is a heavy interpolation of different times, civilizations, religions, and cultures. Mainly, strict European and no Greek or Roman influence. There are bits and pieces of Medieval era, but then it can shoot to pre-Rome eras, and then shoot to strict religious material. It bounces back and forth all over the place, between pieces based on historical fact. For example, based on the armor, aspects, weapons, and fighting styles, the Elves would be the Gauls and Britonnic, around the time of Julius Caesar. The Dwarves are the Goths (Germany, Austria), but they also are the Nordic tribes ("vikings"). The Orcs bear strong similarity to the Vandals and Khazars, and the Mumakil are the Mauretanians (Moors). The Hobbits, Elves, Ents, Gandalf, are strong nods to the Druidism religion (Gandalf, the Elves, and Saruman are Druid priests, the Ents are supernatural beings). The Dwarves, dragons, trolls, giant spiders, orcs and Sauron show heavy nods to Asatru (Odin, Thor, Freya faith). Man seems somewhere in the middle, with more Medieval Christian hints here and there every so often, but very rarely. Besides the giant wolves, eagles, and such obvious fiction, the battles can go from very realistic to utter fiction. But they keep close enough to real history to be identifiable with who they are based on. The elves seem to follow a Gaul and Britonnic style, copper and gold armor, momentum-based swordplay, and a single-man fighting style. Many of the elves ring close to the Britonnic "kluddargos", high class swordsmen. The trolls seem similar to the very early Goths and Brits, as well as the Nordic "sky-clad" warriors who did at times use clubs and maces while stark naked and whipped up into a powerful "mind-over-body" state. The orcs show some resemblance to the Vandal forces, as well as the Thracians and many Celtic tribes (orcs are based off African American miners by J.R.R. Initially, and the whole story has rings of racism mixed with Christian elements, but take it for what it is. It mostly is a story copied from various myths, lore, and some events of Europe before Rome conquered the tribes Game of Thrones is closer to historical facts, and is not really racist at all, but also bounces around with interpolation as bad as LOTR). The Rohirrim bear strong resemblance to the Iberian horsemen who fought alongside Hannibal against Rome, as well as Viriatus; they were Celtic-like natives of Portugal (before Rome took it over and dominated the ethnic look of the region). The orc warg riders are akin to Nordic and Vandal horsemen, Dwarf combat is very close to actual Nordic and Gothic combat, lots of momentum, speed, heavy blows, and strength. The Elves have some resemblance to Gaulish and Britonnic high class warrior combat, but at swordplay and shields. The archery, on the other hand, is copied from Roman archers, Greek archers, and Sudanese (Nubian) archers (who could quickly whip from bow to sword in combat). The trolls use a style somewhere between fiction, but also with the real religion-hyped warriors of the Pechts, Vandals, Goths, viking tribes and Gauls: naked men armed who jumped into battle in a frenzy. The Uruk-hai berserker bears more resemblance to the Asatru religion "Úlfhéðnar", or Norse berserker. The Uruk-hai show resemblance to Goths mixed with European tribal warriors who sided with Byzantine. The Dunedain are very medieval Europeans, primarily England. So, to answer your question. Are the fights factual? sometimes, and not always the entire fight. Are they medieval fights? Again, sometimes, but usually they are mimicry of pieces of history or tribes and states during the Roman era. The closest to mimicking facts, even more than so-called fact based movies, is the game Skyrim. Skyrim can be very close to mimicking historical facts.