Let’s look at the significance of fantasy movies by analyzing the characters and dialogues in Peter Jackson’s The Two Towers of the Lord of the Rings.

Fantasy movies are a genre that shows ‘hope’!

In my opinion, the fantasy movie genre is a genre that shows hope. When we have hope, it means happiness, and in that sense, happiness is closely related to love. Hope is happiness, love, and can also be understood as justice, goodness, and beauty. I believe that a fantasy movie is a “good” fantasy movie when it captures these “good” values.
One of the reasons for this is the nature of fantasy movies. Fantasy movies follow the hedonic principle rather than the realistic principle. The hedonic principle emphasizes the emotional side of human beings over the rational side, which is why fantasy movies are all about ideas based on great imagination. However, this imagination shouldn’t be based on a world that’s completely removed from reality, but rather one that’s grounded in reality. In other words, the imagination should avoid “escapism,” which is a negative effect of fantasy movies, and instead talk about difficult realities and show “hope” that these realities can be overcome. Fantasy movies that are based on simple imagination, such as contrasting good and evil through the appearance of unusual monsters or alien creatures, without a message of hope, only bring a sense of emptiness and emptiness to the audience.
The main audience for fantasy movies is children. Therefore, when writing a fantasy movie screenplay, it is important to consider that it should give hope to a child growing up. Children can only feel safe in their world when they are protected by adults. Unfortunately, due to the patriarchal nature of Korean society, children see adults as something to be feared and not something to be respected. The adults who are supposed to be in charge of children’s safety are actually the ones they fear. The very fact that children are able to overcome adults, the objects of their fear, can be a source of hope for them. The real world is a world that only adults can control, and children feel safe when they do what adults tell them to do. If a child is in denial and is obsessed with toys, fantasy games, or monster movies that destroy the world, it’s likely that their worldview is already filled with fear and anxiety about reality itself. For these children, the only “false” hope is the destruction of the world that adults have built for them.

The “right” hope is to find a good guide in life!

This is why fantasy movies should be able to tell a more “hopeful” hope. Ultimately, what fantasy films should aim to do is to make us realize that humans are not inherently evil by nature – even if they are – and that the innocence of a child can actually make us all good friends; that reality is not something to run away from or destroy, but a world that we should embrace, accept, and slowly transform into something beautiful. Frodo and the Hobbits, the de facto protagonists of The Lord of the Rings, all have the appearance of children. Their souls are pure and untainted, which is why they are given the great responsibility of carrying the One Ring, a symbol of greed. Even the One Ring, which symbolizes absolute evil, cannot overcome Frodo’s pure soul. Saruman and his sympathizers are greedy, “bad,” and to be feared. However, throughout the movie, the children (the hobbits) have friends (Gandalf, Aragorn, etc.) who keep them safe from the “bad” things, and because of them, they are able to preserve purity, justice, and goodness.

Realistic hope and its correlation to purity, justice, and love

As mentioned earlier, the hope shown in fantasy movies should be realistic. Fantasy movies should give children growing up dreams and hope. The word “hope” in this context encompasses all the meanings of purity, happiness, beauty, goodness, justice, and love. Children don’t just exist as children, they are what we adults are. The innocence, justice, love, etc. of a child are kept in the heart of an adult. No matter how hard we grow up and no matter how much knowledge we gain, this innate human innocence remains unchanged. In this respect, I disagree that fantasy movies are a genre for children or immature adults. Rather, fantasy movies are for everyone, teaching us what universal humanity should aspire to.
It is the role of fantasy movies to awaken these feelings of innocence. It is through these kinds of movies that adults are able to bring out their own latent innocence in the face of “evil,” and through that, they are able to live a realistic “dream” where everyone lives happily together. In real life, “evil” can be egotists who don’t care about others and only care about their own greed, or politicians or businessmen who are blinded by self-interest. In a capitalist society, their emergence was inevitable, and it is now a question of how to overcome the gap between them and how to live in harmony with people who are blinded by money.
In The Lord of the Rings, power and wealth do not symbolize happiness, and Frodo, the main character, was a hobbit who was far from that. He was willing to sacrifice himself for the happiness of all the races of Middle-earth, including his own peaceful village, the Shire. Sam’s statement that there are many bad things that happen in the world, but there are so many good things that it’s worth fighting for is a powerful one. The good things Sam refers to are good friends and a life with them. The movie shows that true happiness cannot be achieved by things like money and power (the One Ring), but only by having true friends and guides in your life. The Lord of the Rings is a movie about finding “hope” for the future through the importance of brotherhood and living together (the weak and the strong, children and adults).
‘Hope’ is an attitude of pursuing a happy life, and that happiness lies in a life lived together, not alone. That life is based on brotherhood. Therefore, a fantasy movie should show “hope” that a happy life based on brotherhood is not only possible in a fantasy world, but also possible in reality. In doing so, fantasy movies can be loved by a wide range of people, including children, by changing their negative characteristics of “escaping reality” to positive characteristics of “overcoming reality”.

Overcoming existential anxiety with ‘brotherhood’!

In the movie “The Two Towers of the Lord of the Rings,” we see the protagonists struggle with the two images of good and evil within themselves. In order to escape the anxiety that comes from separation, or loneliness, they are forced to choose one or the other.
Gollum is a prime example. Gollum was originally a hobbit named Smeagol, but was transformed into an evil form by the power of the One Ring. What was Gollum’s greatest strength that allowed him to exist for hundreds of years without dying? A normal human being, or even a normal hobbit, would have died quickly from loneliness, but he had insatiable greed for the Ring. It was his intense greed for the Ring that made him unable to die. Greed is like pouring water on a bottomless pit of poison that eventually wears you out as you strive endlessly to satisfy a need that can never be satisfied. So for Gollum, there is no “self. Blinded by greed, he easily surrenders even the place where the self should be within him. Gollum, who has lost his self, regains his lost self, Smeagol, when he meets Frodo, a friend who takes pity on him and reaches out to him as a monster. Frodo calls him Smeagol, despite Sam’s protests, and Gollum quickly trusts him to guide him on his journey.
If Frodo was the only friend the lonely Gollum had, Frodo had Sam. Frodo’s mission is to take the One Ring to Mordor and remove it, but the task is not so easy. The Ring is greed itself, and when you have it in your possession, you can’t think rationally. The closer he gets to Mordor, the harder the journey, the more Frodo loses himself in the Ring. His voice grows shrill and his eyes become alive. When he comes to his senses, he is tempted to give up. His friend Sam tells him.
“There are a lot of bad things that happen in the world, but when a new day comes and the sun shines so brightly, all those bad things are just a thing of the past, like shadows and darkness. There are a lot of good things in the world, too, and it’s worth fighting for them.”
Frodo could not accomplish this mission alone, almost from the start. He would never be free from greed, as he would have to carry the One Ring. Sam, on the other hand, who was free of the Ring, and therefore free of greed, was able to maintain his composure.
Without his friend Sam, Frodo would have failed in his mission or given up halfway through the journey. This is a stark example of how much we need true friends in our life’s journey.
The second installment of The Lord of the Rings centers on Saruman awakening the Ur-Qur’anic warriors from the underworld to destroy the Rohan Empire. King Theoden of the Rohan Empire has his healthy soul stolen by Saruman. He banishes his nephew and cannot grieve the death of his only son. Unable to protect his people from the ruthless Orcs, his empire slips further down the path to destruction. Enter Gandalf, a friend of King Théoden’s who he thought was dead. Gandalf, who was thought to be dead in the first movie, has returned to the side of the Fellowship as the White Wizard, and now he has come to the aid of his old friend, King Theoden. King Théoden, who has never had any true friends except the cunning Gimli, does not recognize his friend at first, but the powerful sunlight Gandalf emits dispels the darkness that surrounds him and helps him find his lost self. Even when the king rejects Gandalf’s heartfelt advice to call for reinforcements for his people, Gandalf travels a long way to fetch them for him and his people-Gandalf is a friend to virtually all races.
When the enemy attack is imminent, King Theoden is urged by Aragorn to ask for reinforcements once more, but the king refuses, saying that he has not been a good friend to others, and that we are alone. In Aragorn’s eyes, the people of Rohan are all filled with fear and sorrow. Filled with fear, they are confronted by a group of well-trained Elven warriors. The fear that fills the screen is replaced by hope and courage, showing that Rohan is no longer alone. However, the castle is eventually overrun by a relentless stream of enemies, and King Theoden’s despair returns. A single word from his companion Aragorn restores hope. “I will be with you to the last, I will follow you wherever you go.” There is no greater encouragement for a king whose will to fight has been broken and who is facing death. We fear death not because of death itself, but because we feel terribly alone in the moment of death. I don’t know if the analogy is apt, but this may be the motivation behind companion suicide.

A broader concept of “brotherhood” that extends to nature!

In the movie The Lord of the Rings, this idea of brotherhood culminates in the scene in the two towers where a lost friend returns. When a friend you thought was dead comes back to life at a crucial moment, and a friend you thought had left you reappears to help you, it suggests that we are no longer alone, that we are not alone.
Gandalf, thought to be dead after battling the ancient demon Balrog at the end of the first installment, returns to his friends in a more trustworthy form in the second installment. He returns twice at crucial moments when the empire of Rohan is crumbling (as the White Wizard to find the lost soul of King Theoden, and again to lead the Rohan horsemen on the endangered Fellowship of the Ring expedition). Having defeated the Dark One, transcended death, and risen again, he is now a force for good, powerful enough to counter the forces of evil. He brings a new light of hope to the Empire of Rohan, a land where hope has been lost, enlightening the blinded by greed and soothing the outcast to help their friends. He is much like the familiar, heroic characters we see in action fantasy movies-such as Superman or Neo from The Matrix-in that he is a Jesus-like being who transcends human limitations but does not see humans as objects to be used or eliminated, as Saruman does, but rather as people to love and help. He is the “hope” itself, that he is always with us and will return to save us when we are in desperate need.
While Gandalf was the “hope” and spiritual anchor of the Fellowship of the Ring, Frodo relied on the practical help of his fellow hobbits, Sam, Merry, and Pippin. The hobbits’ example of friendship reminds us that hope is only possible when we do our best in real life, and when we have trusted friends by our side. The scene where Merry and Pippin convince the forest god Ent to help their friends (so that Frodo can safely transport the Ring, and Aragorn can defend the Empire of Rohan from Saruman) ultimately turns despair into hope.
“My friends are out there, they can’t fight alone, how can you be indifferent, you are part of this world too!”
Pippin is right, we cannot live alone, especially when it comes to fighting against ‘evil’. This reminder that we are all part of this world expands the concept of brotherhood in that it reminds us of the importance of all life on this planet. This attempt to transcend the concept of brotherhood beyond the good and evil within humans and ultimately apply to all life is exemplified in the movie Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind. The insects of the Buhai, which are seen as a threat to humanity’s survival and are targeted for elimination, are the protectors of nature (the Buhai Forest in the movie), which has been destroyed by foolish humanity. It stands to reason that without nature, humanity cannot survive. The battles between humans, each claiming to be good and evil, are insignificant in the grand scheme of human survival. Nausicaä, the princess of the Valley of the Winds, rebukes humanity for its selfishness and foolishness, emphasizing the brotherhood of all life on Earth, transcending good and evil.
“You drink the water, too! Do you know who cleanses the water? The insects of the Buhai purify the rivers and lakes that humans pollute! And yet you burn the forests? The insects are protecting the world!”
Nausicaä’s angry voice, trying to convince the humans that you don’t drink the water, is reminiscent of Pippin’s voice when he convinced the forest god Ent that he too is part of the world. As Pippin says, we are all part of this world. And ultimately, we are one. Each of us (humans as humans, nature as nature) is divided in this world, but not as separate parts of a whole, but as parts that harmonize with each other to form a whole. Human selfishness comes from separating and clinging to these things, and from seeing nature not as a brotherhood but as something to be discriminated against and exploited. It goes without saying that such selfishness is the “evil” within man.

It is the duty of a fantasy movie to tell hope and love!

The campus in April, with primary-colored flowers blooming and butterflies flying around. I feel grateful for the things that bring life to us who are tired of everyday life. They make me happy to be human. Just like the yellow butterfly that gave “hope to the flowers,” it is this brotherhood that always gives me hope. It is this brotherhood that always gives me hope, just like the yellow butterfly that gave hope to the flowers. It is love that makes things like goodness, beauty, justice, and happiness worth defending, and brotherhood is at the root of this love. Therefore, a fantasy movie that deliciously captures these values can bring beauty to everyday life and hope to those of us who are tired of the harsh reality. Reality is not only harsh on adults, but it is equally harsh on children growing up. If two hours of screen time can make my day, a child’s future, or the lives of the marginalized richer, it is the role of a fantasy movie to do so. That is the duty of a fantasy movie.