King Théoden is dead. The actor Bernard Hill, famous for his gallant deaths in the fields of Pelénnor and the icy waters of the North Atlantic, died yesterday at the age of 79 after having taken part in three Oscar-winning titles film, Gandhi (1982), Titanic (1997) and The Return of the King (2003), and to have been part of the cast of a television series that captivated a generation, the BBC adaptation of three novels by Robert Graves titled as the first of these: I, Claudi. Mourning on social networks demonstrated the power of pop culture to consolidate icons, and the extraordinary soliloquies that screenwriters Philippa Boyens and Fran Walsh wrote in the adaptation of the Tolkien trilogy became a trend.
Of course, in a habitat as given to testosterone and epicness as social media, among the most repeated quotes yesterday was his final harangue to the Riders of Rohan, before starting the charge to Mines Tirith, which in the end it would end up costing him his life: “Advance without fear of darkness, fight, fight, Théoden’s horsemen. Spears will fall, shields will be broken, but the sword will still remain. Red will be the day until sunrise. Ride, gallop, ride, to desolation and the end of the world. Dead, dead, dead! Go ahead, eorlingas”.
But, despite the radio and television effort to draw us in the final hour, we are not there, we are at the funeral of an austere man who, as the master Alfred Hitchcock pointed out, had the most important thing for his work, the physiognomy Bernard Hill had deep marks between his eyebrows, eyebrows always furrowed, a sign of heaviness and ferocity so indisputable that Batman’s prop teams always draw those deep furrows on his hood. That severity allowed him to be the king of Rohan, governor of the West Fold over the plains of La Marca from the citadel of Edoras, at the foot of Ered Nimrais, the White Mountains. When he banished Grima from the palace, Llenguade serp – his Miguel Ángel Rodríguez – discovered the death of his son and wept for him in the necropolis, at the foot of the wall: “Simbelmynë has always grown in the tombs of my ancestors, now it will adorn my son’s grave. I have had to live through dark times: the young die, the elderly grow old. It’s a pity to live to see the last days of my house”. But he did not stand up, despite Aragorn’s insistence. He fled to Helm, where he was cornered by a formidable army to whom he challenged from the bastion: “Is that all, Saruman? That’s all you can summon?”
It leaves us, however, with a sadness about the decline of an era, a sunset that preceded the victory: “What has become of the rider and his horse? What has become of the horn and its claim? They have passed like rain on the mountains, like wind on the prairie. The days fade in the West, behind the hills, plunged in shadow. How did we get to this?” But Helm resisted.
