Written by Mr. Mouseburger 26th Jul 2005
Boromir has attempted to steal the ring from Frodo, who has subsequently escaped by putting it on. When the rest of the fellowship realise he is missing they all run off in various directions trying to find him.
Aragorn, suspecting him of knowing more about Frodo's whereabouts that he is telling, orders Boromir to follow Merry and Pippin and make sure they are safe. Unfortunately, acting as decoys for Frodo, the little scamps have managed to lure a small army of Orcs into chasing them. It appears the young hobbits have been hoist by their own petards, when Boromir comes to their aid and kills several Orcs. Boromir knows he is fighting a losing battle, and so he reaches for his horn, and makes a desperate call for help.
Boromir was always one to blow his own trumpet
On the prow of the hill Lurtz, leader of this Orc war party watches with interest. Reaching for his bow, he fires an arrow at Boromir. It thuds into Boromir's chest and would be enough to slay a normal man, but Boromir is a son of Gondor, and made of sterner stuff. Fighting on, he slays a couple more Orcs when another arrow is embedded into his chest. This time, Boromir falls to his knees, but manages to get up and fight off some more orcs. A third arrow embeds itself into Boromir's chest, and this proves to be enough to break his spirit. He falls to his knees and can only watch helplessly as Merry and Pippin are taken by the orcs.
Lurtz uses Boromir for target practice
Boromir eventually dies in the arms of Aragorn, whom he finally recognises as his king.
Um, this death deserves a much much MUCH higher rating than this. It's perfect, in my book: You can't help but feel while it happens that Boromir deserves to die for how he treated Frodo, but at the same time, he's certainly redeemed himself through his sacrifice to the other Hobbits. And his pledge to Aragon as king in his dying words brings Boromir's saga full-circle, while moving forward the plot of the entire LoTR epic.
I wholeheartedly agree. And who better to play such a back-and-forth type of bad guy than Sean Bean? One of the greatest "Is he a good guy or a bad guy?" actors of all time.
Also, Blaze of Glory deaths are my very favorite of all types of deaths. One day, I hope to have my own Blaze of Glory death. Just don't stand too close to me when I start Blazin'. You're liable to get singed.
I admit i love Boromirs death myself, but we have to remember this rating system should be as objective as possible. 86% is a very high score, especially considering it is just one man being shot with some arrows. Otherwise every death will be 100% - personally i think there are few (maybe one or two) deaths worthy of 100% rating.
However, to alleviate this issue, in the future we will look to add a "rate this death" feature, where visitors can rank each death themselves and give each score a fairer reflection of peoples views.
Mouseburger
It's a very powerful death, and portrayed brilliantly by our man from Sheffield.
I actually expected some calls for this to be awarded a "pointless" category though, as his heroism doesn't actually save Pippin and Merry from being captured and (arguably) tortured. Some might even say Boromir would have better served the Fellowship by giving up the hobbits as a lost cause and living to fight another day.
I don't personally believe it was pointless though. It redeemed Boromir, moved Aragorn to truly believe he was a king and inspired everyone that subsequently heard the tale. He also gave the Fellowship good reason to hope that Pippin and Merry were still alive, without which it is possible they would not have been followed.
From a purely dramatic point of view, it also made Aragorn's subsequent fight with Boromir's killer all the more thrilling - this isn't some faceless brute of an orc, this is the swine who killed Sean Bean!
Cinematically, I especially liked the orcs cowering back from an insane human who refused to die.
It is interesting to note though, that Peter Jackson made Boromir's death far more exciting than in the book. Tolkien chose not to focus on the last stand at all, instead describing it only by what Aragorn could hear from over a mile away.
Also, Jackson embellished the aforementioned dialogue to make it more clear that Boromir was acknowledging Aragorn's Kingship. Again, for the purposes of a film I think this was a good choice.
"I tried to take the Ring from Frodo" he said. "I am sorry. I have paid."
His glance strayed to his fallen enemies; twenty at least lay there.
"They have gone. The Halflings. The Orcs have taken them. I think they are not dead. Orcs bound them." He paused and his eyes closed wearily. After a moment he spoke again.
"Farewell, Aragorn! Go to Minas Tirith and save my people! I have failed."
"No!" said Aragorn, taking his hand and kissing his brow. 'You have conquered. Few have gained such a victory. Be at peace! Minas Tirith shall not fall!"
Boromir smiled.
"Which way did they go? Was Frodo there?" said Aragorn.
But Boromir did not speak again.
"Alas!" said Aragorn. "Thus passes the heir of Denethor, Lord of the Tower of Guard! This is a bitter end."
OB
A 100% needs to be uber-cool, something that has never been done before and quite possibly will never be done again, but no need to start the first MD DB flame war over it, the real reason I posted was to suggest impalement, after all, that is what arrows do, they impale.
Watch closely during when Aragon is comforting the dying Boromir. When the camera is behind Aragorn's back, Boromir's hand is on his shoulder. When the camera is in front of Aragon, then Boromir's hand is gone. This happens every time the camera changes
That aside, yes, I found this death to be a particularly glorious moment in the movie. Boromir was a morally ambiguous character throughout the movie, but he died a hero when he refused to give up even when he was getting plugged with magnum-sized arrows.
[quote=Pyro]Watch closely during when Aragon is comforting the dying Boromir. When the camera is behind Aragorn's back, Boromir's hand is on his shoulder. When the camera is in front of Aragon, then Boromir's hand is gone. This happens every time the camera changes tongue sticking out smiley[/quote]This lazy continuity error unfortunately detracts from my enjoyment of the scene. It's an incredibly poignant moment, but all I can focus on is the hand switching
I was hoping they'd fix it for the extended edition, as Peter Jackson *must* have belatedly realised the mistake - but it's not, so I guess they don't have any alternative footage they can use. If it was only slightly in shot they could fix it digitally, but it's so blatant I think you'd notice such a fix and it would be even more jarring.
I personally found the death somewhat disappointing. Not the Boromir getting shot repeatedly with arrows by Lurtz: that part was cool. What I disliked is that such a morally ambiguous character didn't truly redeem himself. In cinema the part of redeeming oneself, especially when the audience just knows that the character is screwed, is that you succeed in your goal of redemption but still perished. Boromir's idea of redemption was protecting Pippin and Merry but he failed and that's not really redemption. Here's the way I think it should have went down:
Boromir tries to protect Pippin and Merry but same thing happens: he gets plugged with arrows by Lurtz and the Hobbits are taken away. Aragorn then comes forth and fights Lurtz which I still agree with. The part I wanted to see was that Lurtz eventually defeats Aragorn and is poised to make a killing blow but Boromir ultimately redeems himself by tackling Lurtz and engaging him in a final melee combat switching between weapons and fists. Boromir then gets another arrow shot into him but still manages to kill Lurtz (preferably the same way that Aragorn did away with the Orc leader: decapitation: nice!).
Since Boromir didn't truly redeem himself I didn't truly like the death that much. I could actually picture that having happened but it didn't which made me do a genuine WTF (not the initials, the actual words) after I saw the movie. In case you're wondering what I did picture try Gimli's defense of Legolas from the Orc leader Ugluk at the climax of The Two Towers only with the characters being replaced accordingly.
Interesting post Flashpenny, but I have to say I disagree with you! In my opinion, redemption is more about intent than outcome. Boromir had grand plans for his future, that in no way involved wasting his time for the halfling peoples. Despite that, he willingly gave his life to defend two hobbits. Not just that, but his defence was saga-inspiringly epic, with piles of dead orcs surrounding his dying body.
This served as a real motivator for Aragorn, who would have been feeling extremely low by that point. With his dying words though, Boromir managed to rekindle Aragorn's belief in the Fellowship's quest, and reawaken long dormant thoughts of reclaiming his birthright to become a King.
Also, I'm afraid I think your alternative version for the scene is a typical Hollywood cliche, of the kind that we do our best to highlight and mock on this site
Boromir was always a flawed character anyway, he represents the weakness of mankind. He wasn't strong enough to resist the lure of the ring, but once he realised that, he had the courage to die with honour. Without his character we wouldn't necessarily believe the old legend of Isildur being corrupted by the ring, or understand why the ring couldn't be used by men as a weapon.
Well to each its own I guess. With movies, my opinion of watching a bad guy die is that I can see what's going to happen to him and want it to happen. I don't know why but that's just the way I am. When Aragorn killed Lurtz I felt a little let down since I think I would have liked it better if Boromir killed his killer.
Also contrary to an earlier comment, Lurtz is definitely not the most important Orc in the trilogy. He only appears for like 2 scenes (in Saruman's mines in Isengard and again at the climax). The most important thing he does is kill off Boromir which doesn't advance the story as much as everyone thinks it does (he recognizes Aragorn as the king, he never said he had to be the king). The most important Orc is probably either Radbug (Saruman's second-in-command along with Grima Wormtongue), Ugluk (the leader of the Orcs who attacks Helm's Deep) or Lieutenant Gothmog (the Witch-King's buddy who helps him attack Minas Tirith).
I know this isn't a forum but this is the first place I can think of to post this: I plan on making movies later in my life (I'm currently finishing up college and I'm typing scripts for fun) and one of the movies I'm thinking of is a spoof of the Fellowship of the Ring (and the other two). I'm one of those guys who likes songs in their movies so I'm kinda stuck on which of these songs to use for the climax (Boromir's last stand and Aragorn's fight with Lurtz). The ones I'm thinking of are Paint It Black (symbolizing Boromir's heroic last stand), London Calling (due to the tempo being easy to keep up with the fighting) or No Reason (same reason as Paint It Black). Any thoughts (also check out Ugluk and Gollum for suggestions there).
Actually Mr. Briggs Inc., arrows don't impale, they stab. Impalement is when the killing object goes straight through the killed person's body. Arrows stabbed him in major organs such as the stomach, lungs and heart which is the fatal part. If they impaled we would have seen the points coming out from Boromir's back. Also to the writer of this piece Lurtz doesn't use a bow and arrow to off Boromir. He uses a crossbow. There's a difference... not a big one but still a difference.
I take back my earlier comments about this death being disappointing. In the original version I think a few could think that but I rented the Extended Edition yesterday and the climax is epic!!!! When Pippin and Merry are about to die on a bridge of sorts Boromir pretty much just jumps 50 feet in the air and offs the Orc with his own axe. I also found it pretty cool when Boromir kept on getting up and killing Orcs even after an arrow to the heart and stomach slows him down.