The plank scene
Did anyone else think that the scene in which he holds up the plank was too overly dramatic to the point that it seemed silly?
shareWell it actually happened, so no, it was not overly dramatic. :) He held it up for about half an hour!
One does not simply walk into Mordor.
This is an example of how the script and directing were lacking. When I saw the movie, to me, it seemed like he was holding up the plank for several hours. Then near the end of it he raises it above his head again and yells. I had to suppress my laughter when that happened because it was so preposterous and physically impossible (assuming as I did that he had held the plank up for hours already). Very poor directing.
shareWhat you describe is actually more poor editing rather than poor directing. I work in post production and while the director would have worked very closely with the editor, an editor of this caliber most likely would have been responsible for how the passing of time was shown. Perhaps also they were trying to show how long it 'felt' like holding the plank up, I'm sure for Louis that 40mins would have felt like all day.
shareI definitely got impression he held it up for much longer. Seemed like a lot of time had passed because there was definitely a change in how much light of day there was.
shareThat plank looked to be a 4x10 x10 feet. Unless it was balsa would be 150+ pounds.
I'm guessing that working out with weights every day really paid off.