feminine"; in the book she does not appear at all, only her hand-woven banner for her fiancé Aragorn being mentioned. Walsh confirmed that the conception of Arwen in the script changed radically before the release of The Two Towers in the face of fan opinion. Effective film technique Scholars and critics have largely agreed that the film makes fine use of visual imagery and music to convey an impression of Middle-earth, from the New Zealand landscapes to the use of casting, costumes, prosthetics and digital effects to create characters and action. Visual imagery Many commentators have admired the film's translation of Middle-earth architecture and landscapes to Jackson's New Zealand. The scholar of humanities Brian Rosebury wrote that "The attentiveness to the original text's descriptions of locales is often quite remarkable: The West Wall of Moria, the Argonath and the lake of Nen Hithoel, Helm's Deep, Minas Tirith, all provide the Tolkien reader with a satisfying shock of recognition". The scholar Kim Selling found the evocation of the look of Middle-earth and the "eliciting of wonder" "marvellously realized". She felt that the trilogy achieved this both with its many strange creatures, whether beautiful or horrifying, but through landscape and setting, and special effects like half-height Hobbits and the creation of monster Gollum. In her view, these succeeded in the terms set out for believable fantasy in Tolkien's 1939 essay "On Fairy Stories". Even scholars generally hostile to the film version have respected its visual presentation. David Bratman stated that "I felt as if I were seeing two films at once. One in the visuals, which was faithful and true to Tolkien, and another in the script and in the general tone and style, which was so unfaithful as to be a travesty." Verlyn Flieger found much of the film's imagery problematic but praised its effect when used with restraint, as in the case of Boromir's "magisterial" boat funeral, which she called "effective and moving". Daniel Timmons found the "cinematography, art direction, sets, props, and costumes" spectacular, calling this "probably Jackson's finest achievement". He admired the motion-capture that in his view brilliantly animated the Ring-obsessed monster Gollum, and the special effects that made the Wizard Gandalf's battle with the fiery monstrous Balrog in the caverns of Moria so effective. Music The Tolkien scholar Kristin Thompson noted that "even the film's harshest critics" agree that its design elements, including its music, which was