Written by Mr. Mouseburger 24th Feb 2009
Lurtz is the Uruk-Hai leader of Saruman's (q.v.) band of orcs, who are hunting Middle Earth for Frodo and the Ring of Power. It should be noted that Lurtz does not exist in the original books, but he is an impressive foe nonetheless, built like a brick privvy and sporting a set of teeth that would not be out of place in the British royal family.
Having just fired some arrows into Boromir (q.v.), Lurtz prepares to fire the final, telling arrow into Boromir's body and kill him, when Aragon arrives on the scene and swipes the bow out of Lurtz's hand with a swoosh of his mighty weapon. Lurtz is rightly annoyed at this distraction, although his facial expressions rarely change from anything other than annoyance in this film.
Still, we are quickly shown just how tough this foe is going to be to beat when Lurtz hurls his shield a good 50 feet across the copse with unerring accuracy, pinning Aragorn to the trunk of a mighty tree by his neck.
Lurtz picks up his sword and prepares to decapitate this insolant human, but as he swings his sword, Aragorn inplausibly slips out under the shield. The pair grapple for a bit in a mildly uninteresting one-on-one, which shows the full extent of the skill of the make-up artists, as we are treated to a nice close up of Lurtz growling into Aragorn's face. Having earlier demonstrated his strength then, it is no surprise that in a hand to hand contest, that Aragorn gets completely pummelled by Lurtz. However, fortune favours him as he falls near a strategically placed knife and so, in desperation, Aragorn picks it up and stabs it deep into Lurtz's thigh muscle.
This must be agony, but the expression of Lurtz remains one of slight irritation at this mild inconvenience, and he pulls the knife from his leg. However, it has meant that he is down on his knees and at a suitable head chopping level for the pint sized (relatively anyway) Aragorn.
A final growl of defiance by Lurtz and a deft swipe of his sword by Aragorn and the Uruk-Hai's head is parted from the rest of his body, killing him.
Sorry Mouse, but I remember this scene as being rather cooler than your write-up suggests!
I thought the knife that Aragorn uses is his own, a stylish curved Elvish model? I think he recovers it to use in later films too.
Also, I've added "Dismemberment" as I'm pretty sure Aragorn hacks off Lurtz's arm as well.
Anyway, I thought this was one of the better choreographed fights in the series, between two suitably impressive opponents. Everyone is eager for Lurtz to die too, as he's just killed Boromir from a cowardly distance. In that respect, he's the most important orc we ever see.
Fair enough, i will go back and review the death on my Betamax video recorder to see if i have missed anything! It never really inspired me as a death, but i am guessing that is because i enjoyed the power and emotion of Boromir's death soon after.
Actually Mr. Old Bluffer, Lurtz is not the most important Orc in the trilogy. All he does is kill Boromir which isn't all that important (check out the Boromir comments section to see what I mean since I posted this comment originally there on accident). Lurtz only appears for 2 scenes anyway which doesn't sound like somebody important. The most important Orc is either Azog (the leader of the Orcs who attacked the Fellowship in the Mines of Moria and accidentally woke up Balrog, setting up Gandalf's demise), Radbug (Saruman's bodyguard who oversees the mining operations in Isengard), Ugluk (the guy who kidnapped Pippin and Merry after Lurtz was through with Boromir and later led an attack on Helm's Deep in the sequel), or Lieutenant Gothmog (the Witch-King of Angmar's buddy who helped him attack Minas Tirith). Lurtz: not so much.
Don't forget impalement. I dunno if it's an Extended Edition-only scene but I do recall that after Aragorn hacks Lurtz's arm off he stabs his sword into Lurtz's chest. The Orc commander then shrugs this off and merely pushes the sword inwards until it impales his chest in an attempt to get the sword stuck so he can kill Aragorn. This fails as Aragorn yanks the sword out and hacks his head off.